Learning and Memory
Chapter 3
CONSUMER BEHAVIOR, 8e Michael Solomon
Learning Objectives
When you finish this chapter you should understand why:
• It’s important for marketers to understand how
consumers learn about products and services.
• Conditioning results in learning. • Learned associations can generalize to other things,
and why this is important to marketers.
• There is a difference between classical and
instrumental conditioning.
• We learn by observing others’ behavior.
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Learning Objectives (cont.)
• Memory systems work. • The other products we associate with an individual
product influences how we will remember it.
• Products help us to retrieve memories from our past. • Marketers measure our memories about products and
ads.
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The Learning Process
• Products as reminders of life
experiences
• Products + memory = brand
equity/loyalty
• Learning: a relatively
permanent change in behavior caused by experience
• Incidental learning: casual,
unintentional acquisition of knowledge
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I. Behavioral Learning Theories
• Behavioral learning theories: assume that learning
takes place as the result of responses to external events.
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Figure 3.1
Types of Behavioral Learning Theories
Classical conditioning: a stimulus that elicits a response is paired with another stimulus that initially does not elicit a response on its own. Instrumental conditioning (also, operant conditioning): the individual learns to perform behaviors that produce positive outcomes and to avoid those that yield negative 3-6 outcomes.
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I.1. Classical Conditioning
Ivan Pavlov and his dogs
• Rang bell, then squirt dry meat
powder into dogs’ mouths
• Repeated this until dogs
salivated when the bell rang
• Meat powder = unconditioned
stimulus (UCS) because natural reaction is...