Chapter A. The starting point

Advertising = any form of paid communication by an identified sponsor, aimed to inform and/or persuade target audiences about an organization, product, service or idea.

The origins of modern day advertising

Advertising doesn’t create needs, but channels  needs by reshaping them into wants. A side effect is the growing importance of a brand = the label with which to designate an individual product and differentiate it from competitors. Unique Selling Proposition (USP) = a summary statement used to meaningfully differentiate the brand from the competition. This is the key challenge in building brands.

Newspapers and magazines are among the main advertising media. Advertisers reach about a billion people per day through display and classified ads. Market shares have decreased due to television and internet, but magazines are still popular when targeting audiences with special interests; consumer segments that share common interests, values, or lifestyles.

Informational/argument-based appeal = straightforwardly informing consumers about the product, its price, and where it can be bought. This approach is also called the ‘reason-why approach’. A less aggressive approach, emotional/affect-based appeal = aiming to influence the consumer’s feelings/emotions rather than his thoughts. These appeals coexist.

The functions of advertising

Advertising had a place in society on an aggregate level:

• It facilitates competition among firms for consumer attention, preferences, choice, and consumer resources.
• It is the prime means companies have to inform consumers about products.
• It is a key source of funding for major mass media.
• It creates many jobs.

On an individual level, advertising can inform and persuade the individual consumer. With informing, the emphasis is on creating/influencing non-evaluative consumer responses like knowledge or beliefs. When persuading, the focus is on generating/changing an evaluative (valenced) response, in which the advertised brand is viewed as more favourable than before compared to competitors.

Motive for an informational appeal: to communicate something new and potentially relevant about a product, service or idea. Used more frequently for durable goods (products that can be used repeatedly, e.g. a freezer), than for non-durable goods (e.g. food). They are also more often used in developed countries than in developing ones. The most frequent communications are about performance, availability, components/attributes, price, quality and special offers.

The product life cycle (PLC) has four stages:

1. Introduction stage à create brand awareness and induce product trial.
2. Growth stage à build market share, improve the product, or develop brand extensions and communicate those.
3. Maturity stage à consolidate/strengthen market share and shift of focus to creating consumer brand loyalty and maintaining top-of-mind awareness.
4. Decline stage à use informational appeals to convey new/additional uses.

For more complex new products/services, advertising may provide a means to ‘educate’ the consumer about the way they work. For existing products, informational appeals are also used when there are problems with the product. Communicating a product recall = informing consumers that they need to return their product for repair of refunding (e.g. safety implications). Advertising may also have a corrective function = used when consumers have misconceptions of the product or when its reputation is bad.

Informing consumers may sometimes backfire or be ineffective in changing misconceptions. In that case, you need persuasive appeals = intended to change consumer responses (e.g. McDonald’s stating that their burger were made of 100% pure beef after the rumour that they used worms to produce their foods).  The function of advertising is to aid in the marketing or products and services, and the key function of marketing is to facilitate the exchange of value between manufacturers and consumers. It is the persuasion brought by advertising that should result in buying/using the product. In all PLC stages persuasion strategies will flank information appeals in order to increase the odds of consumers responding positively to the product.

Advertisers can use two strategies to achieve the goal of persuasion:

• By directly increasing the attractiveness of the offer or the message à alpha strategies serve to increase the tendency to move toward the advocated position, and influence a consumer’s approach motivation.
• By reducing consumer reluctance to accept the position à omega strategies can persuade because they reduce/minimize the tendency to move away from the position, and influence a consumer’s avoidance motivation.

Alpha strategies include the use of strong, compelling arguments that justify accepting the message position, or communication scarcity. Omega strategies reduce resistance by directly counter arguing consumer concerns; distracting consumers to interfere with their concerns regarding the message position; reframing the message so that it does not appear to be a blatant persuasive attack; or using negative emotions.

Current views on advertising effectiveness

Naïve approach = advertising simply must be effective because it is so omnipresent and expenditures are vast and ever increasing.

Economic approach = correlates advertising expenditures with changes in sales volume in order to address the effects.

Media approach = effectiveness is conceptualized in terms of the number of individuals in a target population who have been exposed to a message, thereby looking at the reach of the message. Problem: it cannot inform on the impact of the exposure.

Creative approach = a message is effective to the extent that is it well-made and creative.

Psychological approach = aims at identifying advertising effects at the individual level. Specific advertising stimuli are related to specific and individual consumer responses. It also seeks to articulate the intrapersonal, interpersonal, or group-level psychological processes that are responsible for the relationship between ad stimuli and consumer responses. This is the perspective adopted by this book.

Consumer responses (individual level)

Cognitive consumer responses = beliefs and thoughts about brands, products, and services that consumer generate in response to advertising. Include brand awareness, recall, and recognition, but also associations, attitudes and preferences.

Affective responses = various more or less transient emotions and moods that can occur as a function of ad exposure. Differ in valence and intensity. E.g. warmth, irritation, fear, pride.

Behavioural responses = the intention and actual behaviour in response to advertising, like buying the product, choosing a brand, product trial, brand switching, and discarding a product.

Assessing advertising effects on consumer responses

Relationships can be correlational or causal:

Correlation = an observed change in one variable is associated with a change in the other (increase-increase = positive correlation & increase-decrease = negative correlation. 0 correlation = no relationship). Correlation is a necessary, but insufficient condition for causality. To infer that A causes B, three conditions must be met:

1. The antecedent A must precede the consequence B;
2. Changes in A must be associated with changes B;
3. No other explanation for the change in B must be present than the change in A.

An experiment is particularly suited to establish causality. It involves manipulating one or more antecedents (independent variables) and assessing their impact on the consequence (dependent variable).

Random assignment ensures that the effects can be reliably attributed to the independent variables. Factorial experiment = when two or more variables are manipulated within the same design.

Mediation analysis = attempts to identify the intermediary psychological processes that are responsible for the effect of an independent on the dependent variable. There is mediation if:

1. The independent variable A has an impact on the assumed mediator C;
2. The variations in C significantly account for variation in the dependent variable B;
3. The controlling for C significantly reduces or eliminates the impact of A on B.

Moderator = individual difference that strengthens or changes the direction of the effect of the independent on the dependent variable. The effect of A on B is different for various levels of C.

Advertising effects can be best understood as joint or interaction effects between situational and person variables. An advertising message may have a larger impact on one consumer group than on another or the direction of the effect may differ. Situational variables = external, environmental variables that act as independent/moderator variables that affect some consumer outcome (e.g. the promotional mix). Person variables = internal dimensions to a specific individual which typically act as moderators (e.g. consumer involvement or knowledge). Individual difference variables include personality traits like need for recognition and need for cognitive closure.

Source and message variables in advertising

Sources of advertising messages can be individuals, organizations or brands behind the product or service. A direct source is a spokesperson delivering a message or demonstrating a product. An indirect source is only associated with the product/service.

Source credibility

Credibility includes the dimensions of source expertise and trustworthiness. It mainly influences message processing and persuasion when recipients are not very motivated to process the message. Trustworthiness can be conveyed by stressing that the message source does not have a vested interest in delivering the message.

Source attractiveness

Many products are sold by appealing to sexual attraction and beauty. Attractiveness frequently functions as a halo: what is beautiful is good. The attractiveness halo-effect can easily extend beyond the model itself to positively affect the products with which he/she is associated.

Argument quality and message structure

Argument quality = what is communicated about the product. An argument is strong when a desirable product attribute is highlighted, coupled with the certainty that it will be delivered with the product.

Message structure = how product information is communicated. Presenting arguments first may increase consumer attention and processing intensity, while presenting them last may benefit them because they are most recently activated in memory. Other relevant message variables are:

Message sidedness

One-sided message = classic, biased ad with arguments supporting a conclusion favourable to the advertised brand. Two-sided advertisements = include both positive and negative, or supporting and counterarguments. One-sided messages are more persuasive when recipients are favourably disposed to the message issue, while two-sided messages are more effective when the issue is unfamiliar/unfavourable to consumers.

Argument-based and affect-based appeals

Argument-based advertisements appeal to reason and use arguments, while affect-based advertisements use emotions and feelings. Experiential products lend themselves well to affect-based appeals. These appeals are also useful in low-involvement purchases. Fear-arousing communications try to scare the consumer into action by referring to risks that the consumer can either prevent or reduce by (not) buying the product. Risks can be:

• Physical = risk of bodily harm;
• Social = risk of being socially rejected;
• Performance = risk that competitive products will not perform as expected;
• Financial = risk of losing a lot of money/spending too much on an inferior product;
• Opportunity = the risk of missing an opportunity because of short supply.

Advertising in context: integrated marketing communications and the promotional mix

Source and message variables are the first class in advertising. Second class of situational variables that may affect consumer responses are the communication tools that make up the promotional mix. This includes direct marketing, interactive marketing, sales promotion, PR, and personal selling. Integrated Marketing Communication = coordinating the elements in the promotion mix to create synergy between them. Advertising can no longer be viewed as invariably non-personal communication, but manifests itself in hybrid forms, including elements from other tools in the promotion mix.

In direct marketing the firm directly and individually communicates with a potential customer, with the objective of generating a behavioural response. It includes database management, telemarketing, and direct response advertising. Word-of-mouth marketing = when a product user tries to convince others to try the product as well.

In event marketing, events are used to get in touch with potential customers, often through sponsorship. Direct mail = a personalized form where consumers are typically addressed by their names.

Interactive marketing = using the potential of the internet for marketing products and services. Advantages of the internet are that it is fast, that consumers can control timing and pacing of information, and that consumers may have more control of content than with traditional media. However, perceived social presence is lower online.

Sales promotion = focused on generating an immediate behavioural response from the consumer. It is a form of ‘action communication’. It uses price-cuts and other forms of temporary incentives to generate sales on an ad hoc basis. Its five basic functions are:

• To increase market size by directly stimulating sales;
• To reward loyal customers;
• To make existing customers more loyal;
• To stimulate trial by new customers;
• To support other communications tools.

Negative effects may occur as sales promotion actions by competitors result in ever-increasing promotion costs for similar sales revenues. Sales promotions may affect the reference price and make consumers reject the offer when the promotion has ended. Price becomes the most salient product attribute in the consumer’s mind, corroding perceptions based on other features.

Public relations = a communication instrument that is used to promote favourable perceptions about the organization as a whole. It includes sponsoring of events, communication with media gatekeepers, political stakeholders, pressure groups, government bodies and internal employees. It is a form of communication creating a mutual understanding between organizations and their publics. Financial PR = aimed at informing and persuading the financial audiences with are essential for the long-term money-raising potential of the company, such as shareholders and investors. Marketing PR = the promotion of new products and services through free publicity.

Personal selling = a two-way, face-to-face form of communication to inform and persuade prospective buyers with the aim of yielding a behavioural response from them. An agent tries to foster compliance from a target.

Persuasion involves changing consumer beliefs and evaluative responses, while compliance is focused solely on overt behaviour and compliance following a request.

Key advantage: it has a higher overall impact on buyer behaviour than many of the other tools, since a sales person can probe symptoms of consumer resistance and try to break through them. The product can be demonstrated and there can be negotiated on the sales terms. There is no waste in reaching audience members that are not part of the target group. Personal selling is relatively expensive and has a limited reach and frequency. There is also a high risk of message inconsistency.

Classic and contemporary approaches of conceptualizing advertising effectiveness

Two approaches to conceptualize the impact of advertising: Modelling approach = focuses on the aggregate level; entire markets/market segments are the primary unit of measurement. Behavioural paradigm = focuses on individual consumer responses as a function of specific advertising input variables (ad variables = independent, consumer responses = dependent). The level of specificity is high in the behavioural paradigm such that the effects of individual ad characteristics on specific individual consumer responses are assessed by employing experimental research methods.

Modelling approach: sales-response models

Sales-response models = aim to relate advertising inputs such as expenditures to aggregated output measures like sales and market share, in order to gain insight in the aggregated advertising effects as a function of aggregated advertising input. Two basic shapes are:

• Concave sales response model = sales follow the law of diminishing returns: the incremental impact of advertising on sales diminishes with increasing the communication budget. Once the entire population of non-buyers has been reached, additional ad expenditures will not add much in terms of impact.
• S-shaped model = initial impact of advertising as a function of communication budget is low. After this phase, sales will start to increase exponentially with increasing expenditures, up to a saturation point where the impact of advertising will level off. After this phase, added investments may even lead to adverse results.

Disadvantages of an aggregate level of analysis are that advertising may not be the only causal factor, variables may interact, and factors outside the realm of the company may be responsible for aggregated effects. Response modelling is based on input-output representations without regard for the underlying processes that are responsible for the occurrence of a relationship between advertising input and sales output. Sales output is a behavioural measure and thus a behavioural approach is needed to complement the modelling approach in understanding advertising effects.

Behavioural approach: hierarchy-of-effects models

Hierarchy-of-effects models propose several intermediate steps instead of assuming a direct link between ad message and consumer response. It is assumed that some form of consumer learning takes place following exposure to advertising.

There are three learning stages:

1. Cognitive stage = consumers engage in directing conscious attention to the target ad and thinking about its content.
2. Affective stage = thinking gives way to emotional responses and the formation of attitudes or preferences associated with the advertised brand takes place.
3. Conative stage = includes behaviour that might arise from exposure to advertising, including (re)purchase and (re)use.

AIDA model = advertising reaches its impact on consumer behaviour through the sequence of Attention (cognitive stage), Interest, Desire (affective stage), and Action (conative stage). The two basic functions of advertising are to inform and to persuade. Modifications:

• AIDCA = Attention, Interest, Desire, Conviction, Action.
• AIETA = Awareness, Interest, Evaluation, Trial, Adoption.
• AKLPCP = Awareness, Knowledge, Liking, Preference, Conviction, Purchase.

None of the models provide a valid description of how advertising works. Other weaknesses are that in many situations the model will not hold because the fixed sequence of processes presupposes a high level of consumer involvement, while this is rather an exception than the rule.

FCB grid = advertising can be modelled along two key variables: the extent of thinking versus feeling and the extent of consumer involvement (low versus high).

1. High involvement-thinking = products that are associated with considerable risk. Decision-making involves the traditional think-feel-do sequence, in which the consumer first learns about the product’s attributes and performance through careful processing of advertising and other sources of information, then develops an attitude, and subsequently acts in accordance with that attitude.
2. High involvement-feeling = involved with a feel-think-do sequence.
3. Low involvement-thinking = household products and simple food items. Decision-making proceeds along a do-think-feel hierarchy: consumers buy the brand without any mentionable cognitive/affective process preceding it. Then, by using the brand, they may learn about its attributes. The evaluation of the usage experience may produce an attitude. Do-think-feel sequence.
4. Low involvement-feeling = includes products that may be regarded as life’s little pleasures. They are bought primarily for hedonic reasons, and affective considerations weigh more heavily than cognitive considerations. After purchase, the product is consumed eliciting an affective experience which may (not) be followed by learning about the product’s attributes. Do-feel-think sequence.

Rossiter et al. grid = high and low involvement product types are crossed with two classes of consumer motives. Positive motivations are transformational motivations and include sensory gratification, intellectual stimulation, and social approval (a consumer who craves milk because he likes the taste). Negative purchase motivations are informational motives and include problem removal, problem avoidance and normal depletion (a consumer who notices he has run out of milk and wants to buy a new bottle).

A weakness of both the FCB grid and the Rossiter et al. grid is that they link certain levels of involvement and motivation to certain products, and thus disregard the possibility that the same product may function in a different role for different individuals. Involvement and motivation refer to person variables, not to invariant attributes of a product/advertising stimulus.

DAGMAR = more explicit with regard to the specific communication objectives that advertising may have in each stage. It highlights a basic distinction in evaluative versus non-evaluative consumer responses to advertising.

Non-evaluative responses:

1. creating category need
2. brand awareness
3. increasing brand knowledge/comprehension

Evaluative responses:

4. brand attitude
5. purchase intention
6. purchase facilitation
7. purchase
8. satisfaction
9. brand loyalty

There is no evidence that advertising affects the consumer in the sequence posited by the model.

Problems with all the hierarchy-of-effects models mentioned above:

• They are only concerned with the effects of advertising ad discrete media messages, whereas in reality, effects often come about in interaction with various other marketing factors;
• They represent a simplistic view of human behaviour and response processes, with advertising as the stimulus and overt consumer behaviour as the ultimate response without any regard for underlying processes and moderating conditions;
• They are inflexible, since they assume that all ads have the same specific effects;
• Especially the models that related specific effects with ways to measure them (DAGMAR) suggest that the postulated sequence of effects is valid, since its constituent components can be measured.

Consumer behaviour and psychology in general are too complex to be captured in a single model.

Cognitive response model = shares with the various hierarchy-of-effects model the assumption that learning takes place in response to exposure to a persuasive message. However, it emphasizes the mediating role of idiosyncratic thoughts/cognitive responses that people generate when being exposed. Once a receiver is exposed to a persuasive message, he may actively add to and elaborate upon message content. Cognitive responding may lead to persuasion, active resistance, or a neutral, unchanged position. Major shortcoming: its failure to account for the processes that occur when ability and/or motivation are low, other than that the extent and valence of thoughts are less consequential for persuasion.

Behavioural approach: dual process models

Dual process approach = information processing, judgement and decision-making must be viewed on a continuum. At one end of this continuum, information processing is characterized by controlled, slow, explicit, conscious, and analytic, bottom-up processing and judgement. People spend time scrutinizing the advertising message and construct meaning, beliefs, attitudes, judgement, and behavioural decisions. This mode of processing is engaged when the issue in a message is highly involving for the consumer. The quality of information becomes an important determinant of persuasion. Strong, compelling arguments evoke mostly favourable thoughts which will increase persuasion.

On the other end of the continuum, information processing involves relatively automatic, fast, impulsive, top-down processing and judgement. Consumers use prior knowledge, simple decision rules (heuristics), stereotypes and other quick guidelines to effortlessly and mindlessly arrive at a decision.

Attitudes formed/changed this way are less persistent, do not predict behaviour very well, and are vulnerable to counter-persuasion. Intermediate forms are highly likely. Both modes complement each other and may even interact.

Behavioural approach: research on unconscious processes in consumer behaviour

Activating a concept in consumer memory (priming) can directly affect overt behaviour without the participant being consciously aware that the activation procedure has any influence on the subsequent behavioural response. Subliminal priming = when people are not even consciously aware of the stimulus, but still show even complex behaviour as a function of the stimulus that is largely involuntary and automatic. Because of the low-involvement nature of most advertising, implicit processes are the rule rather than the exception when it comes to understanding the psychology of advertising.

Chapter B. A look into the consumer's mind

Consumer psychology concerns itself with the psychological antecedents, processes and consequences involved in the acquisition, use and disposal of products and services by consumers. Social cognition focuses on the way cognitive and affective processes are affected by, and influence, social behaviour. Consumers acquire, represent and encode advertising information in four stages:

1. Preattentive analysis = general, non-goal directed, ‘surveillance’ of the environment.
2. Focal attention = after noticing a stimulus, it is brought into conscious awareness where it is identified and categorized.
3. Comprehension = the process of forming inferences pertaining to the semantic meaning of the stimulus.
4. Elaborative reasoning = the process by which the semantically represented stimulus is related to previously stored knowledge that allows for simple/complex inferences.

Automatic, non-conscious processes are more influential during stage 1 and 2. Reflective, conscious processes play an important role during stage 3 and 4. Involvement determines the allocation of resources needed for (non)focal attention, thereby influencing how consumers proceed through the stages. Outcome-relevant involvement = the extent to which the acquisition and use of a product is deemed to have personal consequences for the consumer. This is determined by factors like price and consumer goals.

Preattentive analysis

Information acquisition frequently involves only little higher-order cognitive activity (a consumer may only glance a second at an ad) and is often automatic and non-conscious. This type of preattentive processing results in storage of information in implicit memory. Implicit memory effects occur when the consumer has been exposed to a stimulus previously and involve information processing that is fast, parallel and effortless. Explicit memory = a person’s conscious recollection of facts/events.

Feature analysis and semantic analysis

Preattentive processing mainly relies on feature analysis = quick analysis of the environment for basic familiarity and significance.

It implies that the memory trace produced through exposure to an advertisement only contains information on the perceptual features/design of the ad and not on its meaning. Product choice is only affected by an ad if the product looks identical to the ad. Otherwise it won’t be recognized and thus there is no future influence.

Preattentive processing can also include conceptual processing, resulting in a semantic analysis = analysing the advertised product, capturing its meaning (what is it and what does it do?).

Advantage: an advertisement can influence future choice, even if the consumer is presented at the point of choice with a representation of the product that is perceptually different from the product in the ad.

Matching activation

Hemispheric lateralization = our brain hemispheres have evolved specialized processing units for specific types of information. Picture processing involves higher activation levels of the right hemisphere since that hemisphere is tailored towards more holistic, impressionistic processing. Picture advertisements should be placed in the left visual field. Text advertisements should be placed on the right.

Matching activation hypothesis = when one hemisphere is activated by the information that accommodates the processing style of that particular hemisphere, the other one is encouraged to elaborate on secondary material. Thus when advertisements are not consciously attended to, but happen to be placed in such a position that they can be easily processed by the unused hemisphere, such exposure may result in increased conscious processing.

Preattentive analysis can also result in instant and non-conscious generation of emotions, in particular negative ones. When an urgency signal is induced unconsciously, fear and anxiety are the result, presumably prompting the organism to take immediate action to reduce the threat. Offering a remedy to remove the threat, e.g.  buying the product, is then important for advertising effectiveness.

Preattentive processing and hedonic fluency

Hedonic fluency = the subjective ease with which a stimulus can be perceived and processed. This fluency can be based on:

• Perceptual fluency = the ease with which the physical features such as modality, shape or brightness can be processed; or
• Conceptual fluency = the ease with which the semantic meaning of an object comes to the consumer’s mind and thus reflects the processing of meaning.

Stimuli that have been encountered before, have been stored in memory and are more easily processed (familiarity). When an ad is encountered incidentally, a subsequent conscious exposure produces hedonic fluency as a result of the previous exposure. Result: a positive affect which is misattributed to the focal ad, producing more favourable consumer responses.

(Non)focal consumer attention can be directed outward toward ads and brands presented in the consumer’s environment, or inward toward product-related information already stored in memory. Hedonic fluency may play a role in both types of processes.

Exposure to sequences of unrelated ads may affect consumer judgement as a function of the compatibility of the goals that the ads activate. If the goal of the target ad and the prime ad are compatible, the target ad produces more favourable evaluations than when the goals mismatch. This effect occurs because the goal activated by the priming ad increases the ease of processing of the target ad, if that ad serves the same self-regulatory goals as the priming ad.

This goal fluency results in positive affect that is misattributed to the focal ad and brand resulting in more favourable evaluations and intentions.

Question-behaviour effect = simply measuring behavioural intensions increases the likelihood of people actually performing that behaviour. Asking about some behaviour renders the attitude toward that behaviour more accessible and when that attitude is positive, the behaviour becomes more likely. Response fluency = asking questions about behaviour increases the hedonic fluency of the response to the questions, making perceptions at the time when the behaviour might be performed more easily, positively affecting the likelihood of that behaviour.

Focal attention

Conscious information processing involves focal attention, and is facilitated when consumer involvement turns from low to moderate. Because short-term memory has a limited capacity, consumers select only a few stimuli to pay attention to. Therefore special features are needed that make stimuli stand out. Three classes of stimuli featured attract involuntary consumer attention: salience, vividness and novelty.

Salience = the extent to which a stimulus is noticeably different from its environment. Ways to emphasize this difference are using humour or changing the camera angle used to focus on the target product. Figure-ground principle = figural stimuli become focal whereas non-figural stimuli become non-focal. It captures the process by which stimuli can grab attention and everything else fades into the background. Salience effects are moderated by the extent to which individuals are motivated to process information: they should be at a maximum when processing motivation is low and vice versa.

Vivid stimuli are emotionally interesting, concrete and image-provoking, and proximate in a sensory temporal or spatial way. Vividness = a function of characteristics of the perceiver, or of the advertising stimulus itself. Concrete and image-provoking information in ads may be perceived and processed differently, depending on the extent to which the perceiver has a high or low intrinsic tendency to engage in visual imagery. High visualizers are more sensitive to vivid executional elements in advertising.

A key factor driving a consumer perception of newness (novelty) is the extent to which product information is unfamiliar and disconfirms existing consumer expectancies. Surprise mobilizes cognitive resources that are used to resolve the inconsistency between what was expected and what is actually encountered. Unexpected information results in extended causal reasoning, counterfactual thinking, and cognitive elaboration.

Expectancy disconfirmation model = consumers form expectancies about product performance before buying a product. These are in large part shaped by advertising. After purchase, they compare the actual product with their expectations. Advertisers are confronted with the dilemma between selling more due to unrealistic promising while disappointing customers and selling less but being honest to them.

Categorization

Categorization = the process by which incoming information is classified: labelled as belonging to one or more categories based on a comparative assessment of features of the category and the incoming information.

The success of brand extensions depends largely on whether consumers categorize them as congruent with the parent brand or its associations.

Representativeness heuristic = the extent to which two stimuli are deemed to belong to the same overall category based on shared similarities. This might be used to predict whether consumers categorize a new product as a true innovation or perceive it as similar to existing products.

Another view is that moderate dissimilarity may benefit a brand extension because people sometimes take pleasure in solving moderate incongruities. The associated pleasure may be transferred to the focal brand which is then evaluated better.

Typicality and the pioneering advantage

Categorization effects also exist on individual products. The extent to which a product is prototypical for a category, influences product liking (prototypical products are often liked better than less prototypical ones). However, prototypicality may not serve the brand in terms of advertising salience, where communicating contrast between the focal brand and competitors is pivotal. Pioneering advantage = pioneering a novel category and becoming the most prototypical representative of that category. The pioneer decides on what attributes competitors are judged, and competitors are judged on those attributes only after the pioneer, creating a winning situation for the pioneer.

Assimilation and contrast

Assimilation = objects are classified as more similar to the parent category than they really are when the object and category are perceived as more congruent. Contrast implies a reverse phenomenon. The perception of attributes of the object can change in the direction of features of the parent category when assimilation occurs. Assimilation occurs when information is made salient, which can be included in the parent category.

As the perception of the category member can change when it is viewed in context of the parent category, so too can the perception of the parent category when viewed in context of a new member. This happens with brand extensions. The extent to which the new product affects the associations and beliefs of the parent category, again depends on the similarity of the new product to the parent category.

Impression formation and impression correction

A specific type of categorization occurs when not just products or brands are categorized, but product or brand users as a function of associations related to a parent brand category. Aaker: brands can have different personalities like people. The brand personality scale consists of 5 dimensions: sincerity, excitement, competence, sophistication, and ruggedness.

Stimulus-based impression formation = salient stimulus information guides the impression formation process (e.g. inferences consumers make about someone who wears expensive clothes or who is sitting at the terrace of a golf club versus someone wearing cheap clothes and going to a cheap restaurant).

Memory-based consumer impression formation = assessing how firms can overcome the impact of negative versus positive initial consumer impressions about a brand. Impressions based on negative initial information are less amenable than those based on positive information. However, presenting new, or updating information influences the chances of correcting the initial impressions. Comparative information motivates recall of previous information and careful processing of the new information. When the initial impression was negative, a comparative format would motivate increased weighting of this negative information, compared to a non-comparative format resulting in less positive adjusted impressions than when no comparisons were made in the new information.

Comprehension

After preattentive analysis and focal attention, the process of acquiring, representing and encoding information from advertising also entails a phase of comprehension. This is essential for achieving persuasion and should be an important factor in advertising effectiveness. Truth effect = people’s tendency to initially uncritically accept information, even when certain elements are not fully comprehended.

Seeing is believing

Believing a message appears to be the default, low effort response and critically reappraising a conclusion is a second step not taken automatically. When processing resources are limited, believing becomes the default option and rejection the correction response. It is harder to reject than to accept an advertising claim, even when we know or are informed that the claim is false. In a cluttered media environment where information is constantly competing for our attention, conditions arise that resemble interruption condition: consumers tend to make decisions quickly and as effortlessly as possible and when distracted by too many competing messages they are less able to engage in the extra effort needed for disbelieving claims that have initially been accepted even though they were false.

Repetition increases familiarity which increases believability. Even repeatedly highlighting that a claim is false may not undo the truth effect.

Sleeper effect = repetition increases familiarity for the claim itself, fostering the perception that it is true, whereas it decreases memory for the original context of the claim (the message that the claim is false).

Miscomprehension and misleading advertising claims

Pragmatic inferences = simple assumptions about statements that are literally true, but figuratively false à “Heineken is the best beer in the world”.

Ad slogans sometimes omit comparison information, with consumers frequently providing the missing information without being fully aware that they are doing so often in the direction desired by marketers à “Dentists advise brand X toothpaste”: two or a hundred dentists?

Juxtaposition = facilitates certain (sometimes false) inferences à “Be cool, buy brand X”, there is not really a causal relationship.

Affirmation of the consequent = hinges on reversing cause and effect à “If you can see it, you can make it”, implying that consumers can build anything they can imagine.

Elaborative reasoning

The previous examples of miscomprehension fall halfway between comprehension and elaborative reasoning. The truth effect may be the result of processes that are largely outside conscious consumer awareness, and some of the inferences that consumers make on the basis of sometimes misleading advertising claims as well. Inferences made during the final stage of elaborative reasoning require full consciousness. Hence, elaborative consumer reasoning is facilitated when consumer involvement is high. Elaborative reasoning is about thinking and thinking can vary along at least three dimensions: the extent of thinking, the valence of thinking and the object of thinking. The present view will focus on the object of thinking:

Self-schema and elaborative reasoning

Self-schema = cognitive generalization about the self that is comprised of a more or less comprehensive set of traits, values and beliefs that exerts a powerful influence on information processing. Product information contained in advertising that is congruent with a salient self-schema motivates consumers to process the information in more detail.

Information processing with regard to the self increases the extent of elaborative reasoning, for example when processing strong arguments with regard to the self, although these effects can be offset when processing motivation is reduced or when information processing reaches a satiation point and irritation sets in. A salient self-schema can bias information processing in line with the schema, frequently in order to protect or enhance the self.

Elaborative reasoning can result in either increased or decreased persuasion as a result of the quality of the argumentation in the ad the consumer is exposed to. Then the train of thought might move the consumer away from the advocated position.

Consumer meta-cognition

A specific type of elaborative reasoning occurs when the object of consumer thoughts is not the product, ad or brand, but the thoughts themselves. Meta-cognition = when people reflect on their own inner states, and infer something from that process. Consumers thinking about the motives of marketers and the misattribution of hedonic fluency, can be considered meta-cognitive experiences, since they are judgements that are based on how they perceive information and the extent and direction to which they think about their own judgement and evaluation processes and those of others.

Marketplace meta-cognition = people’s beliefs about their own mental states and the mental states, strategies, of others as these pertain directly to the social domain of marketplace interactions.

Ease of retrieval = the apparent ease with which product and brand related information can be retrieved from memory. It is a form of hedonic fluency. Information that is easy to retrieve may positively affect product attitudes because people may conclude that what they can easily remember must be correct.

So when a consumer is asked to think of 10 reasons why he should buy a BMW and finds this difficult, his attitude towards BMW is less favourable than when he only has to come up with one reason, which is easier. Meta-cognition is often influential in consumer judgement because consumers appear to consider these inferences as diagnostic and trustworthy.

Self-validation = the confidence consumers have in their thoughts and evaluations in response to persuasive messages. Increasing consumer confidence in positive thoughts  and high credible sources enhance advertisement effectiveness and vice versa.

Chapter C. The influence of advertising on consumer memory

Human memory = a system that not only allows us to record, store and retrieve the information we acquire, but influences the way this information is perceived, stored and encoded as well. Encoding = the processes involved in getting the information into the system by transforming an external stimulus into an internal representation, which allows us to retain it in the cognitive system. Storage = information retention over time. You can be able to retrieve this information from your memory, or forget it.

The structure and function of human memory

The Atkinson and Shiffrin model consists of three parts: sensory memory, working/short-term memory, and long-term memory. Information is first held briefly in the sensory memory, then a selection is transferred to the short-term memory, and afterwards an even smaller selection is stored in the long-term memory.

Sensory memory stores should be considered part of the perception process, because the stored information is not yet encoded, but stored in the sensory modality in which it has been perceived. In the working memory, input from the different sensory memories is integrated with information from long-term memory to be briefly held in conscious awareness and manipulated. New information can only access when old information is moved out. Verbal rehearsal lengthens the period for which information stays in the short-term store and at the same time builds up the trace in the long-term memory. When rehearsing information and paying attention to the information, the likelihood of storage in the long-term memory increases. Long-term memory stores nearly unlimited amounts of information for an unlimited period of time.

Baddeley’s major evidence for the multi-systems view of memory:

• Speed of retrieval = retrieval from short-term memory is faster than from long-term memory.
• Capacity = short-term memory is more limited; it can only hold 5-7 pieces of unrelated information.
• Serial position effects = items presented at the beginning (primacy) and at the end (recency) of a list are recalled earlier and more often than items in the middle. Primacy items can be rehearsed and stored in the long-term memory, while the last items still reside within the short-term memory.
• Memory code = long-term memory relies mainly on semantic codes, while short-term memory uses acoustic/phonological coding.
• Neuropsychology = patients who suffer from amnesia may have perfect short- or long-term memories while the long- or short-term memory is impaired.

Levels of processing: items are remembered better the more we pay attention to them and the more deeply they are processed.

The models of working memory of Baddeley and Hitch

Baddeley and Hitch replaced the model of working memory as a unitary system by a multi-component working memory model. A controlling attentional system, the central executive, which has no storage capacity of its own, supervises and coordinates a number of subsystems. Two subsystems are:

• The phonological loop = responsible for the short-term storage and manipulation of speck-based information. Consists of a phonological store that briefly holds sounds and an articulatory rehearsal system that uses subvocal inner speech. Unless speech-based/sound information is subvocally rehearsed, it will become irretrievable within 2 seconds. Articulatory rehearsal process also translates written material into phonological code to allow storage in the loop.
• The visuo-spatial sketchpad = responsible for the short-term storage and manipulation of visual information. It can operate at the same time as the phonological loop, e.g. explaining someone the way to a nearby street and at the same time visualizing the route to that street.

The central executive allocates attention and coordinates the two subsystems. Its main task is planning sequences of activities. It cannot store information, so there is an episodic buffer = a place where information from long-term memory and the subsystems of working memory can be temporarily stored, integrated and manipulated. This is where the consumer consideration set can be found.

Forms of long-term memory

The most important distinction of components of the long-term memory is between forms of conscious and non-conscious memory. Conscious forms are declarative, explicit, or recollective. Non-conscious forms has been referred to as implicit memory.

Declarative or explicit memory = characterized by a person’s conscious recollection of facts or events. Subcategories are:

• Episodic memory = about a specific event that occurred at a particular place and time à Do you remember whether you have ever been to Paris?
• Semantic memory = the mental thesaurus, organized knowledge a person possesses about words and other verbal symbols, their meaning and referents, about relations among them, and about rules, formulas, and algorithms à What is the capital of France?

Free recall test = respondents who previously learned a list of words, are asked to recall as many of them possible. Recognition test = respondents are presented with a list with words they learned before, and some that have not presented before.

Implicit memory effects occur when previous experiences facilitate our performance of subsequent tasks without us remembering the previous experience or being aware of its influence on our performance. In measures of implicit memory instructions refer only to the task at hand and make no reference to prior experiences:

• Word stem completion: participants are presented with the first letters of each, earlier presented and asked to present the first word coming to mind, word: e.g. com____ for computer.
• Word fragment identification test: participants are presented with a few letters of the word and asked to name a word that fits: e.g. c_mp_t_r.
• Perceptual identification: participants who are previously presented with a list of words, are presented with another list, comprised of the same and new words, for 35 seconds. They will recall more old than new words.
• Lexical decision task: participants are either presented with words or non-word leter strings and are asked to decide as quickly as possible whether the presented item was a word or not.
• Category instance generation: participants who have previously learned a list of words containing among others a set of animals, are asked to recall the animals.

Incidental ad exposure should result in implicit memory, whereas the content of ads to which we pay attention should be stored in explicit memory is reminiscent of the levels of processing assumption.

Priming = the phenomenon that exposure to an object or a word in one context increases the accessibility of the mental representation of that object/word in a person’s mind.

As a result, the activated concept exerts for some time unintended influence on the individual’s responses in subsequent unrelated contexts without the individual being aware of this influence. This conception of priming implies the existence of concepts within memory that represent familiar objects/words. When the object/word is presented, this representation will be activated/primed.

Priming is considerably reduced or even absent when the target material is in presented auditory form or when participants study pictorial equivalents of words. Priming cannot only increase the accessibility of single concrete lexical memory location corresponding to the stimulus word, but can activate abstract trait concepts too. Example: when you present respondents with negative terms and then ask them to perceive someone’s behaviour, they will tend to be more negative than when they have been presented with positive terms upfront.

Subliminal priming = the participant is exposed to the priming stimuli as part of a conscious task. The stimuli are presented at such a brief exposure that participants remain unaware that any stimulus has been presented. To ensure that the prime stimulus does not linger on in the short-term memory and thus be recognized despite the brief exposure, presentation of the priming stimulus is immediately followed by a letter string, a so-called post mask. The finding that subliminal presentation of words or pictures can prime mental representations of words of objects in a person’s mind raises the possibility that such procedures could be used effectively in advertising.

Knowledge structures in long-term memory

To be stored in long-term memory, our perceptions of stimuli and events need to be interpreted and encoded into some form of cognitive representation. We succeed in the encoding task by relating the stimulus to previous knowledge, by recognizing that the stimulus belongs to a particular category (e.g. a product category like cars). Once we have assigned an object to a category, we make inferences about its functions, which go far beyond our perception.

Classical view of representing categories as a set of defining features: people abstract category prototypes from their experience with different category members and then classify exemplars on the basis of their similarity to the prototype.

Scripts = abstract knowledge structures that describe standardized sequences of events and the interrelationship between different categories.

Example: knowing that the waiter in a restaurant is the one who serves food and who you can ask for the bill, while relying on the restaurant script.

Associative network models = conceive of mental representations of each isolated piece of knowledge as a discrete node connected to other nodes by links of various types. Each concept/attribute is represented by a node. When looking at our knowledge about drinks, there will be nodes for soft drinks, juices, beers, etc. but also for attributes like sweet, tasty, etc. When a node is activated because it is actively though about, the activation of nodes spreads to other nodes via the links. If an individual is primed with the word ‘sweet’, the activation would spread to all the concepts connected to this feature. The more activated a node is, the more likely it will burst into awareness, be recalled, or be applied to incoming information.

Implications for advertising: The role of memory in judgements: on the ineffectiveness of traditional measures of advertising effectiveness

One of the standard strategies to measure the effectiveness of an advertising campaign is to contact consumers, who were exposed to the ad and ask them what they remember about the ad or the advertised product (recall test). They can also be shown the advertisements and asked whether the recognize it (recognition test).

It is false to assume that people’s product judgements should be related to their recollecton o the evidence on which those judgements are presumably based. Using only recall or recognition measures might result in an underestimation of the impact of a campaign on memory because exposure to advertisements can impact on implicit memory and these effects may not be detectable with measures of explicit memory. Also, recollection of arguments made in a campaign may be unrelated to consumers’ attitude towards the advertised product, because the targets of advertising campaigns may change their product judgements online, while being exposed to the campaign. Then they might be influenced by arguments, even if they cannot remember them, or they might still remember arguments, even though they considered them invalid.

Incidental exposure is likely to leave a trace on implicit memory. Assessing the impact of a campaign on memory, whether implicit or explicit, is not an adequate measure of the effectiveness of an advertisement campaign. The aim of such campaigns is to change consumer attitude towards the product in order to increase the probability that they will buy it.

Thus, attitude change achieved by a campaign, rather than memory for arguments contained in the advertisements should be the indicator on which an evaluation of campaign effectiveness should be based. The change in attitudes achieved by a communication is often unrelated to the arguments that are remembered.

Memory-based versus online judgements

In many situations, we are presented with information, which motivates us to form our judgement at the time we are taking in the information. People integrate the information they receive immediately into an overall evaluation. Once the impression has been formed, there is little purpose for them to remember all the traits on which their impression has been based.

When reading advertisements about brands of a product we are planning to buy, we will probably form an opinion while reading the information. We will not remember all the advantages and disadvantages later on because we were focused on certain attributes. Thus, when we make online judgements, integrating the information while we are exposed to it, our evaluations can be relatively unrelated to the product claims, even though we will still be able to recall them at some later time. If we had no intention of buying the product, but a friend would ask us to advise him, our judgement would be more memory-based.

Carlston: individuals store both the original information about the attributes of the products (attribute-based representation) as well as their evaluations based on this elaboration (evaluation-based representation) in separate representations. Each of these may be used independently in subsequent judgements. An evaluation-based representation is retrieved for use in making subsequent global memory-based judgements, whereas an attribute-based representation is retrieved for use in making subsequent discrete memory-based judgements. Since global judgements predict purchase intentions, measures of memory for descriptive information are poor measures of advertising effectiveness.

Memory factors in brand choice: the role of cognitive accessibility

Consumers rarely consider all brands they are aware of, but base their purchase decision on their consideration set = the set of brands brought to mind in a particular choice situation. The focus is on cognitive accessibility of a brand name as determinant of brand consideration and brand choice.

Purchase situations can encourage more memory-based or more stimulus-based strategies. Buying a car (e.g. choosing to go to a Peugeot dealer) is typically a memory-based decision. Cognitive accessibility influences the composition of the consideration set of car dealers to go to. Shopping in a supermarket with a shopping list is more stimulus-based.  Cognitive accessibility will influence the consideration set because highly accessible brands are more familiar.

Priming a brand name increases the cognitive accessibility of that brand name. With totally unfamiliar brand names, priming can increase liking by increasing processing fluency. Priming can also increase the accessibility of closely associated brands and of the product category to which the brand belongs. This is most likely to happen if the brand is prototypical for the product category and if that particular category was previously not highly accessible in the individual’s mind. By reminding people that there is an attractive but non-obvious choice alternative, some are likely to choose this alternative, which they would not have thought of unaided.

The set of brands consumers consider when deciding on a purchase is typically not only smaller than the total number of brands available in the marketplace but also than the number of brands of which the consumer is aware. Priming that requires a greater degree of conceptual elaboration is more effective for memory-based choices but less effective when choice is stimulus-based. Increasing accessibility of a brand name through priming is likely to influence only the inclusion of a brand in the consideration set rather than the purchase decision. Priming can also influence this decision when:

• Individuals have no particular preference for a specific brand;
• Their preferred brand is not available;
• An attractive, but less accessible subcategory of a given product category has been primed.

Forgetting the message: advertising clutter and competitive interference

The passage of time is not the only reason why we forget things. Forgetting is also influenced by our experiences in the period between exposure to information and recall. Retroactive interference = when interpolated learning interferes with the recall of the original material. Learning nonsense syllables after meaningful adjectives results in much less interference than learning synonyms. Proactive interference = when what we have learnt earlier interferes with later learning. Advertising clutter = the extent to which messages compete for the consumer’s attention.

Several factors should moderate the impact of competitive interference on memory:

• The processing goal of the recipient of the ad information: if recipients read or view the ad with the goal of potentially purchasing the advertised product, they are likely to process the information more thoroughly than if they look at the ad without any specific interest in the brand that is being advertised.
• Brand familiarity reflects the consumer’s level of (in)direct experience with the product:
  • Recipients will have an established knowledge structure for familiar brands. New information will be strongly linked to the brand name.
  • With unfamiliar brands, recipients are less likely to link the information to the brand name and more likely to link it to the product category.

In order to combat interference due to advertising clutter, marketers use retrieval cues, ad repetition or place the ad in an advantageous position within the block of advertisements.

Can advertising distort memory?

Advertising presented after experiencing a product can distort consumers’ memory of their experience. People experience what they expect to experience, at least with products that are not easily evaluated. The effect of advertisements shown afterwards reflects a distortion of individuals’ memories of their evaluation, involving some form of selective retrieval, with possibly a reinterpretation of the retrieved evidence in the light of the ad claims. Post-experience memory distortions are more likely to occur for (rather ambiguous) experience and credence product attributes than for search attributes. People who are familiar with a product and confident in their ability to judge the quality of that product, are unlikely to be susceptible to the distorting influence of advertising messages.

Chapter D. Consumers' development of judgments and feelings about products

What is an attitude? A matter of contention

Defining the concept

Attitudes are evaluative responses. They are directed towards some attitude object and are based on three classes of information: cognitive, affective/emotional, and behavioural. Attitude objects may be abstract (e.g. materialism) or concrete (e.g. Audi) and may be individuals (David Beckham) or categories (candy). One might infer one’s brand attitude from the frequency with which one has recently used the brand.

The major point of contention is whether attitudes should be defined as a predisposition to evaluate an attitude object in a particular way or as the evaluative response itself. Attitude = a psychological tendency that is expressed by evaluating a particular entity with some degree of (dis)favour. Cognitive evaluative responses = the beliefs people hold about the attitude object. Affective evaluative responses = the feelings, moods and emotions people experience when confronted with the attitude object. Behavioural evaluative responses = the intention to act or the overt actions people perform in relation to an attitude object.

Implicit and explicit attitudes: challenging the unity of the attitude concept

Implicit attitudes = evaluations of which the individual is typically not aware and which influence (re)actions over which the individual has little/no control.

Explicit attitudes = evaluations of which the individual is consciously aware. Can be expressed using self-report measures.

Affective priming method = individuals are presented on each trial with a prime and afterwards they are presented with positive/negative adjectives. Then they are asked to decide as fast as possible whether the adjective was positive or negative. The time it takes people to make this judgement is the independent measure.

Implicit Association Test (IAT) = assesses the strength of an association between two concepts with positive and negative evaluations. The response delays are derived from the participants’ use of two response keys which have been assigned a dual meaning.

Modern advertising faces a discrepancy between explicit and implicit consumer responses.

Not many consumers are willing to admit that they are often heavily influenced by advertising in their shopping behaviour and thus, scales designed to tap the persuasive influence of advertising often reveal a sceptic and resistant consumer. More implicit measures are needed to reveal advertising’s impact on consumer perceptions and behaviour. Wilson et al. explained this by suggesting that persuasive advocacies (like advertising) or new experiences might result in the creation of a new, second attitude without replacing the old one. Dual attitudes = different evaluations of the same attitude object, one on an automatic, implicit level, and one on a controlled, explicit level. Example: people who went often to McDonald’s in their childhood (positive attitude) now never go anymore because they found out it is unhealthy (negative attitude).

Are attitudes stable or context-dependent?

There is empirical evidence for both stability and malleability of attitudes. Attitudes can change with changing context and can be placed on a continuum of strength. This ranges from issues which are novel or irrelevant (weak), to issues which are familiar and important (strong). Through heavy advertising, initially unfamiliar brands can become highly accessible in consumers’ minds.

Attitudes = the categorization of a stimulus object along an evaluative dimension (Zanna & Rempel definition).

How do we form attitudes?

Attitudes derive from cognitive, evaluative/affective and behavioural information. Two criteria will be used to distinguish between processes of attitude formation and attitude change. Attitude formation is involved when the issue or object is new and unfamiliar. It is based on low effort cognitive processes that require little cognitive elaboration such as evaluative conditioning or heuristic processing. These processes will be discussed.

The formation of cognitively based evaluative responses

Beliefs about an attitude object are based on information individuals have gathered about the object. They can derive this information indirectly, or from personal experience. Brand-quality-, country-, and price-quality heuristics may also be used to predict quality.

Direct experience results in more information than indirect experience, and attitudes based on direct experience are held with more confidence, are more stable over time, are more accessible in memory, and are more predictive of future behaviour.

Fazio et al.: attitudes derived from direct experience are more accessible in memory than attitudes based on indirect experience are responsible for their greater impact on behaviour.

Doll and Ajzen: it is the greater temporal stability of experience-based attitudes rather than their accessibility that is responsible for the difference in attitudes. The more a person’s expectations prove to be consistent with the actual experience, the better the attitude will predict actual behaviour. Greater attitude accessibility and stability are independently responsible for the fact that experience-based attitudes are better predictors of behaviour than attitudes based on indirect experience. Therefore it is important to use marketing tools that promote direct experience (e.g. free samples) in addition to classic advertising.

If there is a dramatic change in context, the advantage of experience-based attitudes may be lost. Also the expertise and the trustworthiness of the source of the information has an influence on the impact of direct and indirect experience.

People often rely on heuristics to form attitudes, based on their own experience, culture, or on advertisements. Stereotype = belief about the attributes of members of an outgroup. Prejudice = the impact of stereotypes on people’s judgements of, and behaviour towards, members of an outgroup. This is considered bad.

The most often used heuristic cues in consumer behaviour are brand names, country of origin and price. Brand image = the beliefs, feelings, and evaluations triggered by a brand name. Brand images are strongly influenced by advertising. A brand associated with high quality can improve product ratings.

The country of origin is important when buying food, because consumers believe that ethnic food products are likely to be better if they come from the country from which the food originated. As for the price-quality heuristic, people expect that expensive is good. In the service industry, duration is an important heuristic: higher quality is inferred when service duration increases, especially in relation to price (when the duration:price ratio increases).

The formation of evaluative responses based on affective or emotional experience

Three pathways to the acquisition of evaluative responses based on affective or emotional experience are:

• Initially neutral stimuli can acquire positive valence through repeated exposure (mere exposure), or
• through association with events that already have positive or negative valence (classical/evaluative conditioning).
• Individuals may use the affect evoked by the stimulus or the stimulus context as information about this object (affect-as-information).

Mere exposure = attitudes towards stimuli become more positive with increasing frequency of exposure. Advertising wear-in = an advertisement’s impact only increases after an ‘incubation period’ of several exposures where effects are absent/minimal. Explanation for the ‘exposure effect’: frequency of exposure increases perceptual fluency; the ease with which information is processed. Repeated exposure results in a representation of the stimulus in memory. When the stimulus is encountered again, this representation will make it easier to encode and process the stimulus. The increased ease of processing is pleasant and positively affects the evaluation of the stimulus (hedonic fluency).

Classical and evaluative conditioning

Pavlovian/classical conditioning = a neutral stimulus that is initially incapable of eliciting a particular response (conditioned stimulus, CS), gradually acquires the ability to do so through repeated association with a stimulus that already evokes this response (unconditioned stimulus, US). Strategies based on this conditioning are used in advertising. Products are displayed in pleasing contexts with little relation to the product function, or linked to supermodels for example. It is assumed that the positive mood resulting from a pleasing context will be transferred to the product.

Evaluative conditioning effects can result from different processes:

• Misattribution = the evaluation triggered by the US is mistakenly attributed to the CS. Then the CS acquires the valence that was originally associated with the US. There is no awareness of the association between the CS and US.
• CS-US pairings might produce evaluative conditioning effects by causing individuals to form specific beliefs about the CS, e.g. linking a pizza brand to a race car, leading to consumers believing that the pizza will be delivered fast. This process involves inferential belief-formation resulting from a misattribution of some aspect of the meaning of the US to the CS.

Affect-as-information hypothesis = feelings may sometimes influence evaluations through feeling-based inferences rather than through repeated association with the stimulus. Individuals infer their attitude from their present mood state.

The formation of evaluations based on behavioural information

Besides behaviour as a direct experience, there are two other ways evaluations can be influenced by past behaviour, namely self-perception and reinforcement.

Reinforcement = when the interviewer responds with ‘good’ every time a participant agrees with a positive attitude statement, the participant will end up showing a more positive attitude towards the issue than one who has been reinforced with negative direction.

New and unfamiliar brands may particularly benefit from self-perception processes brought about by the direct experience marketing tools mentioned before. Example: people expressing more positive attitudes towards being religious after completing questionnaires designed to increase the salience of pro-religious behaviour.

How attitudes are structured

Attitudes are evaluations of an object which are based on cognitive, affective, and behavioural information. Not all attitudes have strong cognitive, affective and behavioural components. They might have only one or two. Now we will focus on the relationship between beliefs about an attitude object and the evaluation of this object. Attitude structure affects the durability of attitudes, their stability, their resistance to influence and their impact on behaviour.

Expectancy-value models = conceptualize beliefs as the sum of the expected values attributed to the attitude object. Beliefs consist of:

• Expectancy component = reflects the individual’s confidence that the attitude object possesses the attributes they associate with it. The more instrumental an attitude object is perceived to be in helping the attainment of positive values or goals and blocking the attainment of negative values or goals, the more positively the consumer will evaluate the object.
• Value component = the value a consumer attaches to the characteristics of an object.

Fishbein’s model assumes that people’s attitudes towards a brand are completely determined by the information they possess about the product attributes, or the beliefs that are salient at the time the express their attitude (information integration theory).

Rosenberg’s model is a consistency theory = makes the assumption that individuals try to achieve consistency between their evaluations and their beliefs.

Both models predict that changing people’s beliefs results in attitude change, but only Rosenberg makes the additional prediction that changing people’s evaluation of the attitude object should result in changes in their beliefs about the object.

Dual Mediation Hypothesis = the attitude towards advertisements influences brand attitudes through two pathways: indirectly via brand cognitions, and directly via evaluative conditioning. Exposure to the advertisement elicits the expectations that use of the brand will have a number of positive consequences. This positive affect is transferred to the brand through processes of evaluative conditioning. The liking for the advertisement will rub off on the product.

Attitude functions: why people hold attitudes

Categorization and attitude formation are the basic processes that enable consumer to bring order into the chaos of an overload of stimuli. Attitude functions:

• Knowledge function: they help us organizing and structuring our environment to interpret and make sense of otherwise chaotic perceptions.
• Instrumental function: they help us maximizing our rewards and minimize penalties in interactions with our physical and social environment.
• Utilitarian function: they help us to approach those stimuli, which in the past have been associated with positive reinforcements, and avoid those that have resulted in punishments.
• Object-appraisal function: the instrumental and utilitarian function combined: because attitudes are a categorization of stimuli along an evaluative dimension, every attitude can be assumed to serve the object appraisal function.
• Value-expressive function: they help reflect values that are central to our self-concept.
• Social identity function: they might help us to maintain relationships with important groups.
• Ego-defensive function: they help us protect our self-esteem by avoiding having to acknowledge harsh truths about ourselves or about threats from our environment.

Research on the functional approach to advertising has used one of these approaches:

• Individual difference approach = focuses on self-monitoring. Self-monitoring scale = differences between individuals’ scores distinguish people for whom image aspects of a product are particularly important from those for whom these aspects are less important. High self-monitors tend to be concerned about the image they project to others so behave themselves different in various situations. Low self-monitors behave more consistently.
• Object-based/functional approach = assumes that:
  • Some objects are reliably associated with one particular attitude function;
  • Persuasive appeals about these objects are likely to have the greatest impact if they match the function served by these objects.

To be successful in changing a person’s attitude, we must know why he holds that particular attitude and tailor the advertising message accordingly.

Attitude strength

Attitude strength = links aspects of attitude structure and attitude function. Stronger attitudes are characterized by:

• Higher stability over time;
• Greater impact on behaviour;
• Greater influence on information processing;
• Greater resistance to persuasion.

Determinants of attitude strength are accessibility, importance, knowledge, certainty, ambivalence, and evaluative-cognitive consistency.

Accessibility

Cognitive accessibility = how easily or quickly the attitude can be retrieved from memory. The faster the attitude can be retrieved from memory, the stronger the association between the representation of the attitude object and the evaluation. Brand awareness = the ease with which consumers can recall or recognize the brand.

Highly accessible attitudes are more predictive of behaviour than attitudes of low accessibility. They are also more resistant to social influence.

Attitude importance = usually measured by asking people how important an attitude object is to them personally, how deeply they care about it, and how concerned they are about it. The relevance of the attitude to cherished values of the individual, the relevance to self-interest, and the perceived relevance of an issue for the interests of important reference groups are important determinants of attitude importance.

Knowledge = about an attitude object is only moderately positively related to its importance. Individuals with a lot of knowledge should be better able to evaluate the validity of arguments about that issue than individuals with little knowledge. Therefore well-informed persons should be more influenced by strong arguments, while uninformed people are more influenced by heuristic cues.

Attitude certainty = confidence individuals have in the validity or correctness of their own attitude. It is possible to hold a neutral attitude with a high degree of certainty.

Ambivalence = a state in which an individual gives an attitude object equivalently strong positive or negative evaluation, i.e. both likes and dislikes the object. Strategies to assess this are measuring ambivalence as an experienced state or as structural ambivalence (= calculated from evaluations). Attitude objects associated with greater structural ambivalence are less cognitively accessible than attitude objects associated with less ambivalence. Ambivalent attitudes are less predictive of behaviour and less resistant to social influence than non-ambivalent attitudes.

Evaluative-cognitive consistency = the consistency between people’s attitudes towards an attitude object and the evaluative implications of their beliefs about the object. More consistent attitudes are more resistant to social influence than attitudes of low consistency.

Attitude strength and the context dependence of attitudinal judgements

Attitude strength is suggested to be the moderating variable responsible for the conflicting evidence on the context stability of attitudes.

Chapter E. Changing consumer attitudes with advertising

This chapter presents theories of persuasion = any change in beliefs and attitudes that results from exposure to a communication.

Stage 1. Theories which assume that persuasion involves the learning of persuasive arguments contained in a communication

The Yale reinforcement approach

Yale reinforcement approach = assumes that exposure to a  persuasive communication which successfully induces the individual to accept a new opinion forms a learning experience in which a new verbal habit is acquired. Receivers of a persuasive message will only accept the recommended attitudinal response if the incentives associated with this response are greater than those associated with their current position.

Lasswell: in order to understand persuasion you must know who says what to whom with what effect.

Source effect = the impact of the source of a communication on persuasion. Attribution of a communication to either a prestigious or a non-prestigious source influences the target’s evaluation of the communication.

Defensive avoidance = a strong fear appeal is so threatening that it is more effective for receivers to reduce fear by rejecting the appeal as alarmist rather than accepting the recommendation. However, later studies show that recipients’ willingness to accept a recommendation increases when the fear appeal increases in strength.

The information processing model of McGuire

McGuire’s information processing model = there are different stages involved in the processing of persuasive communications, and that determinants of persuasion can have different impacts at these five stages of persuasion:

1. Attention
2. Comprehension
3. Acceptance
4. Retention
5. Behaviour

The receiver must go through each of the above stages if the communication is to have an ultimate persuasive impact. Each stage depends on the occurrence of the previous one. It is assumed that a consumer has to go through every stage systematically in order to be persuaded. There are, however, many ways by which messages can have an influence, even without having been carefully processed. Processing becomes more important when the product becomes more complex and expensive.

McGuire suggests that determinants of persuasion can have different effects at different stages of the persuasion process. He uses only the reception and the acceptance of the message as stages for this. The more intelligent a person is, the more likely it is that he understands the message. However, he is then also more likely to be critical and therefore less likely to accept everything he hears/reads.

Stage 2. The cognitive response model

Cognitive response model = stresses the importance of the thoughts individuals generate (and rehearse and learn) in response to a persuasive communication (i.e. cognitive responses). The passive listener (McGuire model) is replaced by an active thinker who engages in a silent discussion with the communicator and argues for or against the arguments contained in a communication.

Listeners are active participants, who relate the communication to their personal knowledge by elaborating the message arguments and considering information that is not contained in the communication to generate thoughts for or against the arguments presented. The cognitive responses to these arguments determine the impact of persuasive communication on attitudes.

Thought-listening technique = subjects are asked to list all the thoughts or ideas they have while listening to the communication. Relevant thoughts are categorized into those who are favourable and those who are unfavourable to the communication. An index is used to assess the extent to which cognitive responses mediate the impact of the communication on attitudes.

If you think about a persuasive communication and scrutinize the arguments contained in the message, you will discover inconsistencies and therefore be reluctant to accept the recommendation. This is only the case if there are weaknesses and inconsistencies in the communication. Positive cognitive responses = thinking about strong and well-reasoned arguments produces favourable thoughts which enhance persuasion. Persuasion depends on both the extent to which recipients engage in message relevant thoughts, and the favourability of those thoughts.

Increasing message-relevant thinking should increase persuasion for strongly argued messages that mainly elicit favourable thoughts. For weakly argued messages that elicit mainly unfavourable thoughts, increasing message relevant thinking should decrease persuasion:

Stage 3. Dual process theories of persuasion

Dual process theories of persuasion = an extension of the cognitive response model:

• In contrast to the cognitive response model, which assumes that attitude change is always mediated by argument relevant thinking, even if the extent to which recipients think about arguments may be minimal, dual process models acknowledge that recipients may sometimes take short cuts and accept/reject the position recommended by the communicator without thinking about message arguments.
• Dual process theories specify the factors determining the intensity of message processing and thus the conditions under which attitude change will be mediated by message-relevant thinking.

The Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) and the Heuristic-Systematic Model (HSM) will be integrated into one framework.

Dual process theories distinguish two routes to persuasion, which form the endpoints on a continuum of processing intensity:

• Central route to persuasion = taken when recipients carefully and thoughtfully consider the arguments presented in support of a position = systematic processing.
• Peripheral route to persuasion = reflects the fact that people often change their attitudes without thinking about the arguments contained in a communication but for example because of a recommendation or because the issue is not important to them = heuristic processing.

The ELM subsumes the whole range of mechanisms which cause persuasion in the absence of argument scrutiny under the peripheral route, while the HSM only considers one low effort process, namely heuristic processing = the use of simple decision rules in deciding on whether to accept or reject a persuasive communication. The HSM position is adopted and heuristic processing is considered the low effort endpoint of the continuum of processing intensity.

Dual process theories distinguish between two types of qualitatively different information which recipients use when trying to decide whether to accept/reject the communication: the arguments contained in the communication and heuristic cues. The intensity of processing is determined by recipients’ processing ability and motivation: when recipients are unmotivated/unable to engage in systematic processing, they use heuristic cues. When they are motivated and able, they will engage in argument scrutiny. Heuristic cues are easier to process, while message arguments provide more reliable information.

Multiple-role assumption = the two modes of processing (heuristic and systematic) may co-occur, if systematic processing of arguments does not allow one to arrive at a clear-cut conclusion, because the arguments in the communication are ambiguous. Depending on the level of processing motivation, the attributes of the endorser of a product can be used as a heuristic cue to influence attitudes towards a product, but they can also serve as an argument.

Two other processing motives besides that recipients want to form an accurate view on the communicated issue, are:

• Defence motivation = we are not always unbiased listeners because we may have a strong preference for a particular position. For example: we prefer to see ourselves as smart instead of dumb.
• Impression motivation = the desire to express attitudes that are socially acceptable.

These motives can be both heuristic and systematic. Under defence motivation, people will use heuristics selectively to support their preferred position or, when processing systematically, attend more to arguments supporting their position than to opposing ones. Impression-motivated heuristic processing involves the use of simple rules to guide one’s selection of socially acceptable attitude positions. In systematic processing the same goal is reached through evaluating the available evidence in terms of their social acceptability.

Assessing the intensity of processing

The thought-listing technique can be used to assess the extent to which attitude change is based on systematic processing. If attitude change is due to systematic processing:

• then recipients should have generated some thoughts favourable to the position advocated by the communicator, and
• the relative (un)favourability of these thoughts should be correlated with the amount of attitude change.
• A favourability index should act as a mediator of the impact of the manipulated variables on attitude change with systematic but not under heuristic processing.

Processing ability, processing intensity and attitude change

Unless a person has knowledge of the product class in which he wants to buy something, being intelligent or having a classic education will be of little use.

The impact of working knowledge on processing ability

The amount of working knowledge an individual possesses in a certain area is the most important personal factor influencing processing ability. People without a lot of knowledge will be less able to critically evaluate the incoming information from an advertisement than more knowledgeable people. A low processing intensity message length acts as heuristic cue with longer messages considered more valid than shorter ones.

The most knowledgeable people are influenced by the arguments contained in a message, while the least knowledgeable are influenced by the heuristic cue of the message length. If arguments do not allow to draw clear conclusions, people will rely on heuristic cues even under high processing intensity.

The impact of distraction on processing ability

Distraction is the most powerful environmental factor that can influence an individual’s ability to process information. The impact of distraction on the extent to which people are influenced by a persuasive communication depends on the quality of the arguments presented. Distraction increases attitude change with weak arguments and decreases vice versa.

The impact of message repetition on processing ability

Repetition of arguments provides recipients with opportunity to think about and elaborate the message. With strong arguments, greater elaboration results in an increase of favourable thoughts and a decrease of counterarguments, leading to increased acceptance of the message. When message repetition further increases, people get bored, which motivates them to attack the argumentation.

If the positive impact of a small number of repetitions is due to the fact that repetitions provide increased opportunity to favourably elaborate the strong arguments, then repetition results in an immediate decrease of attitude with weak arguments. A lowering of processing motivation results in a decrease in recipients’ willingness to elaborate message arguments. Then boredom sets in earlier at a smaller number of repetitions.

Cosmetic variation = non-substantive features of an advertisement that are not essential in evaluating the product are altered in order to avoid/delay boredom.

Substantive variation = a change in message content, e.g. in the type of arguments made in order to avoid/delay boredom.

Once processing intensity increases, cosmetic variation will be ineffective and only substantive variation will reduce boredom/tedium. Frequency of exposure to advertisements is likely to have increased perceptual fluency which results in greater liking.

Processing motivation, processing intensity and attitude

Personal relevance as motivator

Personal relevance = the importance of an outcome for the individual, and the major variable that affects processing motivation. Most people are, for example, not interested in refrigerator ads, until they are in need of one.

Some refuse to gain knowledge about the product because of lack of time or incapability of understanding the information (ability factors) and just buy the product recommended in the store. Others critically read advertisements and test reports, and based on those, develop favourable attitudes towards a product or brand. Only when recipients of information are motivated, does argument quality influence the amount of attitude change.

Source expertise influences attitudes only under low involvement conditions, with more attitude change when arguments are attributed to a high status source.

In case there is a celebrity endorser in an ad, low involved consumers use the status of this endorser as a heuristic cue, while highly involved consumers still focus on argument quality. Physical attractiveness of the endorser works for both low involved consumers (heuristic cue) and highly involved consumers (as visual evidence for the effectiveness of the product).

Source congruity = the match between cognitively accessible endorser associations and attributes associated with the brand. This becomes important under high processing intensity.

Fear as a motivator

Advertisements for products like hygiene products and medication often point out that they protect consumers from unpleasant health impairment. First they warn them of some threat, then they recommended how consumers can protect themselves against it (i.e. by buying the advertised product). This is based on the assumption that the more you scare people about possible harm, the more they will be willing to buy something that prevents it.

Yale’s drive-reduction model: higher fear should result in more persuasion, but only if the recommended action is perceived as effective in averting danger.

Leventhal’s parallel response model: a threat is cognitively evaluated and this appraisal can give rise to two parallel/independent responses: danger control and fear control. Danger control = the decision to act as well as actions taken to reduce the danger. Fear control = actions taken to control emotional responses, and strategies to reduce fear. If a recommendation seems effective in averting a threat, individuals will engage in danger control. If it appears ineffective, they will mainly focus on fear control.

Stage model of processing of fear-arousing communication: the important determinants of the intensity of processing are the perceived severity of a health threat and personal vulnerability. If both are low, individuals will rely on heuristic processing. If the threat is severe, they will systematically process information about the threat, even if they do not feel vulnerable. When the threat is severe AND the individual feels vulnerable, he/she will be motivated to engage in (defensive) systematic processing. The defence motivation will lead to a positive bias in the processing of the recommended action and will heighten the motivation to engage in the protective action regardless of the quality of the argumentation.

Individual differences in processing motivation

The extent to which people think about message arguments are also affected by individual differences. Need for cognition = the extent to which individuals engage and enjoy effortful cognitive activity. Argument quality has a higher impact on attitudes of people who are high rather than low in need for cognition. Need for cognitive closure = the desire for a definite answer on some topic, any answer as opposed to confusion and ambiguity.

If heuristic cues are available, people with a high need for closure will form their attitudes based on those. People low on need for closure will rely more on arguments.

Processing intensity and stability of change

Attitude change caused by systematic processing is more persistent than change caused by heuristic processing. High levels of issue-relevant cognitive activity are likely to require frequent accessing of one’s attitude towards the issue targeted by the persuasive attempt. Effects: it results in better recall of one’s cognitive responses to the message, and it increases the number of linkages between an attitude and the structure of beliefs in which it is embedded, making the structure internally more consistent and more resistant to counterarguments.

Substantive variation in ad repetition does not only avoid boredom, but also increases the resistance of individuals against the negative impact of counterarguments.

Stage 4. Persuasion by a single route: the unimodel

The unimodel suggests that arguments and heuristic cues are functionally equivalent in constituting two separate content categories of evidence for drawing conclusions from persuasive communications.

Persuasion can be characterized as a singular process of drawing conclusions from available evidence. It doesn’t matter if this evidence if contained in an argument or comes from a heuristic cue. Heuristic cues are as valid as arguments.

Stage 5. Lowering resistance to advertising

Consumers often try to avoid advertisements, and even if they are exposed, their awareness of persuasive intent might increase their resistance and decrease the message’s impact. Persuasion knowledge = the theories consumers have developed about the motives, strategies and tactics of marketers as well their beliefs in their ability to resist these tactics. The focus will be one the impact of the attribution of intention to persuade. The perception of a communicator’s intention to persuade increases resistance in recipients of a message.

When consumers expect to be exposed to counter attitudinal arguments, they will be motivated to access the reasons that support their own position and use these arguments to counter the persuasive communication. When consumers are only warned about persuasive intent without providing information about the direction of the arguments, they are immediately resistant.

Psychological reactance = a motivational state that can be triggered by the perceived threat to one’s attitudinal freedom implied by a social influence attempt. This motivates individuals to re-establish their freedom, e.g. by resisting the influence attempt.

Discounting cue = decreases the impact of the arguments contained in an advertisement.

Sleeper effect = the phenomenon that the impact of a message increases over time, because after some delay, recipients of an otherwise influential message might recall the message but not longer remember the source.

Two-sided advertisements

Two-sided advertisements mention both positive and negative features of a product. They appear as more honest, and stand out from other advertisements. In the optimal case, only the negative attributes which are trivial or of which the consumer is already aware are mentioned. Hereby serious product deficiencies must be avoided, while admitting utterly trivial deficiencies may be too obvious.

Product placement

Product placement = the paid inclusion of branded products or brand identifiers through audio and/or visual means, within mass media programming. Example: James Bond driving a BMW in the movies. Product placement can be categorized according to two dimensions:

• Modality = whether the brand name is only seen or also mentioned;
• Centrality = the relevance of the product use to the plot. This has three levels:
  1. Background = when the product is shown/mentioned in a scene but not used by any of the main characters;
  2. More central is the situation where the product is used by one of the main characters but in a way that has no particular relevance to the story.
  3. Most central is the situation when the product plays a role in the story.

Centrality influences explicit memory: products placed prominently in a movie have a larger impact on recall and recognition than products that are placed subtly in the background. Implicit measures are not affected by the level of placement, although centrality does have a significant impact. Attitudes towards the brand used by the main character are more positive than when the brand is only shown in the background. Disliked characters and product placement that is too obvious, lead to negative results.

Shopping

Sponsorship = a technique by which a commercial organization financially supports an entity (event, team, person, cause, etc.) in order to associate the organization’s name with this entity in the media and to use it for advertising purposes.

Programme sponsorship = the advertiser assumes the total financial responsibility for the production of the programme and provides the commercials that are shown.

Event sponsorship = a company contributes to the costs of an event in order to be allowed to link its brand name to it. Advantages can be increased brand awareness, positive feelings and familiarity. When the event is liked, positive associations are transferred to the brand. Congruent sponsorships (e.g. a sports brand sponsoring a soccer event) are better remembered than incongruent ones (e.g. a brewery sponsoring a soccer event).

Chapter F. The effect of advertising on consumer buying behaviour

Although attitudes are important determinants of consumer behaviour, there are other things that are important as well, such as social norms and perceived behavioural control.

The attitude-behaviour relationship: a brief history

Human behaviour is guided by social attitudes. In the past, many researchers were not able to find a relationship between measures of verbal attitudes and observations of actual behaviour.

Principle of compatibility (Ajzen and Fishbein) = it is important when attitudes are related to behaviour, not whether. Measures of attitudes are only related to measures of behaviour if both constructs are assessed at the same level of generality. A specific action is always performed with respect to a given target in a given context and at a given point in time. One needs to make a behavioural index that aggregates across a representative variety of prejudicial actions, performed in a representative range of contexts, across a representative range of times.

Predicting specific behaviour: the reasoned action approach

Attitudes towards a certain type of behaviour result from the likelihood with which one expects that behaviour to lead to certain outcomes, with each outcome weighted by the value the individual attaches to that outcome. Attitudes are good predictors of behaviour, but behaviour is also influenced by social norms and environmental factors constraining the ability to engage in this behaviour. Two theories predict behaviour intentions and assume that the impact of attitudes/other components on behaviour is mediated by the intention to perform that behaviour.

Theory of reasoned action = the intention to perform a specific behaviour is determined by a person’s attitude towards that behaviour and by:

• Subjective norms:
  • Normative beliefs = your beliefs about how people who are important to you expect you to behave;
  • Control beliefs = lack of time, money, resources, etc.;
  • Motivation to comply = wanting to do what others want you to do.
• Perceived behavioural control = the extent to which performing a given behaviour is under the control of the individual.

Theory of planned behaviour = perceived behavioural control affects behaviour indirectly through intentions, but can also have a direct link to behaviour, which is not mediated by intentions. Perceived behavioural control has a causal influence on intention. The direct link from perceived behavioural control to behaviour is more predictive in nature.

Narrowing the intention-behaviour gap: forming implementation intentions

Behavioural intention: I intend to do X.

Implementation intention: I intend to do X in situation Y.S

People may fail to act on their intentions because they simply forget to act when the opportunity arises. Mental representation of context cues becomes activated when the time and context in which the behaviour should be performed are specified. The formation of an implementation intention will create/strengthen the association between the situational cues and the response that is needed for obtaining the goal. Then the formation of an implementation intention increases the probability that the action intention will be remembered when the specified situation/context arises.

How to resist a temptation: you first have to identify situations in which the risk of yielding to the temptation is high, then think of a coping response that can be effective in helping you to resist, and then cognitively rehearse linking the coping response to the situation.

Implications for advertising

How to design strong and effective argumentations:

Step 1: Decide what exactly you want to influence with the advertisement/commercial. Do you want to improve brand awareness or persuade people to buy a particular product? In the latter case, Fishbein’s and Ajzen’s techniques should be used. It doesn’t make sense to persuade people of a product’s qualities if they are unlikely to buy it because of subjective norms or perceived behavioural control.

Step 2: The specific beliefs which determine the targeted behaviour must be identified, because they are likely to strongly influence the purchase decision.

Step 3: Potential customers must not only be persuaded to buy the product, but also to form an implementation intention, when and where to buy it. Then it is more likely that they will actually make the purchase.

Beyond reasons and plans: the automatic instigation of behaviour

According to the theories of reasoned action and planned behaviour, attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control result in the formation of behavioural intention. This is the most direct cause of behaviour. Automatic processes = processes that occur without intention, effort or awareness and that do not interfere with other concurrent cognitive processes. One’s social and physical environment can influence behaviour without him being aware of being influenced.

The theories of reasoned action and planned behaviour assume that although people are guided by relevant attitudes, subjective norms and control beliefs in forming behavioural intentions, the activation of beliefs can be automatic and unconscious. However, since intentions involve some kind of planning, they are likely to be conscious of the process of intention creation.

Automatic and deliberate influence of attitudes

Implicit attitudes reflect people’s automatic responses, while explicit attitudes reflect cognitively controlled processes. Although attitude measures often converge (come together), under certain conditions they diverge. These conditions exist in the area of prejudice and self-regulation (e.g. liking chocolate, but not eating it because you are on a diet). It is expected that implicit measures predict behaviour better when individuals are unmotivated/unable to exert control, and explicit measures vice versa.

Automatic and deliberate influence of social norms

Intention should mediate the influence of subjective norms on behaviour (according to reasoned action and planned behaviour). It has been suggested that social norms might guide behaviour when people are being aware of their influence. Norms = if-then rules that state that in certain situations individuals should behave in certain ways (e.g. being quiet in a library).

Automatic and deliberate influence of goals

Goal-directed behaviour can be triggered by cues in the environment without an intention having been formed. Goals = actions/outcomes towards which individuals hold positive attitudes. For it to motivate striving for it, there must be a discrepancy between the actual and desired state, and the consumer must perceive the goal as attainable. Unconscious goals are determined by attitudes, norms and perceived behavioural control to the same extent as conscious ones.

Goals, habits and behaviour

People normally have a choice from various means to reach a certain goal. This poses a challenge to the cognitive resources. For goals to be automatically implemented, the selection of the relevant means to reach it needs to be routine. Habits = learned sequences of acts that have become automatic responses to specific cues and are functional in obtaining certain goals. Behaviour becomes habitual if it is performed frequently, regularly and under stable conditions.

Goal-dependent automaticity = well-learnt habitual behaviours like driving and dancing. Starting this behaviour involves an intention, but once the process has been initiated, the rest follows automatically. This kind of behaviour is hard to change.

Behaviour that is performed regularly and under stable conditions is better predicted by past behaviour under the same conditions than by intentions. Intentions predict infrequent behaviour under varying conditions better.

If habits are cognitively represented as links between goals and actions that are instrumental for reaching these goals, then forming implementation intentions should occur through the same processes as the formation of habits. A mental link between a situational cue and a specific action is created. With habits, the association is learnt through repeated behaviour, while with implementation intentions, the association is learnt through repeated mental simulation of performing the action in that specific situation.

Once a particular choice has become habitual, people are often not interested in alternatives anymore. Frequency marketing = awarding repeat buying through special benefits. Cognitive lock-in = when consumers have developed a particular skill in using a service, store, or product and switching to another would engender extra effort and time.

Implications for advertising: the return of the hidden persuaders

Subliminal advertising = advertising that uses messages (embedded in a film or television report) that are presented so briefly that viewers remain unaware that they have been exposed to advertising. Example: showing the McDonald’s logo for 0.5 second during a TV show. This kind of advertising is very manipulative and banned from several countries. Also, its effects haven’t been proved significant.

Transfer appropriate processing = a task like reading a sentence requires a set of sensory-perceptual or conceptual operations and engaging in these operations has the same effect as practising a skill. It increases the efficiency with which this skill can be re-enacted at a later time. Remembering is less considered a process by which the individual accesses some remainder of the studied information in memory than as a re-performance of an earlier act. The more there is similarity/overlap between the analytical processes engaged in during the learning and retrieval phase, the better will be the performance on a memory task.

Chapter G. Convincing consumers to accept request without changing their personal attitudes

Because many advertising messages are not aimed at informing or persuading but at seeking the response of compliance with a sales request, a typical playing field for the forces of social influence is direct response advertising (e.g. mail-order catalogues, tele-sales programmes, and sales promotion actions). Also, in-store promotions and point-of-purchase demonstrations can induce a direct consumer response, namely buying the product. Direct response advertising includes all the messages aimed at getting the consumer to directly response by making a purchase/accepting an offer.

Various social influences are employed in such situations. Compliance = the overt behavioural acquiescence response when a specific door salesman addresses a consumer in a face-to-face context. It can also be more indirect (e.g. an ad or catalogue that asks for quick response because the offer doesn’t last long). Cialdini et al. have identified six principles of social influence:

1. Reciprocity
2. Commitment and consistency
3. Social validation
4. Liking
5. Authority
6. Scarcity
7. Confusion principle (added by the authors).

Social influence and compliance without pressure

With conventional advertising, consumers are exposed some time before they find themselves in a situation where they can actually buy the product. The tactics used to foster compliance are frequently temporally and spatially close to that situation. The principles of social influence typically function to foster purchase (facilitation), but do not affect any of the other advertising objectives like improving brand awareness. They affect singular behaviour and are less effective in influencing longer-term behaviour like repeat buying.

Automaticity is the key of compliance techniques; the response must be mindless. Click-whirr response = a fixed action pattern, which unfolds more of less invariantly when suitable environmental stimuli are present in the influence context.

‘Click’ is the stimulus that prompts the behavioural response, and whirr is the actual unfolding of that response. Like automatic responses, click-whirr responses are fast, effortless, spontaneous, stable across situations, partly inherited, and frequently triggered by emotions. They are also performed routinely and outside conscious awareness. Their effectiveness relies on ‘mindlessness’ of the consumer.

Scripts = predetermined, stereotyped sequences of action that define a well-known situation. These are used by consumers to not having to think how to behave in certain situations. People need action rules that specify the actions that need to be initiated when cues in the environment signal that a certain script is appropriate. Least effort principle = when people only behave in a mindless manner if there is no sufficient reason to invest into mindful behaviour. Besides scripts, people also use cognitive heuristics to simplify complex decisions.

Sufficiency principle = the tendency to strike a balance between minimizing cognitive effort and satisfying motivational concerns. Script following and using heuristics are not completely unconscious processes, because they require conscious processing and awareness at some stage (conscious direction of the script to further cues and choosing certain heuristics consciously to base the behaviour on).

1. The principle of reciprocity

Principle of reciprocity = the motivation to return a favour: we should do to others what they do to us, both positively and negatively.

Door-in-the-face (DITF) technique = a sequence of rejection-then-moderation. A large request is followed by a more moderate target request. The fact that the influence agent makes a concession by slimming down the request, evokes the need to make a concession and to comply.

That’s-not-all (TNA) technique = an initial request is followed by a second request that is made more desirable. Consumer interpret the second request as a favour and are more willing to comply. There are two forms:

• Reduced cost form: the opening bargain is improved by a decrease in the price of the offer.
• Added value form: uses a fixed price, and instead adds desirable attributes/incentives to the initial offer.

In case of small requests, the costs of refusal often outweigh those of compliance. Therefore, it is often not necessary to use a scripted technique but all you have to do is ask. Consumers are also often willing to return a favour (e.g. a cash request, coupon, etc.). An important function of sampling is inducing such favourable behaviour. When consumers accept a free sample, they may feel in debt and thus purchase the product to return the favour of receiving the sample.

2. The principle of commitment/consistency

Commitment/consistency principle = the tendency to respond consistently/in line with previous behaviour. Shopping momentum effect = the tendency to engage in repeated acts of purchasing after an initial and unrelated act of buying. Once a person has given in to the temptation to buy, he will continue to do so. This principle is most effective when commitment is actively, publicly, with effort and freely chosen.

Foot-in-the-door (FITD) technique = compliance with an initial, small request increases the likelihood of compliance with a second, larger request, because the initial act of compliance triggers the principle of consistency. To comply with the second request, people often have to do more than just accept the first one, e.g. signing a petition or placing a sign in their yard. It is thus not the act of initial agreement that results in compliance, but how much effort is required to accomplish the first request. Self-perception theory = the consumer wishes to respond in such a way that his belief system remains consistent. Once he concludes he is ‘the kind of person that accepts these requests’ after the initial one,  he is more likely to accept the second one as well.

Lowball technique = soliciting commitment from customers with a particularly seductive offer and then changing the deal for the worse. Commitment sets in when the initial offer is presented. Example: hooking a customer with a car with all kinds of extras, and then saying that there has been made a mistake and that the extras are excluded from the price offered. Because the customer is already hooked, he is likely to still buy the car, although he has to pay much more than he initially assumed.

When consumers receive a free sample, the act of actually using the product generates a set of newly formed associations and cognitions. These cognitions are a powerful predictor of future behaviour. Product trials through sampling thus trigger both the principle of reciprocity and commitment.

3. The principle of social validation

Social validation principle = turning an eye to others to assess the merits of some object, issue or offer. It is used to suggest that others like what is presented, which convinces the target consumer that the offer can be trusted to be of value. This is very effective in ambiguous and uncertain situations and with experience (can only be found out during consumption) and credence attributes (difficult/impossible to ascertain, e.g. a professional’s advice).

Reference group = a person or group of people that significantly influences an individual’s behaviour. Communicates standards, norms, beliefs and values that are shared by others and thus can serve as a benchmark. Primary groups (e.g. friends and family) are more influential than secondary groups (e.g. trade unions) because they are small and enable face-to-face interaction. Membership groups = the groups one currently belongs to, aspirational groups = groups whose lifestyles, values, or norms one would like to have, and negative reference groups = groups to which the target consumers would not like to belong.

Image-conscious consumers are high self-monitors and are sensitive and responsive to normative social cues. Normative information is more effective on collectivists compared to individualists.

The ambivalence and uncertainty due to the attributes of the advertised product can be further moderated by psychological make-up of the consumer. Strong accuracy and impression motivations are likely to increase the impact of social proof on beliefs, attitudes, and behaviour.

When a consumer has a strong need to hold accurate opinions and values, and has the desire to hold attitudes and display behaviour that will satisfy salient social goals, social proof will have a large impact.

Values and Life-Style Typology (VALS) = claims to identify various groups of consumers along two axes, based on the availability of resources like income and intelligence, and three types of orientation: principle, status and action orientation. Principle-oriented consumers tend to act on the basis of their own beliefs and values and are not very sensitive to group influence. Status-oriented people have a strong impression motivation and therefore act based on others’ beliefs and values. Action-oriented individuals are physically and socially active.

1. Actualizers = have the most resources and achieved a balance between the three orientations.
2. Fulfillers = tend to be principle-oriented, having more resources at their disposal than believers.
3. Believers = tend to be principle-oriented.
4. Achievers = aim to impress others, more successfully than strivers because they have more resources.
5. Strivers = aim to impress others.
6. Experiencers = impulsive, young, sensation-seekers with abundant resources.
7. Makers = action-oriented like experiencers, but with fewer resources, thereby forced to focus energy on attaining self-sufficiency.
8. Strugglers = tend to be older, lack resources and are focused on survival.

4. The principle of liking

The liking principle = we are more likely to comply with the requests of someone we like than someone we dislike/feel neutral towards. Various factors influence liking in social influence situations. Familiarity is an important one: as the target consumer is exposed more frequently to the influence, familiarity increases and a positive attitude (liking) develops. Perhaps the most powerful influence sources are friends and family, because the warm feelings a person has for them, are transferred to the product. This is for example used when companies ask their current customers to bring in their friends.

Another important factor influencing liking is physical attractiveness. Attractive people are considered not only beautiful, but also honest, kind, intelligent, persuasive and sociable (attractiveness halo). A third factor is similarity: people tend to like people who are like them, because they often like themselves. Name-letter effect = liking products, streets, and career choice that share the same letters as your own name. In commercials, you often see quite ‘general’ people who are easy to associate with, in order to increase liking. Also simple gestures like a gentle touch or remembering the customer’s name can increase liking.

The fourth factor influencing liking is ingratiation. People tend to like those who flatter them, fuelled by their vanity. If you compliment a potential customer, it is more likely that he will comply with your request. The fifth, and last factor is bringing good news. When you bring positive news to someone, they are more likely to like you. The reverse is true for negative news.

5. The principle of authority

Authority = the power to influence others into behaving in a certain way either through coercion or with the aid of status and position related symbols. It often comes with social dominance, conveyed through titles, clothing, or products like jewellery or expensive cars that impress others and communicate a high status. Brand can have status as well: the mere presence of brands with specific salient attributes is sufficient to affect nonverbal hierarchisation behaviour, without the brand playing a significant role in the interaction of the people involved. Example: a man driving a Mercedes is considered more competent than one driving a Daihatsu, although the kind of car he is driving may have nothing to do with his area of expertise.

The most famous study regarding authority was done by Milgram. Participants had to act as a teacher who was obliged to give his student (an actor) an electronic shock when he answered a question wrongly. Every additional error made, meant a more intense shock. While motivated by the experimenter to go through, most teachers were willing to go to the point where the shock would have been lethal. Under the power/authority of the experimenter, most participants continued, while they had the option to walk out of the experiment. This indicates how strongly authority can affect a person’s behaviour.

6. The principle of scarcity

Consumers value goods that are scarce (rare, difficult to obtain, in short supply). Luxury brands often use scarcity as part of their strategy. The scarcity principle is also often used for special, ‘limited’ offers that only last for a set period of time. Its heuristic function: consumers think that high value objects are harder to obtain than less valuable ones. This influences their behaviour under conditions of mindlessness.

Commodity theory: limiting the product availability should enhance its desirability not because scarcity acts as a heuristic cue, but because increased scarcity instigates a tendency to form more extreme attitudes. This is the result of enhanced thinking about the merits of the product due to scarcity.

Dual process theories of persuasion: scarcity motivates more extensive systematic/central route processing. It functions as a heuristic cue, it increases the favourability of attitudes regardless of the arguments’ quality. If it prompts more extensive processing, it will increase persuasion when arguments are strong and compelling, but decrease it when arguments are weak.

Reactance theory: if availability is reduced, we feel that we lose the freedom to choose. This prompts a strong motivation to restore freedom.

7. The principle of confusion

When consumers are slightly confused, they may be more prone to comply with sales requests. Disrupt-then-Reframe (DTR) technique = characterized by a small ‘twist’/odd element, in a typical scripted request. The ‘disruption’ is followed by a persuasive phrase that concludes the script, the ‘reframe’ (e.g. “it’s an amazing deal”). This interferes with the consumer’s  ability to actively self regulate his behaviour by distracting him. It works because it directly drains his battery of resources (energy) and because it disrupts/derails his trail of negative thoughts (counterarguments). That way it distracts him and hinders his self-regulation. The persuasive message is then used to base the evaluation on.

Example: “Now is your chance to try your luck for 350 cents (disruption/odd element) a week… that’s € 3,50. It’s a bargain (reframe)!”

Mindlessness revisited: the limited-resource account

The origins of mindlessness (why people fall back on heuristics) are multiple decision moments, or sequential requests. Sequential request techniques like the foot-in-the-door technique trigger the self-regulatory resource depletion = processes involving active self-regulation, require resources that are finite: the active self can thus become depleted (out of energy).

The two-stage model:

1. The initial request or series of requests is presented to the target. Complying with these requests results in self-regulatory resource depletion, thereby producing mindlessness.
2. Self-regulatory resource depletion fosters the use of heuristics that encourage yielding to the target request: the target is more likely to comply.