Theory Of Varied Consume Choice Behavior And Its Importance :: essays research papers

Theory Of Varied Consume Choice Behavior and Its ImportanceFor decades, scholars and practitioners have been frustrated by the verylimited capability of either psychological or marketing models to predictindividual choices on particular occasions. This paper discusses a theorywhich apologizes the degree to which the extant models omit alpha influencesthat produce varied individual choice behaviour. The focus of this paper is onthe sequences of product purchases. Discretionary actions and activities arealso covered.THE THEORETICAL AND APPLIED RELEVANCE OF varied BEHAVIOUR     The assumption that consumers make rational, utility-maximizing choiceshas played an important role in economic thought. As long as preferences remainunchanged, the consumer is expected to choose the close preferred of theavailable products. Thoughts about consumers behaviour towards substituteshold a interchangeable position. If a consumers preference for the most preferredalternative product declines or the product is currently unavailable, theconsumer is expected to choose a close substitute. From the firms strategicpoint of view, this means that the marketer of a secondary brand should makeits brand similar to the most popular brand.Careful consideration of the preceding description of consumer choicebehaviour and the firms selection of a strategy immediately leads one toquestion the oecumenical applicability of these assumption / thought. Althoughconsumers often display stable preferences, sound choice behaviour seldomremains constant. Instead, consumers frequently change their choices ofproducts or brands. Furthermore, the choices made on different occasions ofteninvolve two very different products or brands. In summary, changing, variedbehaviour is the rule. Managers often avoid the use of primary "me-too" brands,recognizing that consumers are seeking more than simple substitutes. Thistendency is seen directly in a number of product categories in which successfulproducts are seldom replaced with exceedingly similar products. Instead, a degree ofproduct newness is viewed as being essential to maintain consumer interest.The theory of consumer choice behaviour that is presented in this paperis designed to explain the typical degree of variability that consumers exhibitin a series of related choices. Should this theory more accurately describeindividual choices, than the meaning and prophetical power of many models must bequestioned. For example, the results from all preference-based mapping methods,such as MDPREF (Carroll, 1972) and the Schonemann-Wang (1972) models, should beinterpreted with great care. In these cases, the analyst must deny jumping tothe conclusion that the choice objects that appear close to each other havesimilar characteristics. All simple attribute-based choice models, such as the astray used conjoint method, must also be interpreted carefully. Here one mustresist the assumption that the set of most pr eferred items get out necessarily have