1. Chapter 10 Household Decision Making

2. Decision Roles
In collective decisions, one may play any (or all) of the following roles:
Initiator: bring up idea or identifies need
Gatekeeper: conducts information search and “presents” information to other decision-makers
Influencer: sways outcome of decision
Buyer: actually makes the purchase
User: winds up using product

3. The Modern Family Before 1900s: extended family
1950s: nuclear family (mother, father, and children)
Today:
Married couples constitute less than 50% of households
Majority of adult women live without spouse
Unmarried opposite sex couples (co-habitation) is 10-15% of all couples
Same-sex couples
Friends, workers and SM/Web are the “new family”

4. Family Size
Depends on educational level, availability of birth control, and religious influences
Marketers keep an eye on fertility and birth rates
Worldwide, women want smaller families (especially in industrialized countries)
Contraception/abortion are more readily available
Divorce is more common
Older people now pursue “non-grandchildren” activities (i.e. travel, education, work)
Some countries want people to have more children (Europe)

5. Sandwich Generation
Sandwich generation: middle-aged adults who care for their parents as well as their own children
Boomerang kids: adult children who return to live with their parents
Roommates and “failed-relationship” kids are most likely to boomerang
Spend less on household items and more on entertainment

6. Pets as Family Members Pets are treated like family members
Spending on pets has doubled in the last decade
Pet Owner Psychology and Characteristics
Pet-smart marketing strategies:
Name-brand pet products
Designer water for dogs
Lavish kennel clubs, gyms, pet classes/clothiers
Pet accessories in cars
Pet Therapists

7. Family Life Cycle Factors that determine how couples spend money:
Whether they have children
Age of children; whether at home or emancipated
Whether the partner works
Family Lifestyles and attitudes towards money
Life Stage of family members

8. Life-Cycle Effects on Buying
Life Cycle stages can show marked differences in consumption patterns:
Young bachelors and newlyweds: exercise, go to bars/concerts/movies
Early 20s: apparel, electronics, gas expenditures high
Families with young children: health foods
Single parents/older children: junk foods
Newlyweds and New Home Owners: appliances, furniture
Older couples/bachelors: home maintenance/re-modeling services, travel, “edutainment”, insurance

9. Household Decisions Families make two types of decisions:
Consensual purchase decisions: members agree on the desired purchase, perhaps differing only in terms of how it will be achieved
Accommodative purchase decision: members have different preferences or priorities and they cannot agree on a purchase to satisfy the minimum expectations of all involved
Frequently result in multi-laterally unwanted compromises or no decision at all

10. Household Decisions (cont.)
Specific factors that determine how much family decision conflict there will be when making “joint” decisions:
Interpersonal need
Product involvement and utility
Responsibility for ownership and/or payment
Relationship power

11. Sex Roles and Decision-making Responsibilities
Who makes key decisions in a family?
Autonomic decisions: when one family member makes decisions for the family
Wives still make decisions on groceries, toys, clothes, and medicines
Syncretic decisions: when both partners “jointly” make decisions
Typically happens with cars, vacations, homes, appliances, furniture, home electronics, interior design, phone service
Increases with education and household income increases

12. Identifying the Decision Maker
“Family Financial Officer (FFO)”
Traditional family norm: the man makes the money and the woman spends it
Modern family norm: either partner can make money; either partner can spend money
Four factors in joint versus sole decision making:
Adherence to sex-role stereotypes
Comparative spousal resources
Experience with purchase
Socioeconomic status

13. LeoShe Mother Types June Cleaver: traditional, stay-at-home mom
Tug of War: work but not happy about it
Strong Shoulders: lower income but optimistic and strong
Mother of Invention: enjoy working and being mothers

14. Heuristics in Joint Decision Making
Synoptic Ideal: Husband and wife take a common view and act as joint decision makers
Heuristics simplify or encourage decision making:
Agree on salient, objective dimensions; different opinions on less salient/objective dimensions
Task specialization
Concessions based on intensity of each spouse’s preferences (bargaining process)
Trade away lower value outcomes for higher value outcomes

15. Children as Decision Makers
Children make up three distinct markets:
Primary market: kids spend their own money
Influence market: parents buy what their kids tell them to buy (parental yielding)
Future market: kids “grow up” quickly and purchase items that normally adults purchase (smartphones, laundry detergent)

16. Consumer Socialization
Consumer socialization: process by which young people acquire skills, knowledge, and attitudes relevant to their functioning in the marketplace
Occurs at different rates in different cultures
Children’s purchasing behavior is influenced by:
Parents
Television and web (“electronic babysitters”)
Sex roles
Peers
Teachers

17. Cognitive Development
Marketers segment children by their stage of Cognitive Development
ability to comprehend concepts of increasing complexity
Three segments often used today:
Limited: Below age 6, children do not use storage and retrieval strategies
Cued: Between ages 6 and 12, children use these strategies, but only when prompted
Strategic: Children age 12 and older spontaneously employ storage and retrieval strategies

18. Five Stages of Consumer Development
This figure reveals the five stages of development for children as they become consumers.

19. Parental Styles for Socializing Children
Authoritarian
Neglecting
Parents exhibit different styles when they socialize their children. Authoritarian parents are hostile, restrictive, and emotionally uninvolved. They do not have warm relationships with their children. They censor the types of media their children see, and tend to have negative views of advertising. Neglecting parents are detached from their children and the parents don’t exercise much control over the children. Indulgent parents communicate more with their children about consumption-related matters and are less restrictive. They believe children should be allowed to learn about the marketplace without much interference.
Indulgent

20. Marketing Research and Children
Kids tend to:
Be undependable reporters of own behavior
Have poor recall
Be flippant
Be overly influenced by other kids
Not understand abstract questions