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Chapter 7:
Personality, Lifestyles, and Values
CHAPTER OBJECTIVES
When students finish this chapter they should understand why:
1. A consumer’s personality influences the way he or she responds to marketing stimuli, but
efforts to use this information in marketing contexts meet with mixed results.
2. Brands have personalities.
3. A lifestyle defines a pattern of consumption that reflects a person’s choices of how to spend
his or her time and money, and these choices are essential to define consumer identity.
4. It can be more useful to identify patterns of consumption than knowing about individual
purchases when organizations craft a lifestyle marketing strategy.
5. Psychographics go beyond simple demographics to help marketers understand and reach
different consumer segments.
6. Underlying values often drive consumer motivations.
CHAPTER SUMMARY
A consumer’s personality influences the way he or she responds to marketing stimuli, but efforts
to use this information in marketing contexts meet with mixed results. .The concept of personality
refers to a person’s unique psychological makeup and how it consistently influences the way a
person responds to her environment. Marketing strategies based on personality differences have
met with mixed success, partly because of the way researchers have measured and applied these
differences in personality traits to consumption contexts. Some analysts try to understand
underlying differences in small samples of consumers by employing techniques based on
Freudian psychology and variations of this perspective, whereas others have tried to assess these
dimensions more objectively in large samples using sophisticated, quantitative techniques.
Brands have personalities. A brand’s personality is the set of traits people attribute to a product
as if it were person. Consumers assign personality qualities to all sorts of inanimate products.
Like our relationships with other people, these designations can change over time; therefore,
marketers need to be vigilant about maintaining the brand personality they want consumers to
perceive. Forging a desirable brand personality often is key to building brand loyalty.
Brands have personalities. A brand personality is the set of traits people attribute to a product as
if it were a person. Consumers assign personality qualities to all sorts of inanimate products.
Like our relationships with other people, these designations can change over time; therefore,
marketers need to be vigilant about maintaining the brand personality they want consumers to
perceive. Forging a desirable brand personality often is key to building brand loyalty.
A lifestyle defines a pattern of consumption that reflects a person’s choices of how to spend his
or her time and money, and these choices are essential to define consumer identity.
A consumer’s lifestyle refers to the ways she chooses to spend time and money and how her
consumption choices reflect these values and tastes. Lifestyle research is useful to track societal
consumption preferences and to position specific products and services to different segments.
Marketers segment based on lifestyle differences; they often group consumers in terms of their
AIOs (activities, interests, and opinions).
It can be more useful to identify patterns of consumption than knowing about individual
purchases when organizations craft a lifestyle marketing strategy.
We associate interrelated sets of products and activities with social roles to form consumption
constellations. People often purchase a product or service because they associate it with a
constellation that, in turn, they link to a lifestyle they find desirable. Geodemography involves a
set of techniques that use geographical and demographic data to identify clusters of consumers
with similar psychographic characteristics.
Psychographics go beyond simple demographics to help marketers understand and reach
different consumer segments.
Psychographic techniques classify consumers in terms of psychological, subjective variables in
addition to observable characteristics (demographics). Marketers have developed systems to
identify consumer “types” and to differentiate them in terms of their brand or product
preferences, media usage, leisure time activities, and attitudes toward broad issues such as
politics and religion.
Underlying values often drive consumer’s motivations.
Two people can believe in and exhibit the same behaviors but their underlying belief systems
may be quite different.
CHAPTER OUTLINE
I. Personality
A. Personality refers to a person’s unique psychological makeup and how it consistently
influences the way a person responds to his or her environment.
1. There has been debate about whether the concept of personality is valid since it
changes with situations and circumstances.
2. Underlying characteristics are part of what defines behavior, but situational factors
often play a large role as well.
Discussion Opportunity—Explain your own personality. Are you consistent or inconsistent with
respect to this identified personality? Give examples. Ask some students to do the same.
Discussion Opportunity—Have students collect a series of pictures from ads in magazines that
would display their personality. Everyone should post these pictures on a sheet of poster board
and display them around the room. Each student should explain his or her ideas of himself or
herself. Does the class agree with the assessment? How well do you really know one another?
B. Consumer Behavior on the Couch: Freudian Theory
1. Sigmund Freud developed the idea that much of one’s adult personality stems from a
fundamental conflict between a person’s desire to gratify her physical needs and the
necessity to function as a responsible member of society.
2. Freudian Systems separate the mind into three parts:
a. The id (which is entirely oriented toward immediate gratification).
i. It operates on the pleasure principle (behavior guided by the primary
desire to maximize pleasure and avoid pain).
ii. The id is selfish.
iii. The id is illogical (it acts without regard to consequences).
b. The superego (which is the counterweight to the id).
i. It is a person’s conscience.
ii. It internalizes society’s rules and it works to prevent the id from seeking
selfish gratification.
c. The ego (which is the system that mediates between the id and the superego).
i. The ego tries to balance these two opposing forces according to the reality
principle, whereby it finds ways to gratify the id that will be acceptable to
the outside world.
ii. Much of this battle occurs in the unconscious mind.
3. Consumer researchers adapted Freud’s ideas because they highlight the importance of
unconscious motives that guide purchase decisions. Thus, consumers cannot
necessarily tell us their true motivation when they choose a product.
4. The Freudian perspective raises the possibility that the ego relies on symbolism in
products to compromise between the id and the superego. The product represents a
consumer’s true goal, which is socially unacceptable or unattainable.
Discussion Opportunity—Ask: What are some products that make their appeals primarily to the
id? What are some products that make their appeals to the superego (bring in examples if you
can)? Do products make an appeal to the ego? If so, how? Describe a mediation experience
where the ego functioned.
Discussion Opportunity—Bring evidence of symbolism (which might be considered to be
Freudian) that you have found in magazine advertisements.
5. Freudian applications in marketing often relate to a product’s sexual symbolism.
a. Some analysts speculate products can substitute for sexual gratification.
b. Male-oriented symbols, or phallic symbols, are designed to appeal to women.
Discussion Opportunity—Ask: Why is the Freudian school often associated with sex and
sexuality? What ramification does this hold for marketing? Does sex sell? According to Freud,
why or why not?
6. The first attempts to apply Freudian ideas to understand the deeper meanings of
products and advertisements were made in the 1950s and were known as
motivational research.
a. This research focused on interpretations of unconscious motives.
b. This form of research relies on depth interviews (several hours long, based on
assumption that respondent cannot immediately articulate latent/underlying
motives) with individual consumers.
c. Ernest Dichter pioneered this depth interview and used them to study 230
products.
*****Use Table 7.1 Here *****
d. Criticisms of motivational research:
i. It gives marketers the power to manipulate consumers.
ii. The technique lacked rigor and validity because interpretations subjective.
e. Benefits of motivational research:
i. Less expensive than large-scale quantitative survey data
ii. Ability to aid marketing communications by allowing companies access to
knowledge that helps them appeal to deep-seated needs
iii. Some findings intuitively plausible
C. Neo-Freudian Theories
1. Neo-Freudian (influenced by Freud) researchers felt that an individual’s personality
was more influenced by how he or she handled relationships with others than by
unresolved sexual conflicts. Famous advocates of this thought-path (Neo-Freudians)
included Karen Horney and Carl Jung.
2. Karen Horney proposed that people could be described as moving toward others
(compliant), away from others (detached), or against others (aggressive).
3. Alfred Adler proposed that a prime motivation is to overcome feelings of inferiority
relative to others.
4. Harry Stack Sullivan focused on how personality evolves to reduce anxiety in social
relationships.
5. Carl Jung developed analytical psychology.
a. He believed people were shaped by the cumulative experiences of past
generations.
b. Central to his ideas was the collective unconscious (a storehouse of memories
inherited from our ancestral past).
c. Shared memories create archetypes—universally shared ideas and behavior
patterns. These memories would be about birth, death, and the devil (as shown in
myths, stories, and dreams).
d. Advertising messages often include archetypes. Young & Rubicam uses the
archetype approach in its BrandAsset Archetypes model that Figure 6.1 depicts.
*****Use Figure 7.1 Here *****
Discussion Opportunity—See if you can find illustrations of Karen Horney and Carl Jung’s
theories in contemporary advertising. Indicate why you think the ads apply. Show examples if
possible.
D. Trait Theory
1. One approach to personality is to focus on the quantitative measurement of
personality traits or identifiable characteristics that define a person.
2. Common traits include:
a. Extroversion (socially outgoing) and introversion (quiet and reserved)
b. Innovativeness (degree to which a person likes to try new things)
c. Materialism (amount of emphasis a person places on acquiring and owning
products)
d. Self-consciousness (degree to which a person deliberately monitors and controls
the image of the self that he or she projects to others)
e. Need for cognition (degree to which a person likes to think about things and by
extension expends the necessary effort to process brand information)
f. Frugality (frugal people deny short-term purchasing whims in favor of
resourcefully using what they own)
Discussion Opportunity—Ask: What traits define you as a person? Give examples.
3. Call centers and media researchers find value in matching personality traits to
representatives/television shows.
4. Problems with Trait Theory
a. Many of the scales are not sufficiently valid or reliable.
b. Personality tests are often developed only for specific populations.
c. Tests may not be administered under the best conditions.
d. Researchers make changes in the research instruments to adapt them to their own
situations.
e. Many trait scales are only intended to measure gross, overall tendencies.
f. Many of the scales are not well planned or thought out.
5. Big Five Personality Traits
a. Openness to experience: The degree to which a person is open to new ways.
b. Conscientiousness: The level of organization and structure a person needs.
c. Extroversion: How well a person tolerates stimulation from people.
d. Agreeableness: The degree to which we defer to other people.
e. Neuroticism (emotional instability): How well a person copes with stress.
II. Brand Personality
A. Products, like consumers, have personalities. A brand personality is the set of traits
people attribute to a product as if it were a person.
1. Examples of personality dimensions include old fashioned, wholesome, traditional,
and lively, among others.
2. Forging a successful brand personality is key to building brand loyalty but it is often
difficult.
a. Consumers can detect if a brand is not living up to its claims and is inauthentic.
b. When consumers then share this opinion online by mocking the real brand, it is
called the “Doppelganger brand image” – one that looks like the original but is
in fact a critique of it.
c. Our feelings about a brand’s personality are part of brand equity, which refers to
the extent to which a consumer holds strong, favorable and unique associations
with a brand in memory and is willing to pay more for the branded version of a
product than for a non-branded version.
3. The creation and communication of a distinctive brand personality is one of the
primary ways marketers can make a product stand out from the competition and
inspire years of loyalty to it.
4. Personality analysis helps marketers identify a brand’s weaknesses that have little to
do with functional qualities.
5. Animism (whereby inanimate objects are given qualities that make them somehow
alive) is an old practice that is comparable to assigning human traits to brands.
Consumers tend to anthropomorphize objects, in other words give them human
characteristics.
*****Use Table 7.2 Here; Use Consumer Behavior Challenge Here *****
Discuss #6
Discussion Opportunity—Ask students if they can think of products that seem “to come alive.”
Have them describe how the marketer or advertiser creates this illusion. What type of impact
does this have on the consumer? What are the dangers of animism?
IV. Lifestyles and Consumer Identity
A. Lifestyle: Who We Are, What We Do
1. Lifestyle refers to a pattern of consumption reflecting a person’s choices of how he or
she spends time and money. It is (in an economic sense) how one elects to allocate
income.
2. A lifestyle marketing perspective recognizes that people sort themselves into groups
on the basis of the things they like to do, how they like to spend their leisure time, and
how they choose to spend their disposable income.
3. Other terms used to describe lifestyle are taste public, consumer group, symbolic
community, and status culture.
Discussion Opportunity—Ask: What are some different lifestyles that people about your age
(those attending and not attending college) tend to follow? What are the differences between
your lifestyle and someone who is a returning student (or a normal undergraduate if you are a
returning student)? A graduate student?
B. Product Complementarity and Co-Branding Strategies
1. People, products, and settings combine to express a consumption style. The adoption
of a lifestyle-marketing perspective implies that we must look at patterns of behavior
to understand consumers.
*****Use Figure 7.3 Here *****
1. Co-branding strategies are used by marketers to combine products that appeal to
similar patterns of behavior.
2. Product complementarity occurs when the symbolic meanings of different products
are related to each other. These products, termed consumption constellations, are
used by consumers to define, communicate, and perform social roles.
V. Psychographics
A. Psychographics involves the use of psychological, sociological, and anthropological
factors to determine how the market is segmented by the propensity of groups within the
market and their reasons to make a particular decision about a product, person, ideology,
or otherwise hold an attitude or use a medium.
B. How do perform a psychographic analysis?
Psychographic studies take several forms including lifestyle profiles, product-specific
profiles, general lifestyle segmentation, and product-specific segmentation studies.
C. AIOs
1. Most contemporary psychographic research attempts to group consumers according
to some combination of three categories of variables: activities, interests, and
opinions.
2. Table 7.6 lists lifestyle dimensions which can be used in psychographic profiling.
3. Marketers use the results of psychographic studies to do things such as:
Define the target market
Position the product
Better communicate product attributes
Develop product strategy
Market social and political issues
4. The best known lifestyle segmentation system is the Values and Lifestyles System
(VALS2). Figure 7.4 illustrates VALS2. VALS segments are grouped according to
resources and self-orientation. Self-orientation is either based on ideals, achievement,
and self-expression. The results include the following types:
Innovators
Thinkers
Achievers
Experiencers
Believers
Strivers
Makers
Strugglers
V. Values
A. A value is a belief that some condition is preferable to its opposite.
1. Two people can believe the same behaviors but their underlying belief systems may be
quite different.
2. Consumers often seek out those that have similar belief systems to their own.
Discussion Topic: Give illustration of how people with similar values band together. How is
this shown in advertising? Give an illustration.
VI. Every culture has a set of values that it imparts to its members. Core values do change over
time. In many cases, values are universal.
A. The process of learning the beliefs and behaviors in one’s own culture is called
enculturation.
B. Learning the value systems and beliefs of other cultures is acculturation.
C. Crescive norms are subtle, and are learned as we interact with others.
1. A custom is a norm that controls basic behaviors
2. A more is a custom with a strong moral overtone
3. A convention is a norm that regulates how we conduct our daily lives.
VII. Values are linked to consumer behavior. Consumption-specific values and product-specific
values affect the importance people in different cultures place on possessions.
A. The Rokeach Value survey identifies nine consumer segments based on the values that
affect consumption behavior.
1. The list of values (LOV) identify nine consumer segments based on the values that
affection consumption behavior.
2. The means-end chain model assumes people indirectly tie product attributes to
terminal values. Laddering identifies associations between specific attributes and
general consequences.
3. Syndicated surveys are used to track changes in values.
End-of-Chapter Support Material
SUMMARY OF SPECIAL FEATURE BOXES
1. Marketing Opportunity
If you know the personality type of the person you are speaking with, you can modify your own
communication style to work more effectively with that person.
2. Net Profit
Messages and products that allow a consumer to promote their uniqueness appeal to some more
than others. Product personalization allows buyers to customize an item to personal taste.
3. Marketing Pitfall
Colleges have brand personalities. Anomaly attempted an advertising campaign for ESPN based
on their notion of the personality at the universities, which was cancelled.
4. CB As I See It: Nira Munichor, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Like people, brands have personality, even arrogance. Consumers who have negative
self-evaluations feel better when they resist buying brands they perceive as arrogant.
5. Marketing Pitfall
Regional airline USAir was rebranded after 9 months and $40 million dollars of research to US
Airways.
6. The Tangled Web
The competitive nature of e-sports has increased the use of swatting, the act of calling police
departments to report incidences at celebrity’s homes.
7. Marketing Opportunity
There is an increase in the trend of cosplay, a form of performance art in which participants wear
elaborate costumes that represent a virtual world avatar or other fictional character.
8. Marketing Opportunity
Not all products that are successful in one country are successful in other countries. Consumer
preferences are based on beliefs about the ability of a product to replace a time-tested way of
solving an issue.
9. CB As I See It: Giana Eckhardt, Royal Holloway University of London
The Sharing Economy promotes resource sharing for consumers who don’t want to own, but
need access to goods and services on occasion, such as a car from Uber, or play to stay from
Airbnb.
