Personality and Consumer Behavior

UNIT II
 Here we’ll learn..

1. How personality reflects consumers’ inner differences?

2. How Freudian, neo-Freudian, and trait theories each
explain the influence of personality on consumers’
attitudes and behavior?
3. How personality reflects consumers’ responses to
product and marketing messages.
4. How marketers seek to create brand personalities-like
traits?
5. How the products and services that consumers use
enhance their self-Images?
Nature of personality..
• The inner psychological characteristics that
both determine and reflect how a person
responds to his or her environment.

• The Nature of Personality:

– Personality reflects individual differences
– Personality is consistent and enduring
– Personality can change
Time to reflect….

• How would you describe your personality?

• How does it influence products that you

purchase?
• Give instances of some of the recent
purchases you have made that you think is
influenced by your personality.
Theories of personality..
• Freudian theory
– Unconscious needs or drives are at the heart of
human motivation
• Neo-Freudian personality theory
– Social relationships are fundamental to the
formation and development of personality
• Trait theory
– Quantitative approach to personality as a set of
psychological traits

5
Freud’s Psychosexual Stages of
Development

6
 1. Freudian theory..
• Id
– ‘Warehouse’ of primitive or instinctual needs
for which individual seeks immediate
satisfaction like thirst, hunger, sex.
• Superego
– Individual’s internal expression of society’s
moral and ethical codes of conduct. Fulfilling
needs in social Acceptance fashion.
• Ego
– Individual’s conscious control that balances the
demands of the id and superego
8
2. Neo-Freudian personality theory

• Social relationships are fundamental to personality

• Alfred Adler:
– Style of life
– Feelings of inferiority
• Harry Stack Sullivan
– We establish relationships with others to reduce tensions
• Karen Horney’s three personality groups
– Compliant: move toward others
– Aggressive: move against others
– Detached: move away from others
 1. Alfred Adler

• Social Interest
• Creative Self
• Striving for Superiority
• Inferiority feelings and compensations
• Style of Life
2. Harry Stack Sullivan
3. Karen Horney’s
3. Karen Horney’s 3 personality groups
4. Erickson’s Stages
Why is appealing to an aggressive consumer a
logical position for this product..?
Consumer seeks to excel and achieve
recognition..
3. Trait theory
• Focus on measurement of personality in terms
of traits
• Trait - any distinguishing, relatively enduring
way in which one individual differs from
another
• Personality is linked to broad product
categories and NOT specific brands
5 Personality Traits

18
Personality traits - Negative

19
Personality Traits

20
Soup and soup lover’s traits in the
US..
• Tomato Soup Lovers • Vegetable/Minestrone
– Passionate about Soup Lovers
reading – Enjoy the outdoors
– Love pets – Usually game for trying
– Like meeting people for new things
coffee – Spend more money
– Aren’t usually the life of than any other group
the party dining in fancy
restaurants
– Likely to be physically fit
– Gardening is often a
favorite hobby
 Snack foods and personality traits- a
study in the US
Snack Personality Traits
Foods
Potato Ambitious, successful, high achiever, impatient with less
chips than the best.
Tortilla Perfectionist, high expectations, punctual, conservative,
chips responsible.
Pretzels Lively, easily bored with same old routine, flirtatious,
intuitive, may over commit to projects.
Snack Rational, logical, contemplative, shy, prefers time alone.
crackers
Cheese Conscientious, principled, proper, fair, may appear rigid
curls but has great integrity, plans ahead, loves order.
How does this marketing message
apply the notion of the Id..?
Attempts to captures mystery and excitement
associated with the “forces” of primitive drives.
Personality and understanding consumer
behavior..

Consumer Dogmatis Social

innovativeness m character

Need for Optimum Sensation

uniqueness stimulation level seeking

Variety-novelty
seeking
1. Consumer innovativeness..

• Willingness to innovate
• Further broken down for hi-tech products
– Global innovativeness
– Domain-specific innovativeness
– Innovative behavior
2. Dogmatism

• A personality trait that reflects the degree of

rigidity a person displays toward the
unfamiliar and toward information that is
contrary to his or her own established beliefs
3. Social Character

• Ranges on a continuum for inner-directedness

to other-directedness
• Inner-directedness
– rely on own values when evaluating products
– Innovators
• Other-directedness
– look to others
– less likely to be innovators
4. Need for uniqueness..

• Consumers who avoid conforming to

expectations or standards of others
5. Optimum stimulation level..

• A personality trait that measures the level or

amount of novelty or complexity that
individuals seek in their personal experiences
• High OSL consumers tend to accept risky and
novel products more readily than low OSL
consumers.
6. Sensation seeking..

• The need for varied, novel, and complex

sensations and experience. And the
willingness to take social and physical risks
for the sensations.
7. Variety-novelty seeking..

• Measures a consumer’s degree of variety

seeking
• Examples include:
– Exploratory Purchase Behavior
– Use Innovativeness
– Vicarious Exploration
Cognitive personality factors

• Visualizers
• Verbalizers
The Ad stresses strong visual
dimensions.. Ex. Visualizers
Detailed description and verbalization
Ex. Verbalizer
Let’s talk..

• What advertising media (print, television,

Internet, salesperson, POP display, newspaper,
radio) is good for a person with a high NFC?
• A Verbalizer?
 From consumer materialism to
compulsive consumption..
Acquire and

possessions
show off

Self centered
and selfish

Materialistic People

personal satisfaction
Do not get greater
from possessions
possessions
full of
Seek lifestyle
From consumer materialism to
compulsive consumption..
• Fixated consumption behavior
– Consumers fixated on certain products or
categories of products
– Characteristics
• Passionate interest in a product category
• Willingness to go to great lengths to secure objects
• Dedication of time and money to collecting
• Compulsive consumption behavior
– “Addicted” or “out-of-control” consumers
Consumer ethnocentrism and
cosmopolitanism ..
• Ethnocentric consumers feel it is wrong to
purchase foreign-made products because of the
impact on the economy
• They can be targeted by stressing nationalistic
themes
• A cosmopolitan orientation would consider the
world to be their marketplace and would be
attracted to products from other cultures and
countries.
Brand personality..
• Personality-like traits associated with brands
• Examples
– Purdue and freshness
– Nike and athlete
– BMW is performance driven
• Brand personality which is strong and favorable will
strengthen a brand but not necessarily demand a
price premium
Let’s reflect..
• Pick three of your favorite brands.
• Describe their personality. Do they have a
gender? What personality traits do they
have?
Product anthropomorphism and brand
personification..

• Product Anthropomorphism
– Attributing human characteristics to objects
• Brand Personification
– Consumer’s perception of brand’s attributes for a
human-like character
– Mr. Coffee is seen as dependable, friendly,
efficient, intelligent and smart.
A brand personality framework..
Product personality issues..

• Gender
– Some products perceived as masculine (coffee and toothpaste)
while others as feminine (bath soap and shampoo)
• Geography
– Actual locations, like Philadelphia cream cheese and Arizona
iced tea
– Fictitious names also used, such as Hidden Valley and Bear
Creek
• Color
– Color combinations in packaging and products denotes
personality
Self and self-image..

• Consumers have a variety of enduring images

of themselves
• These images are associated with personality
in that individuals’ consumption relates to
self-image
One or multiple selves..

• A single consumer will act differently in

different situations or with different people
• We have a variety of social roles
• Marketers can target products to a particular
“self”
Makeup of the self-image..

• Contains traits, skills, habits, possessions,

relationships, and way of behavior
• Developed through background, experience,
and interaction with others
• Consumers select products congruent with this
image
Which Consumer self-image does this ad target, and
why?
Actual self-image because it tells middle-age women
who like their hair long to continue doing so..
Different self-images..
Actual Self-Image ●
How consumers see themselves

Ideal Self-Image ●
How consumer would like to see themselves

Social Self-Image ●
How consumers feel others see them

Ideal Social ●
How consumers would like others to see them
Self-Image

Expected ●
How consumers expect to see themselves in the future
Self-Image

Out-to self ●
Traits an individual believes are in her duty to possess