Book Chapter 11Defying Legislated

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Chapter 11

Defying Legislated or Moral Laws:

Consumer Misbehavior

In This Chapter

▶ Understanding consumer misbehavior

▶ Grasping the motivations behind the misbehaviors

▶ Managing the misbehavior

In this chapter, I focus on consumer misbehavior, which is behavior that

violates laws and generally accepted norms of conduct in today’s society.

It’s important to be familiar with consumer misbehavior because it disrupts

the flow of consumption activities. And this disrupted flow can cause loss

to your business by the way of time and money. This loss can be caused by

theft or by distractions or disturbances that chase consumers away.

Consumer misbehavior is a big problem nowadays. More than $13 billion

worth of merchandise is shoplifted from retailers each year. And more than

10 million people have been caught shoplifting in the last five years. The

software industry alone loses billions of dollars annually due to pirating of

licensed material, both software and entertainment media. Identity theft has

become a huge problem as well. More than 15 million individuals were vic-

tims of identity theft in 2006 alone. Even though lawmakers have begun to

combat the problem with laws created to protect individuals from identity

theft, it hasn’t slowed this category of consumer misbehavior. In fact, it’s

growing annually. I share these alarming statistics with you in order to put

consumer misbehavior in perspective and so you can see the importance of

marketing your intolerance of consumer misbehavior.

Understanding the motives behind consumer misbehavior can be difficult. This

chapter is designed to help. In it, I explain the different types of misbehavior

and discuss the common motives that cause those behaviors. I also discuss

how the morals and beliefs of consumers influence the choice of whether to

engage in consumer misbehavior. Finally, I show you how you can adapt your

marketing strategy to aid in minimizing the occurrence and effects of consumer

misbehavior — at least, as far as they affect your business.

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184 Part III: Consumers in Their Social and Cultural Settings

Discovering What Consumer

Misbehavior Is All About

Consumer behavior is all about value; the ironic thing is that consumer mis-

behavior is also based on value. The difference is the way that consumers

attempt to obtain that value: morally or immorally.

For instance, consumers who shoplift or keep excess change that’s acciden-

tally given to them, think they’re receiving value. (They’re getting something

for nothing after all!) Consumers who purchase items with bad checks also

feel they’re getting value. The truth is that other consumers suffer because of

these consumers who are exhibiting misbehavior in exchange for what they

consider value. Consumers who break societal norms and laws usually have

no remorse for how it affects other consumers.

Some folks consider consumer misbehavior to be a division of human devi-

ance, which is behavior that’s considered unacceptable and not in line with

accepted social standards. This classification is often due to the fact that

human deviance has a long history of research behind it and consumer mis-

behavior has only begun to be recognized, making the research on this topic

difficult to find. You’ll notice that throughout this chapter, the topics that I

discuss are similar to the topics studied in sociology and human deviance

research.

Recognizing the difference between

misbehavior and problem behavior

To get a complete grasp on consumer misbehavior, it’s important to note

that misbehavior isn’t the same as problem behavior. Misbehavior describes

behavior deliberately harmful to another party in the consumption process;

problem behavior refers to behaviors that are outside of the consumer’s

control. Even though the line of misbehavior and problem behavior can be

blurred, the deciding line has to do with the issue of self-control.

This difference is important to recognize because if it’s a problem outside of

the consumer’s control, there isn’t much you can do to prevent it. These are

problems that individuals would like to stop, but they find difficult to do so.

Examples include drug addiction, compulsive shopping, and alcohol prob-

lems. You can’t do much to detour these situations; it takes professional help

to intervene. However, you can take some preventive measures to stop the

misbehavior — or at least lessen the effect it has on your business.

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185

Chapter 11: Defying Legislated or Moral Laws: Consumer Misbehavior

Table 11-1 shows some of the common misbehaviors and problem behaviors.

Notice that the behaviors in the left-hand column affect more than just the

person who’s participating in the behavior, and the behaviors in the right-

hand column affect only the person participating. (Also note that the behav-

iors in each row don’t correspond with one another.)

Table 11-1 Common Misbehaviors and Problem Behaviors

Consumer Misbehavior Consumer Problem Behavior

Shoplifting Compulsive buying or overspending

Fraud Eating disorders

Abusive consumer behavior Problem gambling

Dysfunctional sports behavior Binge drinking

Aggressive driving or drunk driving Drug abuse

Understanding the common forms

of misbehavior and their effects

Consumer misbehavior disrupts the consumption process. In order for the

process to occur in an orderly fashion, the expectations of the consumers,

marketers, business owners, and other consumers must coincide with one

another. If they don’t, conflicts can occur between the parties involved. These

conflicts can often cause frustration and sometimes even the loss of a sale.

For example, when you go shopping the day after Christmas, you expect

to wait in line to make your purchases. You hope that your wait won’t be

a lengthy one and that management does all it can to ensure that the wait

isn’t long. Management expects customers to conduct themselves in an

orderly fashion, keep their places in line, and wait their turns to check out.

Customers expect the same from each other. When you see consumers

become disruptive and abusive by cutting in line or exhibiting rude behav-

ior, it makes you feel uncomfortable — the nice, tidy process is disrupted.

Similarly, the process is disrupted by shoplifters and consumers that write

bad checks, because these behaviors increase your costs.

Some of the most common acts of consumer misbehavior include the ones I

explain in the following sections.

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186 Part III: Consumers in Their Social and Cultural Settings

Shoplifting

Shoplifting is officially understood to be theft of goods from a brick-and-

mortar store. Thousands of dollars are lost daily from the act of shoplifting.

This misbehavior affects all consumers because it increases the prices to

cover store losses.

Computer fraud

Computer fraud refers to any activity conducted illegally by using a computer

and Internet technology. Here are some of the main forms of computer fraud:

✓ Identity theft: This is the theft of another person’s name and private

information by another individual for the sole purpose of stealing their

identity to open credit card accounts or other financial accounts. The

increased reliance on the Internet and technology has contributed to the

rapid spread of identity theft. This type of fraud costs businesses thou-

sands of dollars. Businesses also suffer because of liability suits, fines,

and the loss of clientele that occurs when their security is breached.

✓ Illegal downloading of electronic material: Improvements in technolo-

gies have enhanced the ability for consumers to participate in the shar-

ing of illegal software, video games, and music. Consumers often can

illicitly download electronic material from a number of sources, such

as peer-to-peer networks. Consumers have been provided with alterna-

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