exercise 2
Chapter 4: learning and memory
Dr. Jennifer Houston mar4503
How do we learn?
Theories about how we learn are heavily rooted in both behavioral and cognitive psychology
Behavioral learning theories assume that learning takes place as a result of responses to external events
Classical conditioning
Instrumental conditioning
Cognitive learning theories stress the importance of internal mental processes
Learning is a relatively permanent change in behavior caused by first-hand and observed experiences
Learning is an ongoing process, and sometimes we aren’t aware that we are learning – this is incidental learning, or the casual and unintentional acquisition of knowledge
Behavioral learning theories
The main components of classical conditioning are unconditioned stimuli, conditioned stimuli, and conditioned responses
Real life example:
Publix offers weekly by one, get one sales at their retail locations (unconditioned stimulus) that naturally drives purchasing behavior (the desired response). To reinforce the shopping behavior, Publix starts handing out free cookies during each of their buy one, get one events (conditioned stimulus). After repeated experiences of receiving cookies when these sales occur, a consumer learns to positively associate receiving a cookie with feeling like they’ve gotten a good deal on their groceries (conditioned response). Eventually Publix stops having their buy one, get one sales, but continues to give customers a free cookie on each visit. The presence of the cookie is now associated with feeling like you’re getting a good deal on your purchase.
Classical conditioning occurs when a stimulus that elicits a response is paired with another stimulus that initially does not elicit a response on its own
Over time this second stimulus causes a similar response because we learn to associate it with the first stimulus
Behavioral learning theories
Just like that, a free treat from the bakery that costs the organization significantly less than their buy one, get one sales has reinforced your shopping behavior at their grocery stores
For this psychology to trick to work on your consumer behavior, Publix would have to pair their sales with their free cookies in repetition to increase the stimulus-response association of getting a good deal
Effectiveness also depends on occasionally reinforcing the behavior by pairing a sale with a cookie from time to time to keep the association strong
Once the association has diminished, the consumers response of feeling like they’ve gotten a good deal simply because they’ve gotten a free cookie may face extinction
Classical conditioning occurs when a stimulus that elicits a response is paired with another stimulus that initially does not elicit a response on its own
Over time this second stimulus causes a similar response because we learn to associate it with the first stimulus
Behavioral learning theories
While using classical conditioning to strengthen your purchasing behavior, Publix may find that other bakery treats elicit a similar conditioned response
Stimulus generalization refers to the tendency of similar stimuli to a CS to evoke similar conditioned responses
Similar stimuli can have a halo effect, where consumers react to other stimuli (perhaps a pub sub?) in the same way that they react to the original stimulus
Classical conditioning occurs when a stimulus that elicits a response is paired with another stimulus that initially does not elicit a response on its own
Over time this second stimulus causes a similar response because we learn to associate it with the first stimulus
Behavioral learning theories
If free Publix cookies aren’t your thing, lets look at the most well-known experiment in classical conditioning: Pavlov’s dog study
Practical applications of classical conditioning
Stimulus generalization is central to branding and packaging decisions that try to capitalize on a consumers’ positive association with an existing brand or company name
Family branding – capitalizing on the reputation of a company name
Product line extension – adding related products to an established brands mix
Licensing – renting well-known names to other kinds of products
Look-alike packaging – distinctive packaging has strong associations which some try to copycat
Behavioral learning principles apply to many consumer phenomena, such as when a marketer creates a distinctive brand image or links a product to an underlying need
Conditioning can strengthen the brand equity a consumer feels and lead to customer loyalty
Instrumental conditioning theories
Instrumental conditioning shapes behaviors through giving and withholding punishments and rewards
The key elements of this kind of conditioning are
Reinforcement (positive or negative) that strengthens responses, so we learn the appropriate behavior
Punishment (positive or negative), or unpleasant events that follow an inappropriate or unwanted behavior
Extinction, or when someone no longer receives a reward and ceases the desired behavior
Instrumental, or operant conditioning, occurs when we learn to perform behaviors that produce positive outcomes and avoid those that yield negative outcomes
Marketers hope that consumers learn desired purchasing behaviors as a result of shaping
Instrumental conditioning theories
Examples of reinforcement schedules include:
Fixed-interval reinforcement, where after a specified time period has passed, the first response you make brings the reward
Variable-interval reinforcement, where the time that must pass before you get reinforced varies based on some average (ex: secret shoppers)
Fixed-ratio reinforcement, when reinforcement occurs only after a fixed number of responses
Variable-ratio, when you get reinforced after a certain number of responses, but you don’t know how many responses are required
Instrumental conditioning works best when the conditioner uses a specific reinforcement schedule
Practical applications of instrumental conditioning
Frequency marketing rewards regular purchasers with prizes that get better as they spend more
Think of the sales techniques where you get $10 off a purchase of $50 or more, $20 off $75 or more, $30 off 100 or more and etcetera – these are usually rewards you earn after an initial purchase has been made
Marketers can also use gamification to provide rewards to customers to encourage them to buy more
Example: buy 9, get the 10th free with this card!
Principles of instrumental conditioning are at work when a marketer rewards or punishes a consume for a purchase decision
Cognitive learning theory
Observational learning is a cognitive learning theory that occurs when we watch the actions of others and note the reinforcements they receive for their behaviors
Learning is a vicarious as opposed to direct process
As human beings in a social world, we have a natural tendency to model (imitate) the behavior of others, especially when we may be uncertain of what is expected of us
We may model the shopping habits of friends and family if we’re uncertain on which product to buy
Unlike behavioral theories, cognitive theories stress the importance of internal mental processes
This perspective views people as problem-solvers who actively use information from the world around them to master their environments
Cognitive learning theory
For social learning and modeling to be effective, the following conditions must be met:
The consumers attention must be directed to the appropriate model, whom, for reasons of attractiveness, competence, status, or similarity, they must want to emulate
The consumer must remember what the model says or does
The consumer must convert this information into actions
The consumer must be motivated to perform these actions
Cognitive learning theory
Let's use the example of an Instagram influencer…
Your favorite influencer is someone you want to emulate because you associate them with some sort of attractive qualities
When going to the store or ordering online, you have a list of products based on what your influencer uses
You go specifically to stores that sell the advertised brand
You purchase the product because if Kylie Jenner says you’re going to be fabulous, you’re going to be fabulous
Cognitive learning theory
We learn many of our behaviors from the influents of our parents and other adults who serve as role models
Children are exposed to television and internet advertisements at a very young age, and marketers can target children early in life with the hopes of building lifelong habits
Marketers segment to kids based on their stages of cognitive development (limited, cued, and strategic)
Once children get older, their ability to comprehend the information in product-related messaging increases AND they have yet to develop cognitive defenses to advertisements, making them susceptible to persuasive marketing
Our ability to learn vicariously when we observe the outcomes of what others do makes the lives of marketers much easier.
Consumer socialization, or the process by which young people acquire skills, knowledge, and attitudes relevant to their functioning in the marketplace, further relieves the marketer of some of the burdens involved in learning desired behaviors
Let's get a little bit deeper
Into some science and psychology of the brain
memory
Memory is a process of acquiring information and storing it over time so that it will be available when we need it
Contemporary approaches to the study of memory employ an information-processing approach, with data being input, processed, and output for later use
memory
The three primary memory processes and the different types of memory processes are the basic building blocks of all things related to how we remember
memory
Sensory, working (once known as short-term), and long-term memory systems are described in a temporal way (aka how long can I hold onto this information?)
Memory is also broken down by types
Episodic memory is narrative of the who, what, when, where, why, and how of our lives
Semantic memory is one’s general knowledge of the world, or very broad truths (ex: 2+2=4, the sky is blue)
Autobiographical memory is the narrative of our personal life and identity, and is a combination of our episodic personal experiences and the semantic knowledge we accumulate throughout our lives
When looking at any type of memory or memory network, we can break our memory down into:
What we remember about our pasts
How we’re actively encoding and retrieving memories in the present
How our memories relate to our future selves
Accessing our Memory
Memories of events that are more meaningful to us tend to be the most persistent and easy to retrieve
We can also retrieve memories more easily by regularly accessing memories that are important to us
And by creating as many different retrieval cues as we can in relation to these important memories
Memories of our past are accessed through retrieval – fetching our memories from LTM and bringing them into our working memory
Episodic memory
There are also two ways we encode episodic memory
Intentional learning – actively engaging in learning
Incidental learning – encoding information to remember as a byproduct of perceiving and understanding the world
There are also ways we can control the stimuli we focus on and how we rehearse memories
Elaborate rehearsal involves processing for meaning while information is in our working memory
Maintenance rehearsal is a repetitive rehearsal that only requires shallow processing (but less detail encoded)
Episodic memory
Survival processing: we are biologically wired to learn about what may potentially harm us and avoid this harm at all costs
Flashbulb memories (also called tunnel memories) are one example of how survival processing is linked to our memory
When highly emotional, stressful, or traumatic events surprise us, our memories rapidly consolidate (cortisol)
This consolidation creates pictures in our memory of the central details of the event
This has an evolutionary basis – learning from our failures
Let’s get into the semantics now
Semantic memory can be looked at through the associative model: representing information in terms of connections with other units of information
Nodes are a unit of memory and are connected to one another – loosely or strongly depending on encoding
memory
Retrieval takes place when one node is activated based on the input from a cue
Once a node is activated, this activation will spread to existing associated nodes – spreading activation
memory
Types of spreading activation in marketing:
Brand-specific – memory is stored in terms of claims the brand makes
Ad-specific – memory is stored in terms of the medium or content of the ad itself
Brand identification – memory is stored in terms of the brand name
Product category – memory is stored in terms of how the product works of where it should be used
Evaluative reactions – memory is stored as a positive or negative emotion
Spreading activation allows us to shift back and forth among levels of meaning
The way we store a piece of information in memory depends on the type of meaning we assign to it, which is important to understand when marketers are trying to build associations and initiate spreading activation in the minds of consumers
Levels of knowledge
Concepts are mental constructs that contain information associated with a specific idea
Categories are constructs referring to a set of objects/ideas that are grouped together or associated with each other
Categories have levels and are nested structures
The level of organization is important in defining the category
Basic, subordinate, and superordinate
Retrieval is fluid, depending on a person's expertise
Semantic memory also includes more general aspects of memory – units of memory that are more complex
Schemas – schemas are generalized knowledge about an event, person, or situation (patterns of connected information about a particular topic)
Scripts – a particular type of schema: well-learned sequences of events associated with common activities
memory
Sometimes we need to forget old information because we have new (maybe similar) but more important information to encode in its place.. this is called inhibition
In the case of retrieval-induced inhibition, information we have recently retrieved may interfere with retrieval of similar info from LTM
Consumers may forget stimulus-response associations if they learn new responses to the same or similar stimuli (retroactive interference)
Prior learning can interfere with new learning (proactive interference)
Marketers obviously hope that consumers will not forget about their products
Forgetting can happen as a result of decay (structural changes that learning produces in the brain), or interference (as we learn additional information, it displaces previous information)
memory
Marketers can use the spacing effect to increase the probability of memory recall – they can repeat the target item periodically, rather than presenting it repeatedly in a short period of time
Ad quality and meaningfulness plays a big role in the memorability of the add
Presenting ads in a viewing environment that is more fast-paced and gives the viewer less chance to get bored and wander away from viewing
Being a pioneer (the first brand to enter a market) is more memorable than being a follower brand (someone who rides the coattails of another brand)
We also remember better if we try to recall things in the same state in which they were first presented to us
Marketers obviously hope that consumers will not forget about their products
Forgetting can happen as a result of decay (structural changes that learning produces in the brain), or interference (as we learn additional information, it displaces previous information)
Memory recall and marketing messages
When testing a consumer's recognition, we show them an advertisement and ask them if they have seen it before. Recognition is a basic yes, no, or maybe answer
We test a consumers recall by giving them free recall tests that ask them to think about what they have seen without prompting them with the advertisement first
Marketers must worry about a variety of response biases and memory lapses when looking at the recall and recognition of information
Nostalgia can be a powerful tool for marketers to revive retro brands and carry over old positive brand associations to new products
How do we determine what type of impression we are making on consumers?
The two main measures of impact are recognition and recall
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