1. Comprehension, Memory, and Cognitive Learning
BABIN / HARRIS CB
PART 2
CHAPTER 4
Comprehension, Memory, and Cognitive Learning
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

2. Learning Outcomes
Identify factors that influence consumer comprehension.
2. Explain how knowledge, meaning, and value are inseparable using the multiple store theory of memory.
3. Understand how the mental associations consumers develop are key to learning.
4. Use the concept of associative networks to map relevant consumer knowledge.
5. Apply the cognitive schema concept in understanding how consumers react to products, brands, and marketing agents.
4-2
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

3. Components of Consumer Information Processing
Exposure
Attention
Comprehension
Elaboration
LO1
4-3
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

4. Comprehension
Refers to the interpretation or understanding that a consumer develops about some attended stimulus in order to assign meaning.
LO1
4-4
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

5. Comprehension
Process is largely influenced by other internal factors within the consumer.
Includes both cognitive (thought) and affective (feeling) elements.
Consumer comprehension is not always “correct.”
LO1
4-5
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

6. Factors Affecting Consumer Comprehension
Message characteristics
Receiver characteristics
Environmental characteristics
LO1
4-6
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

7. Characteristics of the Message
Physical characteristics
Intensity
Color
Font
Numbers
Spacing
Simplicity-Complexity
Message Congruity
Figure and Ground
Message Source
Likeability
Attractiveness
Expertise
Trustworthiness
LO1
4-7
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

8. Message Receiver Characteristics
Intelligence/Ability
Prior knowledge
Involvement
Familiarity/Habituation
Expectations
Physical limits
Brain dominance
LO1
4-8
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

9. Environmental Characteristics
Information intensity
Framing
Prospect theory
Priming
Timing
LO1
4-9
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

10. Multiple Store Theory of Memory
Views the memory process as utilizing three different storage areas within the human brain.
Sensory memory
Workbench (or “short-term”) memory
Long-term memory
LO2
4-10
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

11. Sensory Memory
The area in memory where the things that we encounter with any of the five human senses are stored.
Preattentive—consumer has not yet allocated attention to sensations.
Unlimited capacity
Storage methods:
Iconic storage—visual information
Echoic storage—auditory information
Short duration and perishable
LO2
4-11
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

12. Workbench Memory
The storage area where information is stored and encoded for placement in long-term memory, and eventually, retrieved for future use.
Encoding—process by which information is transferred from workbench memory to long-term memory for permanent storage.
Retrieval—process by which information is transferred back into workbench memory.
Limited capacity and duration
Capacity depends on consumer’s involvement.
LO2
4-12
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

13. Mental Processes Help Consumers “Remember” Things
Repetition—rehearsal
Problem: Cognitive interference
Dual coding—two different sensory “traces” are available to remember something.
Meaningful encoding—pre-existing knowledge is used to assist in storing new information.
Chunking—grouping stimuli by meaning so that multiple stimuli can become a single memory unit.
Chunk = single memory unit
LO3
4-13
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

14. Long-Term Memory
A repository for all information that a person has encountered
Unlimited capacity and duration
Semantic encoding—stimuli are converted to meaning which can be expressed verbally.
Memory trace—the mental path by which some thought becomes active.
Spreading activation—cognitive activation spreads from one concept to another.
Tag—a small piece of coded information that helps that particular piece of knowledge get retrieved.
Rumination
Nostalgia
LO3
4-14
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

15. Associative Network
A network of mental pathways linking knowledge within memory.
Declarative knowledge—cognitive components that represent facts.
Nodes—represent concepts.
Path—shows association between nodes.
LO4
4-15
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

16. Product & Brand Schemas
Schema—a type of associative network that works as a cognitive representation of a phenomenon that provides meaning to that entity.
Exemplar—a concept within a schema that is the single best representative of some category.
Prototype—characteristics most associated with a concept.
LO5
4-16
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

17. Reaction to New Products/Brands
When consumers encounter new products or brands, they react to them by comparing them to the existing schema.
LO5
4-17
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.

18. More Terminology Script—a schema representing an event.
Episodic memory—memory for past events in one’s life.
Social schemata—the cognitive representation that gives a specific type of person meaning.
Also known as social stereotype.
Elaboration—the extent to which one continues processing a message even after an initial understanding is achieved in the comprehension stage.
Personal elaboration—person imagines himself associating with a stimulus being processed.
LO5
4-18
©2012 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be scanned, copied or duplicated, or posted to a publicly accessible website, in whole or in part.