Cognitive dissonance

1.  What is motivation, and how is motivation relevant to consumer behaviour? What is the difference between a need and a want?

2.   Describe three types of motivational conflicts, citing an example of each from current marketing campaigns.

3.   What is cognitive dissonance? Why is it important for marketers to understand how this works?

4   Devise separate promotional strategies for an article of clothing, each of which stresses one of the levels of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

Some consumer advocates have protested at the use of super-thin models in advertising, claiming that these women encourage others to starve themselves in order to attain the ‘waif’ look. other critics respond that the media’s power to shape behaviour has been overestimated, and that it is insulting to people to assume that they are unable to separate fantasy from reality. What do you think?

Solution: