Motivation and Values

The Motivation Process

• Motivation: process that leads
people to behave as they do
• Also, the forces that drive us
to buy/use products
• Goal: consumer’s desired end
state
• Drive: degree of consumer
arousal
• Want: manifestation of consumer
need
• The ad shows desired state  Click image for
www.soloflex.com
and suggests solution
(purchase of equipment)

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Motivational Strength
Motivational strength: degree of willingness to expend
energy to reach a goal
• Drive theory: biological needs that produce
unpleasant states of arousal (e.g., hunger)
• Expectancy theory: behavior is pulled by
expectations of achieving desirable outcomes

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Types of Needs
Types of needs:
• Biogenic: biological needs, such as for air, water,
food
• Psychogenic: need for status, power, affiliation
• Utilitarian: need for tangible attributes of a product,
such as miles per gallon in a car or calories in a
cheeseburger
• Hedonic: needs for excitement, self-confidence,
fantasy

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Motivational Conflicts
• Goal valence (value):
consumer will:
• Approach positive goal
• Avoid negative goal
• Example: Partnership for a
 Click image for Drug-Free America
www.drugfree.org communicates negative
consequences of drug
addiction for those tempted
to start

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Three Types of Motivational Conflicts

• Two desirable alternatives

• Cognitive dissonance

• Positive & negative aspects

of desired product
• Guilt of desire occurs

• Facing a choice with two

undesirable alternatives

Figure 4.1 4-6

Specific Needs and Buying Behavior

NEED FOR ACHIEVEMENT NEED FOR AFFILIATION

Value personal accomplishment Want to be with other people
Place a premium on products Focus on products that are used
that signify success (luxury in groups (alcoholic
brands, technology products) beverages, sports bars)

NEED FOR POWER NEED FOR UNIQUENESS

Control one’s environment Assert one’s individual identity
Focus on products that allow Enjoy products that focus on
them to have mastery over their unique character
surroundings loud boom- (perfumes, clothing)
boxes)

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Levels of Needs in the Maslow Hierarchy

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Consumer Involvement
• Involvement: perceived relevance of an object
based on one’s needs, values, and interests
• We get attached to products:
• “All in One” restaurant tattoo on consumer’s head
• Lucky magazine for women who obsess over shopping
• A man tried to marry his car when fiancée dumped him

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Conceptualizing Involvement

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Levels of Involvement: From Inertia to
Passion
• Inertia: consumption at the
low end of involvement
• Decisions made out of habit
(lack of motivation)
• Ad shows how Swiss potato
board tries to increase product
involvement
• Cult product: command
fierce consumer loyalty,
devotion, and even worship
by consumers who are
highly involved

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Message-Response Involvement
• Vigilante marketing: freelancers and fans film their
own commercials for favorite products
• Consumer’s interest in processing marketing
communications
• Marketers experiment with novel ways to increase
consumers’ involvement, such as games on Web
sites

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Purchase Situation Involvement
• Purchase situation involvement: differences that
occur when buying the same object for different
contexts.
• Example: wedding gift
• For boss: purchase expensive vase to show that you want
to impress boss
• For cousin you don’t like: purchase inexpensive vase to
show you’re indifferent

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Measuring Involvement: Involvement
Scale

To me (object to be judged) is:

1. important _:_:_:_:_:_:_ unimportant
2. boring _:_:_:_:_:_:_ interesting
3. relevant _:_:_:_:_:_:_ irrelevant
4. exciting _:_:_:_:_:_:_ unexciting
5. means nothing _:_:_:_:_:_:_ means a lot
6. appealing _:_:_:_:_:_:_ unappealing
7. fascinating _:_:_:_:_:_:_ mundane
8. worthless _:_:_:_:_:_:_ valuable
9. involving _:_:_:_:_:_:_ uninvolving
10. not needed _:_:_:_:_:_:_ needed

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Table 4.1 4-14
Dimensions of Involvement
The amount of consumer involvement depends on:
• Personal interest in product category
• Risk importance
• Probability of bad purchase
• Pleasure value of product category
• Sign value of product category (self-concept
relevance)

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Consumer-Generated Content
• Consumer-generated content: everyday people voice
their opinions about products, brands, and
companies on blogs, podcasts, and social
networking sites
• Examples:
• Facebook
• MySpace
• Youtube

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Strategies to Increase Involvement
• Appeal to hedonistic
needs
• Use novel stimuli in
commercials
• Use prominent stimuli in
commercials
• Include celebrity
endorsers in commercials
• Build consumer bonds via
ongoing consumer
relationships

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Consumer Values
• Value: a belief that some condition is preferable to
its opposite
• Example: looking younger is preferable to looking older
• Products/services = help in attaining value-related
goal
• We seek others that share our values/beliefs
• Thus, we tend to be exposed to information that supports
our beliefs

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Core Values
• Core values: values shared
within a culture
• Example: individualism versus
collectivism
• Enculturation: learning the
beliefs and values of one’s
own culture
• Acculturation: learning the
value system and behaviors
of another culture

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Using Values to Explain Consumer
Behavior
• Cultures have terminal values, or desired end states
• Rokeach Value Survey measures these values
• Survey uses instrumental values, actions needed to achieve
these terminal states
• Examples:

Instrumental Value Terminal Value

Ambitious A comfortable life

Capable A sense of accomplishment

Self-controlled Wisdom

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Using Values to Explain Consumer
Behavior (cont.)
List of Values (LOV) scale:
• Identifies nine consumer segments based on values
they endorse; and
• Relates each value to differences in consumption
behaviors.
• Example: those who endorse sense of belonging
read Reader’s Digest and TV Guide, drink and
entertain more, and prefer group activities

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Using Values to Explain Consumer
Behavior (cont.)
Means-End Chain Model assumes:
• Very specific product attributes are linked at levels
of increasing abstraction to terminal values
• Alternative means to attain valued end states
• Laddering technique: uncovers consumers’
associations between specific attributes and
general consequences

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Hierarchical Values Maps for Vegetable
Oil in Three Countries

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Figure 4.4 4-23
Using Values to Explain
Consumer Behavior (cont.)
Syndicated surveys: track
changes in values via
large-scale surveys
• Example: Yankelovich
MonitorTM
• Voluntary simplifiers:
once basic material needs
are satisfied, additional
 Click image for income does not add to
www.yankelovich.com happiness

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Sustainability: New Core Value?
• Conscientious consumerism: consumer’s focus on
personal health merging with a growing interest in
global health
• LOHAS (lifestyles of health and sustainability):
Consumers who:
• Worry about the environment
• Want products to be produced in a sustainable way
• Spend money to advance what they see as their personal
development and potential

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Sustainability: New Core Value? (cont.)
• Carbon footprint: measures, in units of carbon
dioxide, the impact human activities have on the
environment in terms of the amount of greenhouse
gases they produce
• Primary footprint is a measure of our direct
emissions of CO2 from the burning of fossil fuels
• Secondary footprint is a measure of the indirect CO2
emissions from the whole lifecycle of products we
use

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Materialism
• Materialism: the importance people attach to
worldly possessions
• “The good life”...“He who dies with the most toys,
wins”
• Materialists: value possessions for their own
status and appearance
• Non-materialists: value possessions that connect
them to other people or provide them with pleasure
in using them

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