Page 166 - Encyclopedia of Business and Finance

eobf_C 7/5/06 2:57 PM Page 143

Consumer Behavior

an abundance of ads for Florida resorts, airline promo- gotten. Once transferred to long-term memory, informa-
tions for Florida, and articles about Florida restaurants tion is encoded or arranged in a way that provides mean-
and attractions everywhere? Coincidence? Not really. ing to the individual. Information in long-term memory is
There are just as many now as there were before, only now constantly reorganized, updated, and rearranged as new
you are selectively attending to them, whereas you previ- information comes in, or learning takes place.
ously filtered them out. Marketers continuously struggle Information-processing theorists represent the stor-
to break through the clutter and grab consumers’ atten- age of information in long-term memory as a network
tion. Advertising and packaging is designed to grab our consisting of nodes (word, idea, or concept) and links
attention through a host of techniques, such as the use of (relationships among them). Nodes are connected to each
contrast in colors and sound, repetition, and contextual other depending on whether there is an association
placement. between concepts, with the length of the linkages repre-
Did you watch television last night? You may have senting the degree of the association. Figure 2 illustrates a
paid attention to many of the ads you saw during the com- network model of long-term memory. When Trice
mercial breaks; you may even have laughed out loud at a cofounded Laura’s Wholesome Junk Food, part of her
few of them. But how many can you recall today? Con- challenge was to change consumers’ knowledge structures
sumers’ ability to store, retain, and retrieve product infor- for the concept of a healthful treat, “Healthy foods and
mation is critical to a brand’s success. When information is gourmet/comfort foods have often been thought of as sep-
processed, it is held for a very brief time (less than 1 arate entities. A person allows an occasional ‘treat’ of
minute) in working, or short-term, memory. If this infor- something with the assumption that the treat is a) not
mation is rehearsed (mentally repeated), it is transferred to healthy, and b) needs to be severely limited. By opening
long-term memory; if not, the information is lost and for- up to the concept that being health conscious can also be

Associative network for Laura's Wholesome Junk Food

Laura's
Wholesome Gourmet/Comfort
Junk Food snack foods

Bite-lettes
Unhealthy

Vegan
Good
tasting
Healthy
treat
Decadent

High in High in
Wheaf-free refined sugar unhealthy fat
Sweetened
with fruit
juice Can be
enjoyed Can be
frequently enjoyed once
in a while

Figure 2

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BUSINESS AND FINANCE, SECOND EDITION 143