Role of Research

Notes prepared by: Kevin Stanley Rego, MBA (2008-10, SJEC)


Levels of Consumer Decision Making

There are three levels of consumer decision making:

Extensive problem solving, limited problem solving and routinized  response behavior.

Extensive problem solving

When consumers have no established criteria for evaluating a product category or specific brands in that category or have not narrowed the number of brands they will consider to a small, manageable subset, their decision-making efforts can be classified as extensive problem solving. Here, the consumer needs a great deal of information to establish a set of criteria on which to judge specific brands and a correspondingly large amount of information concerning each of the brands to be considered.

Limited problem solving

Here, the consumers have already established the basic criteria for evaluating the product category and the various brands in the category. They have not fully established preferences concerning a select group of brands. The search for additional information is more like “fine-tuning”; they must gather additional brand information to discriminate among the various brands.

Routinized response behavior

Here, consumers have experience with the product category and a well-established set of criteria with which to evaluate the brands they are considering. In some situations, they may search for a small amount of additional information; in others, they simply review what they already know. In extensive problem solving customer seek for more information to make a choice, whereas in routinized response behavior customers need only little additional information.

Models of consumers: four views of consumer decision making

The term models of consumers refers to a general view or perspective as to how individuals behave as they do. The models of consumers are examined in the following four views:

1. An economic view

In the world of perfect competition, the consumer has often been characterized as making rational decisions. This model, called economic man theory, has been criticized by consumer researchers for a number of reasons. To behave rationally in the economic sense, a consumer would have to (a) be aware of all available product alternatives, (b) be capable of correctly ranking each alternative in terms of its benefits and disadvantages, and (c) be able to identify the one best alternative. Consumers rarely have all the information or sufficiently accurate information or even an adequate degree of involvement or motivation to make the so-called ‘perfect’ decision.

2. A passive view

Quite opposite to the economic view of consumers is the passive view that depicts the consumer as submissive to the self-serving interests and promotional efforts of marketers. Consumers are perceived as impulsive and irrational purchasers in passive view, ready to yield to aims and into the arms of marketers. The principal limitation of the passive model is that it fails to recognize that the consumers play an equal, if not dominant, role in many buying situations-sometimes by seeking information about product alternatives and selecting the product that appears to offer the greatest satisfaction and at other times by impulsively selecting a product that satisfies the mood or emotion of the moment

3. A cognitive view

The cognitive model portrays the consumer as a thinking problem solver. Within this framework, consumers frequently are pictures as either receptive to or actively searching for products and services that fulfill their needs and enrich their lives. The cognitive model focuses on the processes by which consumers seek and evaluate information about selected brands and retail outlets.

4. An emotional view

The marketers frequently prefer to think of consumers in terms of either economic or passive models. In reality, each of us likely to associate deep feelings or emotions, such as joy, fear, love, hope, sexuality, fantasy, and even a little ‘magic’ with certain purchases or possessions. These feelings or emotions are likely to be highly involving. For example, a person who misplaces a favorite fountain pen might go to great lengths to look for it, despite the fact that he or she has six others at hand.

Possessions also may serve to preserve a sense of past and act as familiar transitional objects when one is confronted with an uncertain future. For example, members of the armed forces invariably carry photographs of the girl back home, their families, and their lives in earlier times. These memories frequently serve as hopeful reminders that normal activities will someday resume.

Bibliography

Consumer Behavior

Ninth Edition

Leon G. Schiffman

Leslie Lazar Kanuk

Published by Dorling Kindersley (India) Pvt. Ltd.