This in-class activity helps achieve the following learning objective from Essentials of Marketing:

LO5.2: Understand how psychological variables affect an individual's buying behavior.

LO5.3:Understand how social influences affect an individual's buying behavior.

LO5.4: Describe how culture and ethnicity influence consumer buying behavior.

Assignment

In the short cases that follow, a variety of psychological variables and social variables are operating to influence a consumer's response.

Psychological variables may include motives, attitudes, perceptions, and learning. Social variables may include family, reference groups, and culture.

For each case:

a. Identify one or two relevant psychological variables and briefly explain how each item is illustrated in the case.

b. Identify one or two relevant social variables and briefly explain how each item is illustrated in the case.

1. Eli Hahn has had a coldand all of the typical symptoms that come with itfor almost a week. At first he hadn't taken any medicine. He had always felt that there wasn't anything you could do about a cold. However, while he was playing cards at the home of some friends they kidded him about his runny, red nose. When they offered him an Advil Cold and Flu tablet, he figured it wouldn't hurt to try it. To his surprise, he felt much better after taking the tablet. The next morning, he stopped at a drugstore on his way to work and bought a package of the medicine. Eli had never heard of Advil before, but while driving home from work that evening he noticed a large billboard for Advil.

2. Melody Hadley just returned from a year in Japan as an exchange student. To see her old friends, she is planning a dinner party with a traditional Japanese menu. As she is grocery shopping, she recalls her first experience with sushia raw fish delicacy she plans to serve at her party. When her host family first served it to her, she was not sure she would be able to eat it. Nothing in her American upbringing had prepared her to eat raw fish. However, she did not want to offend her hosts, so she smiled bravely and downed the sushi. To her amazement it was delicious, and she now enjoys sushi frequently. She is sure she will have a lot of fun persuading her friends to try it too.