501132 - CONSUMER BEHAVIOR

Subject type: Mandatory

Coordinator: Vera Butkouksaya

Trimester: First term

Credits: 4

Academic year: 2024

Teaching course: 1

• Catalan

The subject will be taught in Catalan by default. This criterion may be modified from time to time in response to general or specific situations that require it. La llengua d'expressió de l'alumnat en el context de l'aula, així com en el desenvolupament de les diferents activitats d'avaluació, podrà ser català o castellà indistintament. Students who prefer to take the final exam in Spanish must request it from the subject at least one week in advance. 

The subject of consumer behavior has the challenge of familiarizing students with the main concepts and mechanisms that guide consumer decision-making when buying products. The content of the subject therefore refers to the act of consumption as a process of acquisition, but it broadens its view on all those pre- and post-purchase structures that are relevant to the marketing manager, insofar as they enable a systematic understanding of the act of consumption.

Through the recognition of all the variables involved in its determination, the study of consumer behavior is presented as an ideal resource for the social contextualization of the degree of marketing, as well as a fundamental field for the identification of opportunities that they raise the dynamics of the markets, and the strategic adequacy that allows organizations to access and take advantage of them.

BLOCK.1 INTRODUCTION

Topic 1: Marketing and the study of consumer behavior

• Introduction to the study of consumer behavior. Concept and definitions. 
• The consolidation of consumer behavior research in the context of marketing history
• Illustrative summary of the study of consumer behavior: fields of application and research methodologies 

Theme 2: The systematization of the study of consumer behavior

• Dimensions of analysis and identification of study variables
• Consumer behavior as a multidimensional phenomenon
• The Anthropological Determinants of Consumer Behavior: An Introduction to the Duality of the Human Condition

BLOCK.2 EXTERNAL STRUCTURES

Topic 3: The social production of needs

• Consumption and modes of production. The advent of mass consumption society.
• The social production of needs
• Workshop on the study of human needs

Topic 4: Social strata and consumption

• An introduction to the sociology of consumption
• Concept of social differentiation and inequality. Measurement procedures and indicators.
• social differentiation and consumption patterns
• Applications for strategic and operational marketing of the sociological study of social differentiation 

Topic 5: Cultures and consumer behaviour

• Concept and definitions of the cultural dimension of the human condition
• Culture, values ​​and consumption
• New cultural trends
• Gender and culture
• Subcultures, deethnicization and acculturation
• Cultures and consumption: case study applied to an internationalization process

Topic 6: Social groups and other consumption practices

• Marketing and reference groups
• Social groups and consumer behavior
• Brand community and consumer tribes
• Lifestyles, personality and typologies
• Consumer ethics, sustainable consumption and consumer rights

BLOCK.3 INTERNAL STRUCTURES

Item 7: SENSES AND PERCEPTION

• Acquisition of information
• Information processing
• Strategies to capture attention
• Selective perception
• Approach to sensory marketing

Topic 8: CONSUMER BEHAVIOR AND COGNITIVE SCIENCES

• Learning and memory
• Congruence and cognitive dissonance
• Cognitive Biases

Topic 9: CONSUMER BEHAVIOR AND NEUROSCIENCES

• Neuroscience, neuroeconomics and neuromarketing
• Consciousness, unconsciousness and consumption
• Emotions, feelings and advertising communication

BLOCK.4 INTEGRATION

Item 10: INTEGRATED CONSUMER BEHAVIOR: THE DECISION PROCESS

• Socio-cultural conditioning of individual consumption processes
• Decision neural structures
• Recognition of the problem
• Information search
• Decision
• Post-purchase evaluation
• Loyalty and repetition

The relationship between evaluable activities and weighted score percentage is specified under the following formula:

• SE4. Final Exam: 40%
• SE2. Group coursework: 20%
• SE1 + SE2 Individual and group continuous assessment activities: 40%

To make an average, it will be essential that the student has a grade equal to or higher than 5 both in the final exam, (1) and in the group work (2) and in the individual continuous assessment activities (3).

ALONSO, J and GRANDE (2013) Consumer Behavior. ESIC, Seventh Edition, Madrid

RIVERA CAMINO, Jaime; ARELLANO CUEVA, Rolando (2013) Consumer behavior : strategies and tactics applied to marketing. Madrid: ESIC

Solomon, Michael R. (2017). Consumer behavior (11th ed.). Pearson Education.

Stroud, David & Walker, Kate. (2013). Marketing to the aging consumer. Palgrave Macmillan.

Kahneman, Daniel. (2016). Thinking, fast and slow (Kindle ed.). Penguin Books.

Þorsteinn J. Zoëga-Ramsøy. (2014). Introduction to neuromarketing and consumer neuroscience (Kindle ed.).

Pradeep, Akshay K. (2010). The buying brain: Secrets for selling to the subconscious mind. John Wiley & Sons.

Thaler, Richard H. (2015). Misbehaving. Penguin Random House UK.

Kotler, Philip, Pfoertsch, Wolfgang, & Sponholz, Uwe. (2021). H2H marketing: The genesis of human-to-human marketing. Springer.

Cenizo, Carlos. (2022). Neuromarketing: Concept, historical evolution and challenges. ICONO Magazine 14. Scientific Journal of Communication and Emerging Technologies, 20(1).