When you see this ad what are your feelings?
How do feel towards the
product?
How do you feel about the
advertisement?
You may feel positive about
the product but you do not have a positive feeling towards the ads. As
consumers, we have a vast number of such feelings towards products, services,
advertisements, websites, retail stores etc. Our likings and dislikings, in other
words are known as our attitude.
An attitude is
a learned predisposition to behave in a consistently favorable or unfavorable
way with respect to a given object.
For marketers knowledge of
attitudes is valuable because attitudes can be used to predict behavior before
it occurs. Attitudes can explain consumers’ disposition by measuring
perceptions, evaluations, and intentions. By knowing the strength of these
components, marketing strategies can be designed to affect these
components.
The Attitude “Object”
We don’t usually have an
attitude in general, we have attitude towards something called as object.
Object refers to such things as: product, product category, brand,
service, possessions, product use, causes or issues, people advertisement
price, Internet site, price, medium, or retailer. Attitude can also be towards
a brand ambassador!
Attitude “can be
conceptualized as a summary evaluation of an object.” Market researchers tends
to be object specific in conducting attitude research.
Attitudes Are a Learned Predisposition
Attitudes
are learned and are formed as a result of direct experience with the product,
information acquired from others, and exposure to mass media, the Internet, and
various forms of direct marketing.
Although attitudes may result in behaviors, they
are, however, not synonymous with behavior. Although attitudes may be
relatively consistent with behavior, but they may deviate due to situational
factors, such as time, place, and social environment. A person may have a
positive attitudes towards a brand but may not buy it because of economic
constraints or may want to try a brand which is new in the market.
As learned predispositions,
attitudes have a motivational quality. Having positive attitude towards a brand
help sell it in a new variant. For example, Due to high favourable attitude, it
was easy for Dettol to enter into hand sanitizer category.
Attitudes Have Consistency
Attitudes are relatively
consistent but not necessarily permanent. They do change. Marketer efforts are
instrumental in changing attitudes. Marketers at times attempt
at challenging stereotypes to change an attitude.
Attitudes Occur Within a Situation
Consumer
attitudes occur within, and are affected by, the situation. A specific
situation can cause consumers to behave in ways seemingly inconsistent with
their attitudes. The reason behind this is that the consumers can have a
variety of attitudes toward a particular object, each tied to a specific
situation or application. It is important when measuring attitudes that we
consider the situation in which the behavior takes place, as consumers can
behave in ways seemingly inconsistent with their attitudes, or the relationship
between attitudes and behavior could be misinterpreted.
Attitude towards a hybrid car may be favourable on number of factors but overall behaviour may be different and may not exceed attitude towards other.
STRUCTURAL MODELS OF ATTITUDES
Psychologists have developed several models that capture the underlying
dimensions of an attitude. The focus has been on specifying the composition of
an attitude to better explain or predict behavior.
Let us understand some models that are developed to
understand the composition and scope of attitude.
1. TRI-COMPONENT ATTITUDE MODEL
According to the tri-component attitude model, attitudes
consist of three major components: cognition, affect, and conation.
The Cognitive Component
Cognitions are knowledge and perceptions that
a person already have about a product. He gains this knowledge through direct
experience with the attitude object or may search, read and discuss to gain
information from various sources. This previous knowledge and perceptions
commonly take the form of beliefs. The consumer believes that the attitude
object possesses various attributes and that specific behavior will lead to
specific outcomes.
A person planning to buy a car will evaluate the
petrol and diesel variants according to his beliefs. He would also search
online and compare various features and read articles about the same before
finalizing anything.
The Affective Component
The affective
component of an attitude consists of the consumer’s emotions or feelings.
Researchers frequently treat these emotions and feelings as evaluative in
nature. The extent to which a person relate to the attitude object is
determined. Previous experiences that affects the consumer attach a kind of evaluation
to it, such as good or bad. These evaluations when combined with the emotional
state of the individual, such as happiness or sadness, may enhance positive or
negative experiences for the consumer.
For example, a person visiting Starbuck’s Coffee
Shop may have following evaluations that results in affective components.
Recent research suggests that “positive and negative forms of affect
operate differently and that their direct and indirect effects on attitudes are
influenced by brand familiarity.” In addition to using direct or global
evaluative measure of an attitude object, consumer researchers can also use a
battery of affective response scales to construct a picture of consumers’
overall feelings about a product, service, or ad.
The sensual pleasures associated with the
consumption experience is known as Hedonism. Hedonism is the highest form of
affective component. As consumers we have higher evaluation for the objects
that gives us sensual pleasure. A R Rahman’s composition for an advertisement creates
a positive attitude towards the brands. Fragrance samples, sound clips inserts
in magazine, cool, welcoming environment in a retail store are some other
examples.
The Conative Component
Conation component of the
tri-component attitude model, is concerned with the likelihood or tendency that
an individual will undertake a specific action or behave in a particular way
with regard to the attitude object. The conative component may include the
actual behavior itself. In marketing and consumer research, the conative
component is frequently treated as an expression of the consumer’s intention to
buy. Intention-to-buy scales are used to assess the likelihood
of a consumer purchasing a product or behaving in a certain way.
Tri--component Model can also be seen as
2. MULTI-ATTRIBUTE ATTITUDE MODEL
Reference: Schiffman & Kanuk
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