chapter 7 attitudes and attitude change

© 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.1

Chapter 7 Attitudes and Attitude Change

© 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.2

Learning Outcomes

• Define attitudes and describe attitude components

• Describe the functions of attitudes• Understand how the hierarchy of effects

concept applies to attitude theory

© 2014 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

Learning Outcomes

• Comprehend the major consumer attitude models

• Describe attitude change theories and their role in persuasion

• Understand how message and source effects influence persuasion


Attitudes and its Components

• Attitude - Relatively enduring overall evaluations of objects, products, services, issues, or people

• Components - ABC approach to attitudes – Affect– Behavior– Cognition


Functions of Attitude

• Functional theory of attitudes - Attitudes perform four functions– Utilitarian function– Knowledge function– Value-expressive function– Ego-defensive function


Hierarchy of Effects

• High-involvement hierarchy – Occurs when a consumer faces a high involvement

decision or addresses a significant problem• Low-involvement hierarchy – Consumers have some basic beliefs about

products without necessarily having strong feelings toward them


Hierarchy of Effects

• Experiential hierarchy– Purchases are motivated by feelings

• Behavioral influence hierarchy– Some behaviors occur without either beliefs or

affect being strongly formed beforehand


Attitude-Toward-the-Object (ATO) Model

• The ATO Model - Fishbein model– Proposes that three key elements be assessed to

understand and predict consumer behavior• Consumer beliefs about salient attributes• Strength of the consumer belief• Evaluation of the attribute

• ATO formula


Implications of the ATO Approach

• Attitude research is most often performed on entire market segments

• Important for managers to know if consumers believe that complexes offer relevant attributes


Attitude–behavior Consistency

• Researchers are very interested in how attitudes are formed

• Refers to the extent to which a strong relationship exists between attitudes and actual behavior


Factors That Weaken Attitude-Behavior Relationship

• Length of time between attitude measurement and overt behavior

• Specificity with which attitudes are measured • Strong environmental pressures • Impulse-buying situations


Alternative Approaches to Attitude

• Theory of planned action– Expands upon the behavioral intentions model by

including a perceived control component


Expanding the Attitude Object

• Attitude toward the advertisement– Positive relationship exists between a consumer’s

attitude toward an advertisement and his or her attitude toward a particular product

• Attitude toward the company– What consumers know or believe about a

company can influence the attitude they have toward its product


Attitude Tracking

• Extent to which a company actively monitors its customers’ attitudes over time


Persuasion

• Refers to specific attempts to change attitudes• Persuasive techniques– ATO approach– Behavioral influence approach– Changing schema-based affect– Elaboration likelihood model– Balance theory approach– Social judgment theory approach


Attitude-Toward-the-Object Approach

• Changing beliefs • Adding beliefs about new attributes • Changing evaluations


Behavioral Influence Approach

• Directly changing behaviors without first attempting to change either beliefs or feelings

• Behavior change can precede belief and attitude change


Changing Schema-Based Affect

• Schema-based affect refers to the idea that schemas contain affective and emotional meanings

• If the affect found in a schema can be changed, then:– The attitude toward a brand or product will

change as well


Message and Source Effects

• Message effects - Describe how the appeal of a message and its construction affect persuasion

• Source effects - Refer to the characteristics of the person or character delivering a message that influence persuasion


Message Appeal

• Appeals impact the persuasiveness of an advertisement– Sex appeals– Humor appeals– Fear appeals– Violence appeals


Message Construction

• The way a message is constructed also impacts its persuasiveness– Conclusion presentation– Comparative strategy– Placement of information• Serial position effect• Primary effect• Recency effect

– Message complexity


Source Effects

• Credibility– Expertise– Trustworthiness

• Attractiveness• Likeability• Meaningfulness– Match-up hypothesis - Source feature is most

effective when it is matched with relevant products

chapter 7 attitudes and attitude change

Documents

cengage learning

accessible website

learning outcomescomprehend

attitude componentsdescribe

attitude change1

attitude theory2

ato approach attitude

hierarchy of effectshigh