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Mirza Sheriyar Raza (02093-016) Sayyad Owais Gilani (02093-017)

Section: A

Subject: Consumer Behavior

Topic:

Strategies that change attitude components

Submitted to:

Dr. Irfan Amir

Strategies to change attitude components:

How consumers are formed and how they are changed are two closely related issues of

considerable concern to marketing practitioners. When it comes to attitude formation, it is useful

to remember that attitudes are learned and that different learning theories provide unique insights

as to how attitudes initially may be formed. Attitude formation is facilitated by direct personal

experience and influenced by the ideas and experiences of friends and family members and

exposure to mass media. In addition, it is likely that an individual’s personality plays a role in

attitude formation.

Marketers often attempts to influence consumer behavior by changing one or more of the

underlying attitude components. First it is change the cognitive component. A common and

effective approach to changing attitudes is to focus on the cognitive component. Four Basic

marketing strategies are used for altering the cognitive structure of a consumer attitude. Change

belief is the strategy involves shifting beliefs about the performance of the brand on one or more

attributes. There is some evidence that beliefs tend to be consistent with each other. Thus,

changing one belief about a brand may result in other beliefs changing to remain consistent with

the changed belief. Most consumers consider some product attributes to be more important than

others. In shift importance marketers often try to convince consumers that those attributes on

which their brands are relatively strong are the most important. Another approach to changing

the cognitive component of an attitude is to add new beliefs to the consumer’s belief structure.

The final strategy for changing the cognitive component is to change the perceptions of the ideal

brand or situation.

Now the second one is changing the effective component. Firms increasingly attempts to

influence consumers’ liking of their brands without directly influencing either beliefs or

behavior. Marketers use three basic approaches to directly increase affect: classical conditioning,

affect toward the ad itself, and mere exposure. In classical conditioning approach, a stimulus the

audience likes, such as music, is consistently paired with the brand name. Now it is the affect

toward the ad or website. Liking the advertisement generally increases the tendency to like the

brand. Somewhat similar results are associated with liking the website on which an ad appears

(Aweb). Using humor, celebrities, or emotional appeals increases Aad and Aweb. While

controversial, there is evidence that affect or brand preference may also be increased mere

exposure. That is, simply presenting a brand to an individual on a large number of occasions

might make the individual’s attitude toward the brand more positive. A common explanation of

the mere exposure effect is that “familiarity breeds liking”.

Now the last one is change the behavioral component. Behavior, specifically purchase or use

behavior, may precede the development of cognition and affect. Or it may occur in contrast to

the cognitive and affective components. For example, a consumer may dislike the taste diet soft

drinks and believe that artificial sweeteners are unhealthy. However, rather than appear rude, the

same consumer may accept a diet drink when offered one by a friend. Behavior can lead directly

to affect, to cognitions, or to both simultaneously.

Strategies of the attitude change can be classified into six distinct categories: (1) changing the

basic motivational function, (2) associating the attitude object with a specific group or event,

(3) relating the attitude object to conflicting attitudes, (4) altering components of the

multiattribute model, (5) changing beliefs about competitors’ brand, and (6) the elaboration

likelihood model. Each of these strategies provides the marketer with alternative way of

changing consumers’ existing attitudes.

There are some strategies for influencing and changing attitudes: (1) Changing existing beliefs

and values, (2) Creating new needs and aspiration, (3) Using group influences, (4) Understanding

intervening factors. Changing existing beliefs and values includes provide information that

challenges individual beliefs and challenges. Creating new needs and aspiration means point out

benefits of behavior change and reward behavior change, remove ego threats and provide ways

to better understand environment. Using group influences is to involve individual in groups

which reward the desire attitude. Understanding intervening factors means to become familiar

with individual’s background and its effects on attitude and behavior.

References:

Leon G. Schiffman, & Leslie Lazar Kanuk (2006). Consumer behavior: Consumer attitude formation and change (9th ed.). New Jersey, USA: Prentice Hall.

Hawkins, D, Mothersbaugh, D, & Best, R (2007). Consumer Behavior: Building Marketing Strategy. New York City: McGraw-Hill

Breckler, S. J. (1984). Empirical validation of affect, behavior, and cognition as distinct components of attitude. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 47, 1191-1205.