Question

Explain how social influences can affect consumption choices

Answer 1

Background Information

Why does an individual behaves (including buying behavior)in a particular way? The answer is "Social influence". Psychologists have spent decades in studying the power of social influence. The Social Factors are the factors that prevail in the society where a consumer live in. The society consists of several individuals that have different behaviors, preferences and consequently buying behavior. Every Individual performs those activities which are acceptable to his society. The various social influences can be categorized into family, reference group and role & status.

1. Family: Family is the first school of an individual. The family members play a crucial role in shaping Individual's opinion, preferences and behavior. Family provides an environment wherein the individual's personality evolves, and he develops value system. For Instance, The buying behavior of a child develops by watching his parent's attitude and consequently he buys the same products or services even when he grows old. As per psychologists, an individual passes through two families: Family of Orientation and Family of Procreation. The former type of family is the family wherein an individual has taken birth, and he has been influenced by the behavior of his parents. However, family of procreation is the family created after his marriage- his spouse and children and as such, these factors also affect buying behaviour of an Individual

2. Reference Group: The second one is a reference group. The reference group dominates the self-image of consumers and consumers’ behavior. Every Individual hails from a particular reference group. A reference group is that group with which an individual aspires to get associated. It has been concluded by various studies that all the members of the reference group have similar buying behavior and they strongly dominate each other.

3. Role and Status-Brand selection often shows the social status of an individual. Social status is the position that individuals have in social groups. It  is based on many aspects: wealth, education or occupation. Almost in every society, social status is important and people aspire the admiration of others by following the group's beliefs and norms.