Below is the pool of questions for the final exam.

You will see four of the following

questions.
Good Luck!
1) What is experimentation and what is its role in consumer research?
What do we mean by dependent and independent variables? Internal
vs. external validity? Explain with examples.

Experimentation is the conscious manipulation of one or more variables by the experimenter

in such way that its effect on one or more variables can be measured. By experiments experts
prove or disprove their assumptions and upgrade the theory.
Independent variable (cause) is manipulated variable, dependent variable (effect) is
measured variable. Example:
1. We conduct experiment if oral interference (popcorn) has influence on mere exposure
effect. Independent variable are people eating sugar cube (it melts and has no effect),
dependent variable are people who eat popcorn and we measure these group results.
2. We conduct experiment whether higher salary causes the hard work of the managers. In
this experiment independent variable is higher salary and dependent variable is hard
work.
Internal validity refers to whether the manipulation of the independent variables actually
caused the observed effects on the dependent variables Control of extraneous variables is a
necessary condition for establishing internal validity. Example: In the research about whether
high salary causes the hard work of the managers. But maybe there will be another variables
other than high salary, such us personality, motivation or competition, that cause the result.
Internal validity in this research is we able to say that only our independent variable, high
salary, (not personality, motivation, or competition) causes the dependent variable, hard
work.
External validity refers to whether the cause-and-effect relationships found in the
experiment can be generalized. Example:
1. Experts prove that popcorn negatively influences on mere exposure effect, the question is
whether also other oral interferences as snacks have influence on mere exposure effect.
2. When we know that high salary causes hard work for managers than we should able to
say whether high salary also causes had work for other than managers, for example
assistant managers, vice managers, staff, or workers.
To what populations, settings, times, independent variables and dependent variables can the
results be projected?
2) Explain the stages of consumer decision making with examples. How is
it different for low vs. high involvement product categories?

1.PROBLEM RECOGNITION: ideal state(expectations, future goals) actual state

Customer recognizes need that something is missing (hunger, thirsty, biological need, need
encouraged by ads).

2.INFORMATION SEARCH: It depends on knowledge, experience, age, education, money.

Internal (what we already know, what is saved in our long-term memory). External (asking
friends, family for recommendation, internet research ..)
3.EVAULATION OF ALTERNATIVES: recall of brands we already know and compare their
advantages and disadvantages.
4.PURCHASE DECISION: Final decision can be based on price, quality or other factor. It
depends what customer wants, either the cheapest product or luxury one.
5.POST-PURCHASE BEHAVIOR: Satisfied customer is likely to come back and purchase
again, spread good word about the brand among friends. Unsatisfied customer will most
likely spread negative review, which can harm brand name, therefore is important to make
customers satisfied with the purchase.
For low involvement products customers usually don`t spend a lot of time for information
search and they don`t put so much effort. Example: COOKIES. Customer comes to the
grocery store and randomly pick those, which look most attractive. In this case the main role
has packing, flavor and price.
For high involvement products customers spend more time and put more effort in to the
purchase, since those products are way more expensive. Example: CAR. Customer uses
internal and external research and tries to get as much as possible information about the car.
He/she is not going to buy a car based on the color, but will make internet research, ask
friends, family and go to the shop to get all needed information.

3) What are the different strategies marketers use for attracting

consumers attention? Why is it important to get their attention?
Explain with examples.

First of all is important that people notice a product, then create positive attitude and make
them to buy your product.
*sales promotion (discounts, bundles, 2+1 gratis ): short-term impact, especially to attract
price sensitive customers.
*advertising: long-term impact, building brand equity, creating customer loyalty
Low involvement products need more sales promotion and less advertising, since customers
don`t pay so much attention for brand name, but more for good price.
*endorsement (advertising through celebrities): Customers will associate a brand name with
famous person and also is more likely they will remember it. Example: Naomi Campbell has
the main role in advertisement for Dolce Gabbana perfume I like Naomi, that`s why I like
Dolce Gabbana, because she uses it, I want to use it as well.

*sponsorships: McDonalds is sponsor of Olympic Games. First of all is excellent

advertising, since millions of people see it, second of all, it creates good brand name
sport+McDonalds people perceive it as good brand.
*music: Music has significant influence on consumers while purchasing, it makes them more
relaxed, exited etc., which convince them to buy a product. It depends on shop what are they
selling and what is their purpose. If in grocery shop is playing chill music, customers feel
relaxed and not in a hurry, consequently they are willing to spend more time and more
money.
*humor: Make your customer smile, and he/she is going to be yours. If a product is
introduced through humor is more likely that customers will remember it and when people
are in a good mood are more likely to buy a product.
*creativity: People like what is different and definitely attracts them. Any kind of creativity,
even if it is crazy, will attract customers` attention.

4) Why it is important to enhance consumers memory? How is it

enhanced? Explain different strategies with marketing examples.

*Sensory Memory, Shor-Term Memory, Long-term Memory

*Explicit Memory, Implicit Memory
To enhance consumers` memory is very important, since impacts on their associations and
final purchasing decision. If certain brand name is in their memory it will always be one of
the alternatives while choosing between different brands. So, when a customer thinks about
certain product, the brand will come to their mind immediately if they saw it before many
times and it is saved in their memory. Brands must grow in order to get attention, to get in
people`s mind and memory (more associations, bigger chance that people will remember you
and choose your company). It`s important to build trustworthiness and innovativeness.
Memory can be enhanced by repetition (mere exposure effect) of the brand name, meaning
by advertising and eventually it will stay in consumers` memory, they will always think
about this brand while comparing different alternatives and more likely to buy the one,
which was repeated many times. Memory can be enhanced also by:
Chunking involves changing information so that fewer parts must be remembered. To
expose the most important info in advertising. If I have consultation company is the most
important to expose brand name and contact, so customers can easily remember necessary
info.
Rehearsal involves repeating information over and over (repetition)
Recirculation information is learnt gradually by absorbing through repetition. (example)!!!
Elaboration involves consumer`s thinking about the object (product in advertisement). For
instance, when consumer see advertisement for XYZ banana may think about the color
yellow and then goes to the zoo seeing monkey eating banana brand name XYZ will be
activated.

Another strategy to enhance memory is by endorsement (advertising through famous

person).
5) What does choice heuristics mean? What are the different choice
heuristics? Explain with examples.

Heuristics are general decision making strategies people use that are based on little
information, yet very often correct. Heuristics are mental short cuts and reduce work in
decision making in several ways.
CHOICE HEURISTICS:
Performance-related tactics
Habit tactics

IF CHOOSING AMONG FAMILIAR

PRODUCTS:
Choose the product that provides the
best level of performance
Select the one you typically buy as long
as it is satisfactory
CHOICE HEURISTICS:
IF CHOOSING AMONG UNFAMILIAR
Variety seeking tactics
PRODUCTS:
Normative tactics
Choose something different
Price tactics
Choose the one other recommend
Buy the least expensive or the most
expensive (depends on your beliefs
about the relationship between price and
quality)
*low/high involvement product: we put way less effort in low involvement product, since the
risk is way lower.
Example: I want to buy mineral water and go to supermarket and I dont need a long time to
think which brand that I want to buy, I will pick the cheaper one.
6) Explain the following heuristics with marketing examples: Availability
heuristics, Anchoring and Adjustment heuristics, and Omission Bias

AVAILABILITY HEURISTICS: Overestimating the likelihood of events with greater

accessibility in memory. Things that come to mind more easily are considered to be far more
common. When you are trying to make a decision, a number of related events might
immediately come to your mind and consequently you might judge those event as more
frequent and more possible than others. Example: if we ask people how many people buy
KFC this week, than maybe most people will give more than 80% because the know many
people buy KFC. Yet KFC managers said that the percentage of this week costumer is less
than 50%.
ANCHORING AND ADJUSTMENT HEURISTICS: Estimation of the value of a quantity
by knowledge of the value of a related (or sometimes unrelated) quantity. Anchoring occurs
when individual makes new decision based on the old, anchor number.

Bargaining: car salesman (used cars) will put first price quite high which is way
above fair price because he knows that a customer will bargain. The final price will
be still higher than if the salesman had offered a fair or low price. Another example is
bargaining for other products, when the seller tries to sell one product for 100$ and
after bargaining he sells it for 80$, although the price for locals is 50$.

OMISSION (inactions) BIAS: Tendency to judge harmful actions as worse, or less moral than
equally harmful inactions. Example: a car salesman know that the cars engine is on the last legs.
When the prospective buyers turns up, a salesman have 3 options: 1) tell him about the engine, 2)
Lie about the condition of engine, 3) say nothing and let him found out for himself. If the salesman
choose the option 3 than he is suffering from omission bias.

7) Explain the following heuristics with marketing examples:

Stereotyping, Weber-Fechner Law, and Gambler Fallacy.

STEREOTYPING: Consumer expects that a group of products has certain characteristics

without having actual information about that individual product.
Stereotyping by country of origin, for instance, German cars are known as high
quality cars, therefore consumers perceive majority of German cars as very good,
reliable and quality cars.
By brand. For instance, we know one product of well-known brand and
consequently we consider also other products from the same brand as quality
products. I buy Maxfactor mascara and I am super satisfied, that`s why I consider
also other products as quality and I buy eyeliner, lipstick etc as well, because I
trust to this brand and I believe it can`t disappoint me.
WEBER-FECHNER LAW: Difficulty in comparing small differences in large quantities.

A customer considers whether to buy a car for 100 000$ here or to drive 30 min
and get the same car for 99 000$ (1% of discount). He/she will prefer to buy it
here, since the discount is only 1% (1000$).
A customer considers to buy a watch for 10$ here or to drive 30 min and buy it
for 5$ (50% of discount). He/she will prefer to drive for 30 min, since the
discount is huge (50% - 5$).
The point is that amount of discount misleads customers and they should rather
take a look on amount of money and not the number of discount.

GAMBLER FALLACY: Thinking that future probabilities are effected by past events when
they are not.

When customer is in casino and fails 30 times, he thinks that next time will
definitely win, since he lost so many times before. But future events have nothing

to do with past events, besides in casino is all about the luck, future and past
events are not connected.

8) What is the role of attitudes in consumer behavior? How are attitudes

formed under high vs. low effort conditions? Explain with examples.

Attitude is overall evaluation of the product. First of all, we have to like and have positive
impression about the product in order to get need to buy the product. Positive attitude is
precondition of the purchase.
Attitude consists of two parts: COGNITIVE PART and AFFECTIVE PART. Cognitive part
includes rational evaluation, which means that are consumers attentive to product`s features
and how useful it is. Affective part includes feelings, which refers how consumers feel
when they use the product, emotional connection to the product.
Example: when we buy a car it is important to look on its features and all equipment the car
offers, but it is important how do we feel in the car, while driving. Another example are
clothes, of course we buy them based on the look, color, price and purpose with need them
for, but still is very important how we feel in that clothes. Both examples include cognitive
and affective part, yet one of them is predominating.
High involvement products (car, apartment, TV, computer, smart phone ): more
important is cognitive part, since those products are expensive and firstly is
necessary to look on useful features a product offers.
Low involvement products (sandwich, nail polish, note book, coffee ): more
important affective part, so how we feel while using this product. For instance,
expresso is available in every cafe and restaurant and its purpose is to give you more
energy and keep you awake, but people want to enjoy while drinking expresso
(coffee in general), therefore customers decide where to buy a coffee based on the
taste an where they can get the best coffee in terms of taste.

*What can we do as marketers to create positive attitude for products?

For high involvement products it is important to provide quality products, otherwise is

impossible to create well-known brand name. In order to create positive attitude, a company
must invest in professional branding and advertising and increase repetition of the
product (mere exposure effect), so customers will have it in memory and when they will
decide between different alternatives, the product will always be in customer`s memory and
they will associate it with other alternatives. Example: two sided info; tell your customers
advantages and disadvantages of the product in order to create/increase trustworthiness.

To create positive attitude for low involvement products is also good tool to use advertising
and increase repetition in order that customers will memorize the product. Example: big
yellow M for McDonalds can be seen everywhere and we memorize it subconsciously.
High&low involvement: Example: Toothpaste is in principle low involvement product, but it
is still worth to spend a bit more effort on it, since it is very important how we treat our teeth.
In this case is relevant to get real dentist in advertisement and create credibility of the
product. It is important from whom the information comes.
In order to create positive attitude is important to increase TRUSTWORTHINESS and
INNOVATIVENESS!!!