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Consumer Belief and Attitude

August 7th, 2010

Consumer Beliefs About

Product Attributes

• Beliefs result from cognitive learning.

• Beliefs are the knowledge and inferences that a consumer has about objects, their attributes, and their benefits provided.

– Objects are the products, people, companies, and things about which people hold beliefs and attitudes.

– Benefits are the positive outcomes that attributes provide to the consumer.

– Attributes are the characteristics of an object

Consumer Attitudes• Attitude is a learned tendency to act in a consistent

way toward an object, based on feelings and

opinions that result from an evaluation of knowledge

about the object

• Attitude is the amount of affect or feeling for or

against a stimulus or the attitude object

• Attitudes are stored in long-term memory

• Beliefs are the cognitive knowledge about an object

• In high involvement situations, beliefs predict

attitudes; attitudes might result in behaviours, both

favourable and unfavourable

Origins of Attitudes

• Mere Exposure - The more we are

exposed to an object the more we will like

them.

• Social (observational) Learning

• Classical Conditioning

• Operant Conditioning

• Cognitive Learning

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The Three Component Theory

of Attitude• Cognitive component: consumer belief(s)

about a brand, outlet, product, action, etc., that

is based on personal knowledge, actual

experience, the knowledge or experience of

others, or perception.

• Affective component: consumer feelings (e.g.

likes, dislikes, or neutrality) about a brand,

outlet, product, action, etc. flowing from beliefs.

The Three Component Theory

of Attitude• Intention component (“behavior” or

“behavioral intention”): consumer’s intention

to act positively, negatively, or neutrally toward a

brand, outlet, product, action, etc. that is based

on his or her affective component stance.

• This three component theory seems to be more

clearly tied to high-involvement brand, outlet,

product, action, etc. situations than low-

involvement.

Beliefs: Cognitive Component of

Consumer Attitude• A consumer belief is a psychological association

between a product, brand, outlet, action, etc. and an attribute or feature (and associated benefits) of such– Beliefs are cognitive (based on knowledge,

experience, perception, etc.)

– The stronger the association of features or attributes (and associated benefits) with the product, brand, outlet, action, etc., the stronger the consumer’s belief

– Brand equity is a measure of the strength of the association in the marketplace

Strategies To Change

Consumer Beliefs • Positioning by

– Product attributes

– Consumer benefits

– Intangible attributes

– Price

– Application/Use

– Brand user

– Celebrity recognition

– Brand personality

– Product category

– Association with

competitors

– Country or geographic

area

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Affect: Emotive Component of

Attitude• Purchase decisions are typically influenced by affective

response

• Affect—the way in which we feel (e.g. like, dislike, neutral) in response to marketplace stimuli

– It is emotive rather than cognitive (beliefs)

– It is comprised of both our knowledge of stimuli and our evaluations of them

– Affective responses can be very general or very specific

Affective Response

• Affective responses help consumers reach purchase decisions in four ways:– Ego defense: means through which people try to

realize personal goals and images

– Adjustment of utility: developing affective responses that lead to perceived rewards and avoid perceived punishments

– Value expression: displaying consumers’ own values to the external world

– Application of prior knowledge: may lead to both positive and negative effects on affective response

Intention: Behavior Component of

Consumer Attitude

• Affect is not closely linked to actual purchase

• Behavioral intention—attitude toward brand purchase (an action)

– A better predictor of behavior than either beliefs or affective responses

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Key Issues…Attitudes

• Attitudes are learned; are formed as result of –

– Direct experience

– Information acquired from others, or exposure to

mass media and other communication forms

• Attitudes are not permanent, they do change

• Attitudes occur within and are affected by the

situation (events or circumstances)

• Attitudes have consistency; i.e., usually

consistent with the behaviour they reflect

When Behavior Predicts Attitudes

• At times we adjust our attitudes to

make them consistent with our

[expected] behavior.

Predicting Consumer Attitudes

• Multi-Attribute models identify how

consumers in high-involvement situations

(i.e. standard hierarchy of effects) combine

their beliefs about product attributes to

form attitudes about various brand

alternatives, organizations/ companies, or

other objects.

Example: if you are Radio Station

manager

• You want to know whether consumers like you – Attitude prediction

• You want to know HOW MUCH they like you: more or less than another radio station– Attitude Measurement

• And if they like you less than another radio station, you want to make them like you more– Attitude Change

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Attitude-Toward-The-Object Model(Fishbein Model)

Identifies three major

factors that are

predictive of attitudes:

•Salient Beliefs

•Strength of the Belief

•Evaluation

A beo i i

i

n

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where,

A = Attitude towards an object (brand)

bi = Belief that the brand possesses attribute i

ei = Evaluation or desirability of attribute i

i = attribute 1, 2, … n

An Application of the Fishbein

Model• Research Question: What is the listeners’ attitude towards Kantapur

FM and Radio Nepalaya?

Importance or Evaluation weights for each attribute:

For example: How appealing is it to you when a radio station plays lots of music?Not appealing Very appealing

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Beliefs about specific attributes:

For example: Do you believe that Kantipur FM plays lots of music?

Yes No

+3 +2 +1 0 -1 -2 -3

An Application of the Fishbein

Model

Kantapur FM Radio Nepalaya

ATTRIBUTE Bi Ei Bi x Ei Bi Ei Bi x Ei

Plays lots of music +2 7 +14 +2 7 +14

Plays lots of commercials +3 1 +3 +1 1 +1

Gives news updates +1 6 +6 +2 6 +12

Has interesting RJs -1 8 -8 -2 8 -16

SUM +15 +11

Strategic Interpretation:

Multiattribute Models

Attribute

Importance

Our

Performance

Competitors

Performance

Strategic

Implication

High Poor Poor Neglected

Opportunity

Good Competitive

Disadvantage

Good Poor Competitive

Advantage

Good Head-to-Head

Competition

Low Poor Poor Null Opportunity

Good False Alarm

Good Poor False Advantage

Good False Competition

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So: this formulation lets us

measure, predict and compare

attitudes

Attitude Change Using

Fishbein’s Multi-attribute Model

MODEL: Ao = biei ; i = 1 to n

• So change Attitudes by:

– Changing belief about an attribute…Bi

– Or change ―desirability‖ of an attribute…Ei

– Or introduce an attribute that consumers had

not earlier considered…Add a new Bi /Ei

combination

Belief-Importance Model

• The Fishbein model looks at brands in

isolation

• The B-I model allows the comparison of

affective responses toward competing

brands

• Evoked set of brands—a list of brands we

consider prior to making a decision

The Belief-Importance Model

m

i

iioo IBA1

where,

Ao = Attitude toward brand (o)

Bio = Belief that brand (o) does well or poorly when

its attribute (i) is compared with those of competitors

Ii = Importance of attribute (i) in selecting the brand

i = attribute 1, 2, … m

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Assignment

• Do an Attitude survey of your brand,

product or service using the Fishbein

Model in comparison to a competing

brand. Have at least 5 attributes surveyed.

• Due Saturday, August 14th, 2010

beginning of the class.