Motivation Research

Sasmita Mishra
What is motivation research?
 Motivation research deals with the analysis of
wishes, desires,needs drives and such things
 In other words, it attempts to determine the why of
consumer behaviour
 This research is used most extensively in marketing
to determine why consumer buy one brand or type
of product instead of competing alternatives
 Such information helps in designing the product, its
package, pricing and advertising
Motivation research
techniques
 Non-disguised-structured techniques
 Non-disguised non-structured techniques

 Disguised-non-structured techniques

 Disguised structured techniques

Non-disguised structured
Technique
 This approach employs a standardized questionnaire to collect
data on belief, feelings, and attitudes from the respondent.

 Nothing about the purpose of the study is concealed from the

respondent

Different methods under this are:

Single question method
Multiple-question method
Physiological tests
Non-disguised structured
Technique
Single question method
The respondent is required to give one answer selected from various
choices given to them.
Ex. Which one of the following responses best describe your feelings about
X brand of product?
 I think it is an excellent product
 I think it is a very good product
 I think it is a good product
 I think it is a poor product
 I think it is a very poor product
Non-disguised structured
Technique
Demerits of single-question method
Subject-matter being specific it is difficult to construct meaningful
categories
Specified alternative answer may force the respondents to
express an attitude which he does not hold
Semantic difficulties are likely to be accentuated because
answers are limited to fixed alternatives which may not exhibit a
clear meaning of the respondent
There is no way to determine how much one person differs in
terms of “favourableness” or “unfavourableness”
Non-disguised structured
Technique
 Multiple question method
In this method a number of questions are asked about the attitudes
and total score from all the questions responses give the score
or total attitude of the respondent
 Physiological tests
Various laboratory tests such as galvanic skin response, eye
movement, and pupil dilation are used to measure one’s attitude
Non-disguised non-structured
techniques
 In this technique questions are not predetermined
and the purpose of the study is revealed fully to the
respondent
 The techniques are also called depth interviews,
clinical interviews, unstructured interviews and so
on.
 Respondent’s response obtained through this
technique are spontaneous, highly specific and
concrete and are self revealing.
Demerit: data obtined are qualitative and ambiguous
Disguised non-structured
techniques
 Purpose of the study is not revealed.
 Main projective techniques are
Word association test
Thematic apperception test
Sentence completion test
Word association test

There are a number of ways of using word association tests:

 A list of words or phrases can be presented in random order
to respondents, who are requested to state or write the word
or phrase that pops into their mind;
 Respondents are asked for what word or phrase comes to
mind immediately upon hearing certain brand names;
 Similarly, respondents can be asked about slogans and what
they suggest;
 Respondents are asked to describe an inanimate object or
product by giving it "human characteristics" or associating
descriptive adjectives with it.
Word association test
Example: a group of tourism professionals working on establishing a
strategic marketing plan for their community were asked to come up
with personality traits or "human characteristics" for the villages as
well as the cities within their area:
Villages Cities
Serene Brash
Conservative Rushed
Quaint Liberal
Friendly Modern
Accessible Cold
Reliable
Most of the tourism industry representatives came from the cities and
had strongly argued that the urban areas had historically been
neglected in promotional campaigns. As a result of this and other
exercises, they came to the realization that the rural areas were a
strong feature of the overall attractiveness of the destination and
needed to be featured as key elements in any marketing campaign.
Thematic Apperception Test
 In the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT),
the respondents are shown one or more
pictures and asked to describe what is
happening, what dialogue might be carried
on between characters and/or how the "story“
might continue. For this reason, TAT is also
known as the picture interpretation technique.
 Although the picture, illustration, drawing or

cartoon that is used must be interesting enough

to encourage discussion, it should be vague
enough not to immediately give away what the project is about.
Sentence Completion Test
 In the sentence completion method, respondents are given
incomplete sentences and asked to complete the thought. These
sentences are usually in the third person and tend to be
somewhat ambiguous. For example, the following sentences
would provide striking differences in how they were completed
depending on the personality of the respondent:
 "A beach vacation is……………………"
 "Taking a holiday in the mountains is…."
 "Golfing is for…"
 "The average person considers skiing….."
 "People who visit museums are…………"
Sentence Completion Test
 Generally speaking, sentence completion tests are
easier to interpret since the answers provided will be
more detailed than in a word association test.
However, their intent is also more obvious to the
respondent, and could possible result in less honest
replies.
 A variant of this method is the story completion test.
A story in words or pictures is given to the
respondent who is then asked to complete it in
his/her own words.
Disguised structured
techniques
 When we are to measure those attitudes which respondents
might not readily and accurately answer, we can use this
technique
Ex. To measure attitude towards management-labour relations
questions like this can be asked
“average wage of workers in pre-independence period was: i) Rs. 2,
ii) Rs. 5.
Here it can be assumed that few people know the answer. The pro-
labour respondents would guess the low figure and the pro-
management respondents would guess the high figure.
Limitations of Motivation
Research
 Caution are required to be exercised not only in the application of these
techniques but also the resultant data should be analyzed and
interpreted according to the psychological theory

 Originally these techniques were used to collect data fro a single

individual over a period of time. It is not free from drawbacks while we
apply these techniques to gather data from a number of individuals

 The designing and administering of these techniques need qualified and

experienced researchers. Such personnel are hardly available

 Generally small samples are taken for conducting motivation research;

generalization if drawn on this basis are misleading