II.

The Consumer as an Individual

 Consumer Motivation and Personality
 Consumer Perception and Positioning
 Consumer Learning
 Consumer Attitude Formation and Change
 Emotions and consumer behavior

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Learning objectives
After this chapter you should be able
• To understand the meaning of learning.
• To understand behavioral learning like classical conditioning, instrumental
conditioning and observational learning.
• To understand how consumers process information.
• To understand cognitive learning as a form of consumer decision-making.
• To understand the impact of involvement and passive learning on purchase
decisions.
• To understand how to measure the outcomes of consumer learning.

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 What does learning mean?

Defined
Learning is applying one’s past knowledge and experience to present circumstances
and behavior.
Consumer learning is a process that evolves and changes as consumers acquire
knowledge from experience, observation, and interactions with others and newly
acquired knowledge affects future behavior.
• It ranges from simple and often reflexive responses to marketing stimuli (such
as packaging, product colors, and promotional messages),
• to learning abstract concepts and making decisions about purchasing complex
and expensive products.

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Why are Marketers concerned with how individuals learn?

They want to teach them, in their roles as consumers, about

• products,
• product attributes, and potential consumer benefits;
• about where to buy their products,
• how to use them,
• how to maintain them, even
• how to dispose of them.

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How do Marketers apply the concept of learning?

• Repeating advertising messages about brands and their benefits,

• Rewarding people for purchase behavior by selling products that provide
superior benefits,
• Getting consumers to make associations among different offerings under the
same brand name, and developing brand loyalty

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Behaviroral learning

• Observable responses to external stimuli signal that learning has taken place
• Behavioral learning focuses on the inputs and outcomes of learning

Three forms of behavioral learning:

1. Classical Conditioning
2. Instrumental Conditioning
3. Observational Learning

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1. Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning:
• a stimulus that elicits a response
is paired with another stimulus
that initially does not elicit a
response on its own
• Classical conditioning is viewed as an automatic response that
builds up through repeated exposure and reinforcement
• The conditioned stimulus becomes associated with a particular
event or feeling as a result of repetition

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The strategic applications of classical conditioning

 Associative learning
 Need for repetition
 Stimulus generalization
 Stimulus discrimination

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 Stimulus Generalization
Responding the same way to slightly different stimuli is called stimulus generalization.
 Product line extensions
Additions of related items to an established brand; these are likely to be adopted because they
come under a known and trusted brand name
 Product form extensions
Offering the same product in a different form but under the same brand
 Family branding
Consists of marketing different products under the same brand name
 Licensing
Is contractually allowing a well-known brand name to be affixed to the products of another
manufacturer

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 Examples of product line and form extension,
family branding and licensing
Product line extensions

Family branding Licensing

Product form
extensions

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Stimulus Discrimination

Brand differentiation
 Market leaders want consumers to distinguish between
products and imitators
 Relevant, meaningful, valuable differentiation

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 Task for next week

4.5
Visit a grocery. Can you identify any packages where the
marketer’s knowledge of stimulus generalization and stimulus
discrimination was incorporated into the package design? Note
these examples and send them to:

c.deteffe@cbs.de

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