CHAPTE

R
FIVE and
Personality
Consumer
Behavior

Learning Objectives
1. To Understand How Personality Reflects
Consumers Inner Differences.
2. To Understand How Freudian, Neo-Freudian,
and Trait Theories Each Explain the
Influence of Personality on Consumers
Attitudes and Behavior.
3. To Understand How Personality Reflects
Consumers Responses to Product and
Marketing Messages.
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Learning Objectives (continued)

4. To Understand How Marketers Seek to
Create Brand Personalities-Like Traits.
5. To Understand How the Products and
Services That Consumers Use Enhance
Their Self-Images.
6. To Understand How Consumers Can
Create Online Identities Reflecting a
Particular Set of Personality Traits.
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Chapter Five

Introduction
Marketers have long tried to appeal to
consumers in terms of their personality
characteristics. They have intuitively felt
that what consumers purchase, and when
and how they consume, are likely to be
influenced by their personality factors.

What Is the Personality Trait

Characterizing the Consumers to
Whom This Ad Appeals?

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Enthusiastic or Extremely
Involved Collectors

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Personality and
The Nature of Personality
The inner psychological characteristics
that both determine and reflect how a
person responds to his or her environment
The Nature of Personality:
Personality reflects individual differences
Personality is consistent and enduring
Personality can change

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Discussion Questions
How would
you describe
your
personality?
How does it
influence
products
that you
purchase?
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Chapter Five

Theories of Personality
Freudian theory
Unconscious needs or drives are at the heart
of human motivation

Neo-Freudian personality theory

Social relationships are fundamental to the
formation and development of personality

Trait theory
Quantitative approach to personality as a set
of psychological traits
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Freudian Theory
Id
Warehouse of primitive or
instinctual needs for which
individual seeks immediate
satisfaction

Superego
Individuals internal
expression of societys
moral and ethical codes of
conduct

Ego
Individuals conscious control
that balances the demands of
the id and superego
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Id, Superego and ego

Freud proposed that the human personality
consists of three interacting systems:
the id, the superego, and the ego.
The id was conceptualized as a warehouse
of primitive and impulsive drive- basic
physiological needs such as thirst, hunger
and sex-for which the individual seeks
immediate satisfaction without concern for
the specific means of satisfaction.

Superego
In contrast to Id, the superego is
conceptualized as the individuals internal
expression of societys moral and ethical
code of conduct. The superegos role is to
see that the individual satisfies needs in a
a socially acceptable fashion. Thus, the
superego is a kind of brake that restrains
or inhibits the impulsive forces of the id.

Ego
The ego is the individuals conscious
control. It functions as an internal monitor
that attempts to balance the impulsive
demands of the id and the sociocultural
constraints of the superego.
Freud emphasized that an individuals
personality is formed as he or she passes
through a number of distinct stages of
infant and childhood development.

How Does This Marketing

Message Apply the Notion of
the Id?

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It Captures Some of the Mystery and The

Excitement Associated With the Forces
of Primitive Drives.

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Neo-Freudian Personality
Theory
Social relationships are fundamental to personality
Alfred Adler:
Style of life
Feelings of inferiority

Harry Stack Sullivan

We establish relationships with others to reduce
tensions

Karen Horneys three personality groups

Compliant: move toward others
Aggressive: move against others
Detached: move away from others
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Why Is Appealing to an Aggressive

Consumer a Logical Position for This
Product?

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Because its Consumer Seeks

to Excel and Achieve
Recognition

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Trait Theory
Focus on measurement of personality in
terms of traits
Trait - any distinguishing, relatively
enduring way in which one individual
differs from another
Personality is linked to broad product
categories and NOT specific brands

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Soup and Soup Lovers Traits

Table 5.2 (excerpt)
Chicken Noodle Soup
Lovers

Vegetable/Minestrone
Soup Lovers

Watch a lot of TV
Are family oriented
Have a great sense of humor
Are outgoing and loyal
Like daytime talk shows
Most likely to go to church

Tomato Soup Lovers

Passionate about reading

Love pets
Like meeting people for coffee
Arent usually the life of the party

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Enjoy the outdoors

Usually game for trying new
things
Spend more money than any
other group dining in fancy
restaurants
Likely to be physically fit
Gardening is often a favorite
hobby

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How Does This Ad Target the

Inner-Directed Outdoors
Person?

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A Sole Person is Experiencing

the Joys and Adventure of the
Wilderness

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Consumer Innovativeness
Willingness to innovate
Further broken down for hi-tech products
Global innovativeness
Domain-specific innovativeness
Innovative behavior

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Consumer Motivation Scales

Table 5.3 (excerpt)
A GENERAL CONSUMER INNOVATIVENESS SCALE
1. I would rather stick to a brand I usually buy than try
something I am not very sure of.
2. When I go to a restaurant, I feel it is safer to order
dishes I am familiar with.
A DOMAIN-SPECIFIC CONSUMER INNOVATIVENESS
SCALE
1. Compared to my friends, I own few rock albums.
2. In general, I am the last in my circle of friends to know
the titles of the latest rock albums.
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Dogmatism
A personality trait that reflects the degree
of rigidity a person displays toward the
unfamiliar and toward information that is
contrary to his or her own established
beliefs

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Personality and Understanding

Consumer Behavior
Ranges on a continuum for innerdirectedness to other-directedness
Inner-directedness
rely on own values when evaluating products
Innovators

Other-directedness
look to others
less likely to be innovators
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Need for Uniqueness

Consumers who avoid conforming to

expectations or standards of others
Sample Item from a consumers Need for
Uniquensess Scale
1. I collect unusal products as a way of telling
people IM different.
2. When dressing, I have sometimes dared to be
different in ways that others are likely to
disapprove.
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Conti
As far as IM concerned, when it comes to
the products I buy and the situations in
Which I use them, Customs and rules are
made to be broken.

Optimum Stimulation Level

A personality trait that measures the level
or amount of novelty or complexity that
individuals seek in their personal
experiences
High OSL consumers tend to accept risky
and novel products more readily than low
OSL consumers.

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Sensation Seeking
The need for varied, novel, and complex
sensations and experience. And the
willingness to take social and physical risks
for the sensations.

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Variety-Novelty Seeking
Measures a consumers degree of variety
seeking
Examples include:
Exploratory Purchase Behavior
Use Innovativeness
Vicarious Exploration

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Cognitive Personality Factors

Need for cognition (NFC)
A persons craving for enjoyment of thinking
Individual with high NFC more likely to
respond to ads rich in product information

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Cognitive Personality Factors

Visualizers
Verbalizers

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Hall

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Why Is This Ad Particularly

Appealing to Visualizers?

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The Ad Stresses Strong

Visual Dimensions

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Why Is This Ad Particularly

Appealing to Verbalizers?

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It Features a Detailed
Description

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From Consumer Materialism to

Compulsive Consumption

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From Consumer Materialism to

Compulsive Consumption
Fixated consumption behavior
Consumers fixated on certain products or
categories of products
Characteristics
Passionate interest in a product category
Willingness to go to great lengths to secure objects
Dedication of time and money to collecting

Compulsive consumption behavior

Addicted or out-of-control consumers
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Consumer Ethnocentrism and

Cosmopolitanism
Ethnocentric consumers feel it is wrong to
purchase foreign-made products because of
the impact on the economy
They can be targeted by stressing
nationalistic themes
A cosmopolitan orientation would consider
the word to be their marketplace and would
be attracted to products from other cultures
and countries.
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Brand Personality
Personality-like traits associated with brands
Examples
Purdue and freshness
Nike and athlete
BMW is performance driven

Brand personality which is strong and favorable

will strengthen a brand but not necessarily
demand a price premium

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In What Ways Do Max and Other Brand

Personifications Help Create VWs Brand
Image?

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Speaks English, is interviewed

about VW products, and is a
friend

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Product Anthropomorphism and

Brand Personification
Product Anthropomorphism
Attributing human characteristics to objects
Tony the Tiger and Mr. Peanut

Brand Personification
Consumers perception of brands attributes
for a human-like character
Mr. Coffee is seen as dependable, friendly,
efficient, intelligent and smart.
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A Brand Personality Framework

Figure 5.12

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Product Personality Issues

Gender
Some products perceived as masculine (coffee
and toothpaste) while others as feminine (bath
soap and shampoo)

Geography
Actual locations, like Philadelphia cream cheese
and Arizona iced tea
Fictitious names also used, such as Hidden
Valley and Bear Creek

Color
Color combinations in packaging and products
denotes personality
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Self and Self-Image

Consumers have a
variety of enduring
images of
themselves
These images are
associated with
personality in that
individuals
consumption relates
to self-image
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One or Multiple Selves

A single consumer will act differently in
different situations or with different people
We have a variety of social roles
Marketers can target products to a
particular self

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Makeup of the Self-Image

Contains traits, skills, habits, possessions,
relationships, and way of behavior
Developed through background,
experience, and interaction with others
Consumers select products congruent with
this image

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Which Consumer
Self-Image Does This Ad Target, and Why?

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Actual self-image because it tells middleage women who like their hair long to
continue doing so.

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Different Self-Images

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Extended Self
Possessions can extend self in a number
of ways:
Actually
Symbolically
Conferring status or rank
Bestowing feelings of immortality
Endowing with magical powers

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Altering the Self-Image

Consumers use self-altering products to
express individualism by:
Creating new self
Maintaining the existing self
Extending the self
Conforming

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Virtual Personality
You can be anyone
Gender swapping
Age differences
Mild-mannered to aggressive

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