Chapter 3

Learning and Memory

CONSUMER
BEHAVIOR, 9e
Michael R. Solomon

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 Learning Objectives
When you finish this chapter, you should
understand why:
• It’s important for marketers to understand
how consumers learn about products and
services.
• Conditioning results in learning.
• Learned associations can generalize to other
things and why this is important to
marketers.

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 Learning Objectives (continued)
When you finish this chapter, you should
understand why:
• There is a difference between classical and
instrumental conditioning.
• We learn by observing others’ behavior.
• Memory systems work.

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 Learning Objectives (continued)
When you finish this chapter, you should
understand why:
• The other products we associate with an
individual product influences how we will
remember it.
• Products help us to retrieve memories from
our past.
• Marketers measure our memories about
products and ads.

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 The Learning Process
• Learning: a relatively
permanent change in
behavior caused by
experience
• Incidental learning: casual,
unintentional acquisition of
knowledge

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 Behavioral Learning Theories
• Behavioral learning theories: assume that
learning takes place as the result of
responses to external events.

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 Types of Behavioral Learning Theories
Classical conditioning: a
stimulus that elicits a
response is paired with
another stimulus that
initially does not elicit a
response on its own.
Instrumental conditioning
(also, operant
conditioning): the
individual learns to
perform behaviors that
produce positive
outcomes and to avoid
those that yield negative
outcomes.
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 Classical Conditioning
• Ivan Pavlov rang bell and
put meat powder into dogs’
mouths; repeated until dogs
salivated when the bell rang
• Meat powder = UCS (natural
reaction is drooling)
• Bell = CS (dogs learned to
drool when bell rang)
• Drooling = CR
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 Marketing Applications of Repetition
• Repetition increases learning
• More exposures = increased brand
awareness
• When exposure decreases, extinction occurs
• However, too MUCH exposure leads to
advertising wear out
• Example: Izod crocodile on clothes

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 Marketing Applications of
Stimulus Generalization
• Stimulus generalization: tendency for stimuli
similar to a conditioned stimulus to evoke
similar, unconditioned responses.
• Family branding
• Product line extensions
• Licensing
• Look-alike packaging

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 Discussion
• Some advertisers use well-known songs to
promote their products. They often pay more
for the song than for original compositions.
How do you react when one of your favorite
songs turns up in a commercial?
• Why do advertisers do this? How does this
relate to learning theory?
• If you worked for an ad agency, how would
you select songs for your clients?

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 Instrumental Conditioning
• Behaviors = positive outcomes or negative
outcomes
• Instrumental conditions occurs in one of
these ways:
• Positive reinforcement
• Negative reinforcement
• Punishment
• Extinction

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 Figure 3.2 Instrumental Conditioning

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 Reinforcement Schedules in
Instrumental Conditioning
• Fixed-interval (seasonal sales)
• Variable-interval (secret shoppers)
• Fixed-ratio (grocery-shopping receipt
programs)
• Variable-ratio (slot machines)

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 Cognitive Learning Theories:
Observational Learning
• We watch others; we model behavior
• Conditions for modeling to occur:
• The consumer’s attention must be directed
to the appropriate model
• The consumer must remember what the
model does and says
• The consumer must convert information to
action
• The consumer must be motivated to
perform actions
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 Figure 3.3
The Observational Learning Process
• Modeling: imitating others’ behavior

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 Role of Memory in Learning
• Memory: acquiring information and storing it
over time so that it will be available when
needed.
• Information-processing approach; Figure 3.4
• Mind = computer and data = input/output

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 How Information Gets Encoded
• Encode: mentally program meaning
• Types of meaning:
• Sensory meaning, such as the literal color
or shape of a package
• Semantic meaning: symbolic associations
• Episodic memories: relate to events that are
personally relevant
• Narrative: memories store information we
acquire in story form
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 Figure 3.5 The Memory Process

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 Figure 3.6
An Associative Networks for Perfumes

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 Spreading Activation
• As one node is activated, other nodes
associated with it also begin to be triggered
• Meaning types of associated nodes:
• Brand-specific
• Ad-specific
• Brand identification
• Product category
• Evaluative reactions

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 Levels of Knowledge
• Individual nodes = meaning concepts
• Two (or more) connected nodes =
proposition (complex meaning)
• Two or more propositions = schema
• We encode info that is consistent with an
existing schema more readily
• Service scripts

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 Retrieval for Purchase Decisions
• Retrieving information often requires
appropriate factors and cues:
• Physiological factors
• Situational factors
• Consumer attention; pioneering brand;
descriptive brand names
• Viewing environment (continuous
activity; commercial order in sequence)
• Post experience advertising effects

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 What Makes Us Forget?
• Appropriate factors/cues for
retrieval:
• State-dependent retrieval/
mood congruence effect
• Familiarity
• Salience/von Restorff
effect
• Visual memory versus
verbal memory

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 Measuring Memory for Marketing Stimuli
• Recognition versus recall
• Problems with memory measures
• Response biases
• Memory lapses
• Omitting
• Averaging
• Telescoping
• Illusion of truth effect

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 The Marketing Power of Nostalgia
• Marketers may
resurrect popular
characters to evoke
fond memories of
the past
• Nostalgia
• Retro brand

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 Discussion
• What “retro brands” are targeted to you?
Were these brands that were once used by
your parents?
• What newer brands focus on nostalgia, even
though they never existed before?

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 Chapter Summary
• Marketers need to know how consumers
learn in order to develop effective messages.
• Conditioning results in learning and learned
associations can generalize to other things.
• Learning can be accomplished through
classical and instrumental conditioning and
through observing the behavior of others.
• We use memory systems to store and
retrieve information.

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