MF-205 Consumer Behaviour

Part 3: Learning and Memory (Chapter 4)

Dr Michal Krol
Fire together, wire together
This principle (introduced in Part 1) is
fundamental to how we learn.

When two nerve cells tend to be activated

simultaneously, a neural pathway between
them is forged. A stimulus that would
originally only trigger one of the neurons
can now activate both!
Behavioural Learning Theories
As one of the primary frameworks in psychology, behaviourism assumes
behavior is either a reflex evoked by the pairing of certain stimuli, or a
consequence of the individual's history and motivation (particularly any
reinforcement and punishment contingencies).
Classical Conditioning
Demonstrated by Ivan Petrovich Pavlov (1904 Nobel in Medicine).
Marketing Example
Associating a brand name
with the joy of „your” team
winning a trophy.
The conditioned response becomes stronger with repetition of the association
between the two stimuli. This happens particularly when the repeated exposures are
not too close, because the brain ignores
ignores repetitive stimuli.

For the same reason, it helps if the intervals between

repetitions are irregular and if the exposures are
not identical (e.g., TV + online ads).

The conditioned response is not permanent, and

will decay with time. Extinction also occurs if we
are exposed to the neutral stimulus without the
unconditioned stimulus.
Example:
The Lacoste Crocodile
Repeating an online advertising message is especially effective when it has to
compete with rival messages shown on the same site and when it appears on a site
related to the advertised product.

Note the difference between interesting-surprising vs. out-of-context-irrelevant.

Excessive personalization
can result in repeatedly
displaying an out-of-context
ad to the same consumer
and an „advertising
wear-out”.
Stimulus generalization
This is the tendency of a new stimulus to evoke responses or behaviors
similar to those elicited by another, similar stimulus (e.g., a previously
conditioned one).

For instance, have you ever found that you do not trust someone even
though you have only just met them?
Marketing applications of stimulus generalization include
look-alike packaging, family branding, product line
extension, and similar practices.
Supernormal stimuli
A supernormal stimulus is an exaggerated version of
a stimulus to which there is an existing,
evolutionarily programmed response tendency.

For example, a songbird will prefer to feed a cuckoo

planted in its nest rather than its real chicks...
...or choose to nest on a large
plastic egg.

Stupid birds, right?

 30000 years later, the
online plastic sex doll rental Being biologically pre-
business is booming.
programmed and hence
evoking very strong
Venus of Willendorf responses, supernormal
statue (30000 BC) stimuli are often used as
unconditioned stimuli in
marketing campaigns.
Sex Sells? Not necessarily.
Using sexual imagery in ads attracts attention towards the sexual content, but
paradoxically the effect is so strong that it drives attention away from the
brand and the product.

A meta-analysis of 78 studies revealed people were NOT any more likely to

remember the brand or purchase the product having viewed ads with a sexual
appeal. In fact, they often viewed the brand negatively if the sexual content was
not related to the product.

A better example of exploiting evolutionarily primed reactions is this.

Instrumental (operant) conditioning
In operant conditioning, a behavior is learned
through reinforcement or punishment. For
example, a rat learns to press a button that
activates a food dispenser. The response
(operant) is voluntary.

In contrast, classical conditioning involves

involuntary behavior based on the pairing of As the founder of
radical behaviourism,
stimuli with biologically significant events. The Burrhus Skinner
(Harvard) considered
responses are under the control of the stimulus free will an illusion
and taught animals to
that automatically elicits them. play ping pong.
 Add Remove Add Remove

consumers try a product alcohol after-effects mobile internet fair

and like it usage policy
Interestingly, what tends to work best is variable
reinforcement (especially when positive), which is
when a response is reinforced after an unpredictable
number of responses.
This is what sustains, e.g., problem gambling or
toxic relationships between people.
But – it can also be used to promote pro-social
behaviour.
It is easier to sustain learned behaviour
than to train it from scratch. In the former
case, partial reinforcement may be
sufficient, especially when it signals that
the main reinforcement is getting closer.

In frequency marketing and

gamification strategies,
consumers get a „pat-on-the-head”
feedback in the form of virtual points,
badges, etc. that may sometimes translate
into real rewards like discounts.
Gamification also works because an immediate reward is often stronger even when it
is small, as demonstrated by research on instant gratification (watch these little
consumers).

We also put more effort in as we get closer to

final goal, e.g. pre-loaded loyalty cards are more
effective (the endowed progress effect),
because the reward is then perceived as nearer
and hence more valuable.

Visualisations of the goal progress also help in

making it seem closer and increasing effort.
Cognitive Learning Theory
Stresses the importance of internal mental processes (i.e., no more black box).
For instance, in observational learning, people learn by observing the behaviour of
others and its consequences.

In a classic experiment, children who watched an adult

kick and punch a large, inflated „Bobo doll” were more
likely to do likewise when the adult has left the room.
 Marketing Example:
Learning by Modeling
Learning via modeling is particularly strong in children under 12, whose top-down
attentional control mechanisms are also not yet fully developed, and who cannot
always differentiate between media content and advertising.
This makes them very susceptible to TV and online advertising. Children who watch
more ads become more materialistic and their desire for
consumption goods increases.
However, with their cognitive skills still developing,
brand recall can be poor. This makes advertising
aimed at children especially effective if the product is
very salient or dominates a given product category.
Children are therefore in need of more protection from possible negative
outcomes of advertising. This is reflected in advertising regulation.
For example, Britain has recently announced a ban on the advertising of
unhealthy foods before 9pm.
Memory: encoding-storage-retrieval

Duration: Duration: Duration:

The more effort it takes to process information, the more likely it is that it will be
transferred to long-term memory and stay there.

An incoming piece of information is stored in an associative network that stores

related information. Always the cognitive miser, the brain tries to merge new an old
information into a compressed, consistent structure.

A bit like vector (vs. raster) graphics.

The consequence of this is that things that are more strongly associated with
elements of our existing knowledge structure will be remembered better.

For example, a phone model named LG Chocolate will be easier to remember

than, say LG LTE-X.10 Pro.
The same factors that make a piece of information
attract and hold our attention top-down also
increase the intensity with which it is processed.

This means we remember not only the visually

spectacular ads, but also the ones that are original
and make us think.
Did you know?
According to the desirable difficulties framework,
studying information that is less fluent can result in
greater learning.

For example, when you study in a foreign

language or when your teacher has a bad accent,
you might actually remember more from the
lectures, because you are forced to work harder to
process the incoming information.
The Google Effect
There is an increasing tendency for people to forget information that can be
found online. Instead of storing the information itself, we store information
on where to find it online („memory outsourcing”).
Behavioural Scripts
A cheetah will start chasing a gazelle as soon as it starts running away from it.

This is why, when encountering a cheetah in the wild, you should back away
slowly.

Although to a smaller extent,

humans rely on such scripts too.
Behavioural Scripts
A script is a special type of a stored memory - a sequence of events and
actions expected to occur in a particular situation.

Stored in procedural memory, scripts allow us to carry out everyday tasks

automatically, using less cognitive resourses,
thus releasing them for other tasks.

Our scripts keep getting updated, like when

we learn to put on facemasks
before shopping. Still, we can get stuck
with inefficient scripts or skills, e.g. the
QWERTY keyboard layout.
Processing Order Effects
Because new bits of information are compressed to make
them consistent with existing ones, the order in which we
get exposed to them is key.

For example, pioneer brands (the first to enter the

market) can become synonymous with the product
category. When we later become exposed to competing
products, these can actually re-activate our memories of
the pioneer brand and become stored e.g. as a
„Gillette-like razor”.
Context/state-dependent Retrieval
Interestingly, our memory depends not only on the circumstances in which we
learned, but also on those in which we retrieve the memories.

When both sets of circumstances are the same,

either in terms of our internal state (e.g., mood)
or the external context (e.g., place) our recall is
stronger.

This is because we then get more retrieval cues,

which activate the relevant neural pathways.
No sooner had the warm liquid mixed with the crumbs
touched my palate than a shudder ran through me and I
stopped, intent upon the extraordinary thing that was
happening to me. [...] And suddenly the memory revealed
itself. The taste was that of the little piece of madeleine which
on Sunday mornings at Combray (because on those
mornings I did not go out before mass), when I went to say
good morning to her in her bedroom, my aunt Léonie used
to give me, dipping it first in her own cup of tea or tisane.
The sight of the little madeleine had recalled nothing to my
mind before I tasted it.

And all from my cup of tea.

Nostalgia Marketing
Brands often use retro-style logos and designs, sourced from when the
target consumers were young.

The purpose is for the products

to induce a state-dependent
retrieval of positive memories from
the consumers’ young age.
The context during encoding and storage matters for retrieval
For example, when the ad contains a novel, unusual, and hence
memorable element (even not related to product), the rest of the ad is more
likely to be remembered.

Similarly, ads played during TV

shows people enjoy more are
also remembered better. It is
even better if the ad is related to
the show.