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2/25/2022

Chapter 8: Attitudes and Persuasion

Agenda:

• What are attitudes? • ABC Model

• Attitude formation and change • Self Perception Theory

• MAAM model

• Important consideration: Consistency • Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• Social Judgment Theory

• Heider’s Balance Theory

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Attitude:

• Attitude is a lasting, general evaluation of people (including oneself), objects, advertisements, or issues

• It is lasting because it tends to endure over time.

• It is general because it applies to more than a momentary event

• Attitude object (AO) is anything toward which one has an attitude

• Attitudes tend to be predictive of consumers’ behaviors.

Beliefs, Attitudes, & Preferences

 Beliefs: Non-evaluative judgments

 These say nothing about liking or disliking or relative preferences.

 Mountain Dew tastes sweet and citrusy

 It contains more caffeine than other soft drinks.

 Attitudes: Evaluative judgments

 These statements are explicitly evaluative—they are statements of like or dislike

 Mountain Dew tastes good.

 Preferences: Comparative judgments of attitudes (not beliefs)

 These statements refer to relative preferences—which does the person like or dislike more?

 “Mountain Dew is better than Sprite.”

Beliefs about the products; not attitude towards the product

Direct indication that the consumer prefers/likes Mountain Dew over Sprite

“Mountain Dew is sweeter than Sprite” ?

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What is it?

Belief Attitude Preference

Snickers is better than Twix. X

Sprite is sweet. X

Cotton is softer than polyester. X

New York is crowded. X

Mountain Dew is gross. X

Gambling is very risky. X

Why should marketers care about the difference? Because you might spend time trying to changes beliefs which aren’t affecting attitudes if you can’t recognize the difference.

Attitudes:

Definition: a favorable or unfavorable evaluation/judgements that we make about things around us (people, issues, events, etc. )

• As marketers we care about attitudes towards our products, brands, companies, employees, etc.

• Characterized by strength (commitment) and valence (i.e., positive vs. negative) • Strength: how easily do we retrieve it from memory, how confidently is it held, how persistent

is it, how resistant is it to change? • Direction: good/bad, ambivalence, indifference.

• Ambivalence vs. Indifference • Ambivalence – holding both positive and negative attitudes (favorable and unfavorable

evaluations) toward the same thing. • Indifference – have no attitude at all.

• Learned and enduring • Attitudes are learned - we develop them as we gain knowledge or information about something • Persist over time although we can change and modify them.

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Attitudes:

• Stored in memory; sometimes constructed on the fly

• When are attitudes constructed on the fly? • Forgot prior evaluation/No prior evaluation.

• Things that haven’t been considered before, for example new products.

• Low confidence in the currently held attitude

• “I’m not sure I really do (dis)like this thing.”

• Changes have taken place

• There is new information that is relevant to your attitude (e.g., “I like this politician, but now they’re saying she took bribes.”)

• The “problem” with attitudes constructed on the fly: they can be subject to external influences over which marketers have no control!

Attitude Strength (Commitment):

COMPLIANCE • Lowest level (Superficial): consumer forms attitude because it gains

rewards or avoids punishments • Likely to change when the behavior is no longer monitored or when

other options are available.

IDENTIFICATION • Mid-level: attitudes formed in order to conform to another person or

group • Ads that depict dire social consequences when we choose one product

over another rely on this tendency

INTERNALIZATION • Highest level: deep-seated attitudes become part of consumer’s value

system • Difficult to change because they are important to us

• Attitude Commitment: how easily do we retrieve it from memory, how confidently is it held, how persistent is it, how resistant is it to change?

• Consumers vary in their degree of commitment to an attitude. • Relates to their level of involvement with the object.

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Failure of Better Tasting Coke?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqvTMPY8Q_8

Functional Theory of Attitudes:

‒ Relates to rewards and punishments. ‒ We develop some attitudes towards a product because they provide pleasure or avoid

pain. ‒ Ads that highlight direct product benefits appeal to this function – “You should drink

diet coke because it has zero calorie”

Utilitarian Function:

− Expresses consumer’s self-concept or central values. − A person forms a product attitude because of what the product says about

them as a person. − E.g., attitudes about politics, movies, music

Value-Expressive Function:

− Such attitudes are formed to protect ourselves from external threats or internal feelings.

− Nescafe; deodorant ads

EGO-Defensive Function:

− We form such attitudes because we need order, structure, or meaning. − This applies when a person is in an ambiguous situation or when

confronting a new product. − E.g., It is OK to wear causal pants to work on Fridays.

Knowledge Function:

We have attitudes because they perform certain function for us

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Agenda:

• What are attitudes? • ABC Model

• Attitude formation and change • Self Perception Theory

• MAAM model

• Important consideration: Consistency • Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• Social Judgment Theory

• Heider’s Balance Theory

The ABC Model of Attitudes

feeling

knowing

doing

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ABC Model of Attitude: Hierarchies of Effects

• assumes that a person approaches a product decision as a problem-solving process • assumes that the consumer is highly involved when making the purchase decision • motivated to seek out a lot of information about the product, carefully weigh alternatives, and come to a thoughtful decision

• assumes that we act on the basis of our emotional reactions • highlights the idea that intangible product attributes like advertising, packaging, brand, etc.

can help shape our affective attitude towards the product

• assumes that the consumer initially doesn’t have a strong preference for one brand • acts on the basis of limited knowledge • forms feelings only after buying the product

Agenda:

• What are attitudes? • ABC Model

• Attitude formation and change • Self Perception Theory

• MAAM Model

• Important consideration: Consistency • Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• Social Judgment Theory

• Heider’s Balance Theory

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Attitude Formation:

Attitude formation can occur in two ways:

• Attitudes can be inferred based on behavior - Self-Perception Theory • pertain to the behavioral aspects of the ABC model. • Low-involvement hierarchy

• Attitudes can be based on attribute beliefs - Multi-Attribute Attitude Model (MAAM)

• pertain to the cognitive aspects of the ABC model. • High-involvement hierarchy

Attitude Formation: Self-Perception Theory

• Consumers may determine their attitudes towards an object based on their own behavior. • Behaving favorably towards an object

means favorable attitudes towards the object.

• Behaving unfavorably towards an object means unfavorable attitudes towards the object.

• Works only if behavior was not coerced and we don’t have strong pre-existing attitudes

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Self Perception Theory: Marketing Applications

• Self-perception theory assumes that we observe our own behavior to determine just what our attitudes are. • We infer the attitude from our behavior.

Attitude Formation: Fishbein (MAAM) Model Procedure

 MAAM models identify specific components and combine them to predict a consumer’s overall attitude toward a product or brand.

 Assumes that a consumer’s attitude toward an object depends on the beliefs that they have about several of its attributes.

 The three elements that make up multi-attribute models are attributes, beliefs, and important weights.  The attributes are used to evaluate the attitude object.  The beliefs refer to the assessment of whether the brand has specific attributes.  Importance weights reflect the relative priority of an attribute to the consumer.

 Not all attributes are important.  Importance weights indicate how much the consumer cares about each attribute.  For instance, in case of cell phones, some people care more about camera, others more about

price or privacy.

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Attitude Formation: Fishbein (MAAM) Model Procedure

1. Identify relevant attributes

• Not all attributes are relevant to the consumers

2. Determine importance weights (w) for these attributes

• Importance weights indicate how much the consumer cares about each attribute

3. Determine beliefs (b) about brand/product on these attributes

4. Sum values of all attributes used in evaluating the brand weighted by the importance of each attribute

= w1b1 + w2b2 + w3b3 + …..Overall brand attitude

 Focus on (1) consumers’ beliefs about multiple product/brand attributes & (2) how important those attributes are to the consumer.

Fishbein (MAAM) Model: An Example

1. Identify relevant attributes

2. Determine importance weights (w) for these attributes

3. Determine beliefs (b) about brand/product on these attributes

4. Sum values of all attributes used in evaluating the brand weighted by the importance of each attribute

Features Design Price Ease of Use Overall Importance weights 0.4 0.3 0.1 0.2

Galaxy S21 8 8 2 9 One Plus 9RT 6 10 3 8

iPhone 13 9 6 4 8 Google Pixel 6 6 6 6 6

Galaxy S21 = (0.4 x 8 = 3.2) + (0.3 x 8 = 2.4) + (0.1 x 2= 0.2) + (0.2 x 9 = 1.8)

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Changing Attitudes: Marketing Applications of the MAAM

MAAM suggests several ways that marketers can change or reinforce consumer attitudes regarding their brands and products:

• Change or reinforce consumer beliefs about your attributes • strengthen perceived links between your brand and positive attributes

• Change or reinforce importance of attributes • highlight or intensify the perceived importance of a specific attribute • induce or draw attention to a specific need served by an attribute • capitalize on relative advantages your brand has on certain attributes

• Add a new attribute or remove an attribute you perform poorly on.

• Influence competitors’ (other alternatives’) ratings • use comparative advertising to highlight competitors’ weaknesses (weak attributes) • draw attention to or “prove” false claims

= w1b1 + w2b2 + w3b3 Overall brand

attitudes + w4b4

Changing Attitudes (MAAM): What is it?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPOIpCGoIHI

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Changing Attitudes (MAAM): What is it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvi66xlG0Q0

Changing Attitudes (MAAM): What is it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sylWyBnFBNM

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Changing Attitudes (MAAM): What is it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnKPEsbTo9s

Changing Attitudes (MAAM): ABC Model

• Affective • Learning can occur via classical/operant conditioning and mere exposure. • Classical conditioning relates more to your immediate response to a stimulus, it is often

affective (emotional or visceral) in nature.

• Behavioral • Punishment and reward programs (operant conditioning) may change a consumer’s

behavior without changing anything about how they feel about the stimulus. • Removing the reward or punishment will likely lead to an immediate change in the behavioral

component of the attitude.

• Cognitive • This is about changing something in the consumer’s information processing • Weights, change/add beliefs and/or change ideal

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Agenda:

• What are attitudes? • ABC Model

• Attitude formation and change • Self Perception Theory

• MAAM Model

• Important consideration: Consistency • Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• Social Judgment Theory

• Heider’s Balance Theory

Attitude Consistency: Cognitive Dissonance Theory

• Consumers value cognitive coherence and are motivated to maintain consistency (harmony) among their attitudes, values, and beliefs over time – (basis of) principle of cognitive consistency

• We will change components of our attitude to make them consistent with each other.

• Theory of cognitive dissonance: when we do have inconsistent attitudes and behaviors, we will find some way to rectify the dissonance and bring our attitudes and behaviors back into consistency.

• Being internally inconsistent gives rise to negative emotions.

• For instance, smoking while knowing that smoking is really bad for you.

• The smoker can either quit smoking or find reasons/evidence to not believe that it is so bad for them to smoke

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Attitude Consistency: Social Judgement Theory • Social judgment theory assumes that people assimilate new information about attitude objects in light of

what they already know/feel

• The initial attitude acts like a frame of reference, and we categorize new information based on this standard.

• People differ in terms of what information they find acceptable or unacceptable. • They form latitudes of acceptance and rejection around the attitude standard. • Ideas that fall within the latitude of acceptance are deemed favorable, but others are rejected. • People tend to perceive the messages that fall within the latitudes of acceptance as more consistent

(even if they are not): assimilation effect • We tend to see messages that fall in our latitude of rejection as even more unacceptable than they

actually are: contrast effect

frame of reference

Initial Attitude = Positive Opinion about Fizzy Drinks

Latitude of Acceptance based on frame of

reference

They are good on a summer day

Latitude of Rejection based on frame of

reference

They have a lot of preservatives

Attitude Consistency: Heider’s Balance Theory

• Considers how a person might perceive relations among different attitude objects and how they alter attitudes to maintain consistency (balance) among the objects

• Resulting attitude structures are known as triads: Involves relations among three elements –

• Person • Perception of attitude object • Perception of other person/object

• The theory specifies that we want relations among elements in a triad to be harmonious.

• If the relations are unbalanced, this creates tension • We are motivated to reduce by changing our perceptions in order to restore balance.

• It conceptualizes the consistency motive as a drive toward psychological balance. • The consistency motive is the urge to maintain one's values and beliefs over time.

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Heider’s Balance Theory:

YOU (Person)

Your friend (Other Person)

Attitude Object

The triad is balanced if the affect valence in a system multiplies out to a positive result

Heider’s Balance Theory:

YOU (Person)

Your friend (Other Person)

Attitude Object

• Do the multiplication test. If the sign is negative, the triad is unbalanced and something needs to change. • The theory does not say what route people will take; it only says that people will strive to achieve balance in

some manner