CONSUMER BEHAVIOR

February 25, 2016

Ellen Kountz, contact@ellenkountz.com
BS Econ Wharton ’92, EMBA ESSEC ‘99
 Ellen Kountz 2

CH. 4: PERSONALITY AND

SELF-CONCEPT
Consumer Behavior
 Ellen Kountz 3

Personality
• The collection of individual characteristics that make a
person unique. Features are:
• It is integrated.
• It is self-serving.
• It is overt.
• It is consistent.
• Its characteristics are individualistic and unique.

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 4

Approaches to studying personality

1. The psychoanalytic approach. Here the emphasis is on
psychoanalysis, or studying the processes and events which have
led to the development of personality traits. The focus is on the
individual. This approach is typified by Freudian psychiatry, which
seeks to help patients to confront the life events which have
shaped their personalities.

2. Typology. Here the individuals are grouped according to

recognized personality types.

3. Trait theories. The individual traits of personality can be examined

as factors making up the whole person, and each trait can be
categorized.
Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning
 Ellen Kountz 5

Freud: the id, the ego and the superego

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 6

Type approach: Myers-Briggs

1. Extrovert/introvert
2. Sensing/intuitive
3. Thinking/feeling
4. Judging/perceptive.

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 7

Type approach: Karen Horney

1. Compliant: Moves towards people, has goodness,
sympathy, love, unselfishness, and humility. Tends
to be over-apologetic, over-sensitive, over-grateful,
over-generous, and over-considerate in seeking for
love and affection.
2. Aggressive: Usually moves against people.
Controls fears and emotions in a quest for
success, prestige and admiration. Needs power,
exploits others.
3. Detached: Moves away from people. Conformity is
repugnant to the detached person. Distrustful of
others, these people are self-sufficient and
independent, and value intelligence and reasoning.

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 8

Traits approach
• There may be 18000 identifiable personality traits.

• Traits do not change much in most people.

• In most cases it is difficult to link specific traits to

behaviour.

• Traits interrelate in complex ways which are not yet fully

understood.

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 9

Self-concept
• The individual’s ideas and feelings about him/herself.
• “Of all the personality concepts which have been applied
to marketing, self-concept has probably provided the most
consistent results and the greatest promise of application
to the needs of business firms.” (Foxall 1980)
• People project a role which is confirmed or denied by
others.

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 10

Four attributes of self-concept

1. It is learned, not innate.
2. It is stable and consistent.
3. It is purposeful: there is a reason and a purpose behind
it.
4. The self-concept is unique to the individual, and
promotes individualism.

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 11

Components of self-concept

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 12

The person as artwork

Slide content courtesy South-Western Cengage Learning

 Ellen Kountz 13

THANKS, SEE YOU NEXT WEEK!

CONTACT@ELLENKOUNTZ.COM
Consumer Behavior