Consumer Psychology

Consumer Psychology: studies the habits of consumers in the marketplace Obedience: when authority does exist, and behavior is changed as a result ● Stanley Milgram’s Shocking Research: studies of conformity and wondered how much impact social influence could have on behavior. Participants were “randomly” assigned to teacher or learner role. But learner was a confederate that had a simple memory test for paired words. Teacher shocked the learner if incorrect and increased intensity. Learner wasn’t shocked but screamed and hit wall of discomfort and asked to end. Teacher asked to stop but had to continue. ○ Predicted that they would stop but all of them went to 300 and even at deadly shock. Had to obey or disobey the authority to continue and may be due to foot-in-the-door technique due to smaller shock increments. 65% of teachers will deliver shocks up to point of being lethal ○ Ethical issues on if they suffered damaged self-esteem and stress from realization that they were willing to administer killer shocks, and that deception violates right to participate in experiment and inadequate debriefing that learner wasn’t actually shocked ○ Proximity to Learner: the closer the teacher was to learner, the lower final intensity (closer so hear immediate reactions) ○ Distance to Teacher: the further away the authority was from the teacher, the lower final intensity (closer so obeys more) ○ Authority Type: the legitimacy of authority didn’t need to be extremely high status ○ Group Support: a dissenting other lowered final intensity of shock (if others present disagree, then more likely to also disagree) ● Follow-up study replication. The more prompts that seemed like an order, the less likely the teachers obeyed. Instead of obedience, Milgram’s study could’ve been more about social identity. Participants identified themselves more in line with the experimenter than the learner so they acted to commit to the goal of the experimenter so they thought that what they were doing was right Compliance: changing one’s behavior due to other people directing or asking for the change. Person asking doesn’t have the power of authority Compliance strategies based on an initial refusal: Foot-in-the-Door technique: asking for a small commitment, after gaining compliance, asking for a bigger commitment ● Individualistic cultures (U.S.) more likely to comply with a second request than people in collectivistic cultures (Japan) ● Ex. Door-to-door Sales people ● Study Freedman and Frasier: ask people to put unattractive sign on their wealthy houses so large request compliance was 16.7% so then asked to just put in window. Later, asked to put larger and ugly sign up so foot in the door compliance is 76.0% if already put small sign in window Door-in-the-Face Technique: asking for a large commitment and being refused and then asking for a smaller commitment ● Ex. Neighbor asks to take care of cat and dog but says no so neighbor asks to water his plants instead ● Study Cialdini: ○ Smaller request only: 16.7% ○ Rejection Moderation: 50.0% Lowball Technique: temporarily reduce the cost or request. Get a commitment to the cheaper request then reinstate the original higher cost. getting a commitment from a person and then raising the cost of that commitment ● Related to Foot-in-the-door, once a commitment is made, the cost (time, effort, money, sacrifices) of that commitment is increased ● Ex. TV companies advertise low prices but then when sign up, there's more costs ● Study Cialdini: control asked to do study only at 8am, tell about task and commit to it. Low ball is when tell about task to talk with people and then say its at 8am ○ Control: Task -> Time -> Commitment ○ 24% behaviorally commit ○ Low Ball: Task -> Commitment -> Time ○ 53% behaviorally commit