Szmigin &

and
Piacentini
Piacentini

Consumer Behaviour

Chapter 1: A historical context for

understanding consumption

© Oxford University Press, 2018. All rights reserved.

 By the end of this lecture you will:

• Evaluate the early history of consumption, and the role of

economics and philosophy in the development of consumer
behaviour.
• Understand how consumption became a part of everyday life,
including the rise of conspicuous consumption.
• Recognize the key trends in the development of shops and
shopping, as well as the rise of motivational research.
• Evaluate the role of consumerism in the development of
consumption.
• Learn how consumers can be classified and identify types of
consumers.
• Explain what a postmodern consumer is.
• Analyse the different approaches to studying consumers.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 How many decisions do we make
everyday ?

• What to eat for breakfast?

• Which clothes to wear?
• What fragrance to put on?
• Which form of transport to use?
• What music to listen to (and in what form)?
• Which books to take, and in which bag?
• Where to have coffee?
• Whether to go out tonight?

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Definition of Consumption

Arnould, Price, and Zinkhan (2004: 5):

‘individuals or groups acquiring, using and
disposing of products, services, ideas or
experiences’.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Stages in consumption history

• Subsistence level consumption

• Sharing and bartering
• Exchanging goods for money
• Commercialization of goods – buying from
shops etc.,
• Growth of trade across borders, leading to
globalization.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Exchange Value, Use Value, Symbolic Value

• Exchange Value = what the value of a good is to the consumer and

therefore what it could be exchanged for, usually its price

• Use Value = the value of a good to the consumer in terms of the usefulness
it provides.

An example of a car = fuel economy + number of seats + safety + boot space

• Symbolic Value = the symbolic meaning consumers attach to

goods to construct and participate in the social world

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 The Revolution in Shopping

From barter to corner shops, to malls, to catalogues. Today we shop from

our laptops, tablets, and mobile phones.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 From service to self service

• Individual service was replaced by self service.

• The shopping trolley affects how and what we buy.
• Technology impacts forms of shopping, e.g. fresh food vending
machines.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Motivational Research

• Developed from Freud’s view that behaviour was often determined by

irrational and unconscious motives and by socialized inhibitions.
• Ernst Dichter recognized:
– the role of emotions in our choice decisions;
– that these decisions could not necessarily be analysed or explained
from a purely rational viewpoint.
.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Motivational Research

= SEDUCTION
= POWER

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Critique of Motivational Research

Vance Packard’s The Hidden Persuaders (1956)

1.Could not be a cure-all for all marketing problems.

2.Validity of taking diagnostic tools from clinical psychiatry
and applying them to consumer behaviour.
“You are showing
3.Relies too heavily on the person making the Pepsi in all these
interpretation. commercials with ice…
You must not do
4.Findings were not subjected to objective confirmation by this…You are
conventional methods before they were applied to business associating your client
situations. with death!”
5.Morally questionable…. Dichter on the Pepsi
campaign

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 The rise of consumerism
• Consumer Association UK (1957)
– Similar organisations around the world, e.g. in Australia, Canada,
India, Uganda.
• Consumer legislation
– Consumer Credit Act (UK) 1974; Indian Consumer Protection Act
1986; Republic of China’s Consumer Protection Law 1994; European
Charter of Fundamental Rights 2000.

Ralph Nader (1959) Naomi Klein (2000)

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Consumer Types
Source: Gabriel and Lang (1995, 2006)

Consumer Type Description

Chooser The rational, problem solving consumer, requiring genuine options, finance options,
information
Communicator Uses goods to communicate. This can be functional as in the use of a burglar alarm to
convey status or taste.
Explorer Consumers increasingly have places to explore, from car boot sales to the internet. Often
we explore with little idea of what, or even if, we wish to buy.

Identity-seeker Creating and maintaining personal and social identity through consumption.

Hedonist/Artist Consumption as pleasure. Consumption can fulfil needs for emotional connection,
aesthetic pleasure and fantasy.
Victim The exploited consumer. The consumer may be uneducated or unaware of choices, or
because of their socio-economic situation they may have limited choice.

Rebel Using products in new ways, as a conscious rebellion. It can include consuming
differently, or less frequently or boycotting. It can also refer to active rebellion (joyriding,
looting, taking over consumption spaces etc.)
Activist Participates in co-operative movement, value-for-money movement, especially fighting
against corporate greed and political activism, seeking more ethical consumption

Citizen Consumers are also citizens with rights and responsibilities. Awareness that
consumerism encroaches on areas such as housing, healthcare and education as well
as consumer goods.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Classifying Consumers
Source: Dagevos (2005)

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Classifying Consumers
Source: Dagevos (2005)

Calculating is rational, mainstream, efficient and effective, “Keep up

with the Joneses”, concerned with convenience.

Traditional is conformist, cost-conscious, self-disciplined, fearful of

new things, community-oriented.

Unique is described as fun and impulsive, seeks variety, seeks

status and distinction, new things.

Responsible is captured by involvement, altruistic, “Keep down with

the Joneses”, informed, environmentally aware.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 The Postmodern Consumer

• Fragmentation and multiple selves.

• Breakdown between production and consumption.
• The ‘sign’ as represented by consumption is all important.
• Hyperreality.
• Critical of modern capitalism.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Hyperreality

• According to one of the most prominent philosophers of postmodernity,

Baudrillard (1983), it is the realization (becoming real) of what is (was)
hype, of the simulation, or of the (romanticized) imagination of what is
thought was (once) real. It is the (re)creation, as reality, of a simulated
past that is imagined more so than identified.

• E.g. Recreating places - Venice in Las Vegas, Manchester’s Trafford

centre as simualcrum of Rome’s Pantheon.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Approaches to studying consumers and
consumption

Interdisciplinary perspectives
on consumption:

• Anthropology
• Sociology
• Psychology
• Economics
• History and Geography

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Studying alcohol consumption from different
perspectives

• What are the ritualistic practices around going

Anthropology out; getting ready; preloading

• How does local community policing influence the

Sociology behaviour of young people in the Night-time
Economy?

• What effect does personality type have on

Psychology consumption?

• If we introduce minimum unit price of alcohol,

Economics how will this influence consumption levels?

• Historically, how is alcohol consumption today

History different from 20, 30, 50 years ago?

• Geographically, how does urban geography

Geography influence alcohol consumption?

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Practitioner insight:
Lord Mitchell, Shadow Spokesperson for
Business, Innovation and Skills, UK
• Insights into the regulation of short-term high-cost loan companies (‘payday loans’)
– Sector grown significantly since 2008
– Risen in line with recessionary pressures, households struggling to balance
rising monthly costs/outgoings with falling wages.
– Households unable to raise money through retail banks often turn to payday
loans.
– Lenders have charged an APR in excess of 4,000%.

• Financial Services Act in 2012 - the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) given
powers to cap the total amount charged by short-term loan companies. In addition,
borrowers will be prevented from repeatedly rolling over loans and lenders.

• Raises questions about:

– How people and organisations outside commercial firms impact on consumer
behaviour.
– Protection of vulnerable consumers.
– The ethical issues around the marketing of such products.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition

 Conclusions
In this lecture we have:

• Introduced key aspects relating to the early history of consumption, and

role of economics and philosophy in development of consumer behaviour.
• Explored how consumption has become a part of everyday life.
• Studied key trends in the development of shops and shopping, such as
global innovations in online shopping
• Described how motivational research has been important for studying
consumer behaviour, as it recognizes that not all consumer decisions can be
explained by rational or economic arguments.
• Evaluated the rise of consumerism as part of everyday life.
• Learned about classifications and typologies of consumers.
• Explained how the postmodern consumer encapsulates the uncertainty
and playfulness of behaviour, image and identity in consumption in the 21st
century.
• Analysed how changes in understanding consumption and consumers over
time have led to many different approaches to studying consumers.

Szmigin & Piacentini: Consumer Behaviour, 2nd edition