Course Instructor:

Mafi Rahman
Lecturer
Department of Business Administration-General
Faculty of Business Studies
Bangladesh University of Professionals (BUP)
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 Topics
• Sensory Information.
• The Absolute and Differential Thresholds.
• Perceptual Selection.
• Perceptual Organization.
• Interpretation: Cues.

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 Learning Objectives
1. To understand how perception shapes sensory input and
subsequent consumer behavior.
2. To understand the distinction between the sensory absolute and
differential thresholds.
3. To understand why consumers notice some stimuli but not others.
4. To understand how people organize stimuli.
5. To understand how consumers use integral and external factors to
evaluate products.

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 Perception

“How we see the world around us.”

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Write a story
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 Sensory Information
• Sensory input (stimuli) by itself does not produce or explain the coherent picture of the world
that most adults possess. The study of perception is largely the study of what we
subconsciously add to or subtract from raw sensory inputs to produce our own private picture
of the world.
• Perception is the result of two different kinds of inputs that interact to form the personal
pictures—the perceptions—that each individual experiences. One type of input is physical
stimuli from the outside environment; the other consists of people’s expectations, motives,
and what they have learned from previous experiences.
• Sensation is the immediate and direct response of the sensory organs to stimuli.
• A stimulus is any unit of input to any of the senses. Examples of stimuli (i.e., sensory inputs)
include products, packages, brand names, advertisements, and commercials. Sensory
receptors are the human organs (the eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and skin) that receive sensory
inputs.

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 Sensory Information

• As sensory input decreases, however, our ability to detect changes in input or intensity
increases, to the point that we attain maximum sensitivity under conditions of
minimal stimulation. This accounts for the statement, “It was so quiet I could hear a
pin drop.”

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 Sensory Information
Types of Sensory Input:
1. Sight: Sensory input from our eyes is reflected in brand colors, store layouts, website design,
and more.
2. Scent: Consumers tend to linger in stores that have pleasant and congruent smells.
3. Touch: Touching a product influences persuasion and that touching could be used as a
persuasive tool.
4. Sound: Companies have invested large amounts of resources in designing products and
packages that emit just the right audio sensory input. In contrast, the absence of sound is
becoming a popular advertising tool. Music played in restaurants, showrooms. Fig 4.1
5. Taste: There are five known fundamental tastes in the human palate: salty, sweet, sour,
bitter, and umami. Marketers can influence the perception of taste with sights and sounds.
6. Sensory Input and Culture: We are trained by our culture how to interpret our sensory
perceptions. Taste of spices.

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 The Absolute and Differential Thresholds
The Absolute Threshold
• The lowest level at which an individual can experience a sensation is called the absolute
threshold. The point at which a person can detect a difference between “something” and
“nothing” is that person’s absolute threshold for that stimulus.
• We experience sensory adaptation—getting used to certain sensations; that is, becoming
accommodated to a certain level of stimulation and becoming less able to notice a particular
stimulus. As our exposure to the stimulus increases, we notice it less.
• Sensory adaptation is a problem that concerns many national advertisers, which is why they
try to change their advertising campaigns regularly.

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 The Absolute and Differential Thresholds
The Differential Threshold
• The minimal difference that can be detected between two similar stimuli is called the
differential threshold, or the just noticeable difference (JND).
• The stronger the initial stimulus, the greater the additional intensity needed for the second
stimulus to be perceived as different.
• Sometimes, marketers promote the smaller packages as premium versions.

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 The Absolute and Differential Thresholds
The Differential Threshold
Product Pricing and Improvements
• Manufacturers and marketers endeavor to determine the relevant JNDs for their products for
two reasons.
• First, they want to prevent changes (e.g., reductions in product size or quality, or increases in
product price) from becoming readily discernible to the public (i.e., remain below the JND).
• Second, they want to ensure that product improvements (e.g., improved or updated
packaging, larger size, or lower price) are very apparent to consumers, but without being
wastefully extravagant (i.e., they are at or just above the JND).
• When it comes to product improvements, marketers want consumers to readily perceive any
improvements made in the original product. Improvements below the JND will not be
perceived and will hurt the credibility of a marketer promoting the product as “new and
improved.”

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 The Absolute and Differential Thresholds
The Differential Threshold
Logos and Packaging
• Marketers often want to update their existing package designs without losing the recognition
of loyal consumers. They usually make a number of small changes, each carefully designed to
fall below the JND so that consumers will perceive only minimal difference between
succeeding versions.
• One year, for the holidays, Coca-Cola packaged regular Coke in snow-white cans, which
exceeded the JND. Consumers became confused because the holiday cans were confusingly
similar to Diet Coke’s silver cans. The company brought back the familiar red can immediately.

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 Perceptual Selection

Which stimuli get selected depends on two major factors, in addition to the nature of
the stimulus itself: (1) consumers’ previous experience as it affects their expectations
(what they are prepared, or “set,” to see) and (2) their motives at the time (their needs,
desires, interests, and so on). Each of these factors can increase or decrease the
probability that a stimulus will be perceived.

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 Perceptual Selection
Stimuli’s Features
• Physical stimuli that affect consumers’ perceptions of products and evoke attention include
the product itself, its attributes, package design, brand name, advertisements, commercials
(including copy claims, choice and gender of model, positioning of model, size of ad, and
typography), and placement of promotional messages within the advertising space.
• Ads that contrast with the buyers’ environments are very likely to be noticed.
• Shocking and unrealistic images also provoke attention.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=Htq6ScRntG4

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 Perceptual Selection

Personal Expectations
• A person tends to perceive products and product attributes according to his or her own
expectations.
• Stimuli that conflict sharply with expectations receive more attention than those that
conform to expectations.
• Consumer who has read positive online reviews and recommendations about a new
restaurant in town. This person has high expectations based on the positive feedback and
anticipates a delightful dining experience. When they visit the restaurant, they are more
likely to perceive the food, ambiance, and service positively because their expectations
were shaped by the familiarity and previous experiences shared by others.

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 Perceptual Selection
Consumer Motivation
• People tend to perceive the things they need or want: The stronger the need, the greater the
tendency to ignore unrelated stimuli in the environment.

• Marketing managers recognize the efficiency of targeting their products to the perceived
needs of consumers. For example, a marketer can determine through marketing research what
different segments of consumers view as the ideal attributes of the products they need and
wish to purchase. The marketer can then segment the market on the basis of those needs, and
vary the product advertising, so that consumers in each segment will perceive the product as
meeting their own special needs, wants, or interests.

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 Perceptual Selection
Perceptual Selectivity
• Selective Exposure: Occurs when consumers tune into messages that they find
pleasant or with which they are sympathetic, and they actively avoid painful or
threatening ones.
• Selective Attention: Selective attention is consumers’ heightened awareness of stimuli
that meet their needs or interests and minimal awareness of stimuli irrelevant to their
needs.
• Perceptual Defense: Perceptual defense takes place when consumers subconsciously
screen out stimuli that they find psychologically threatening, even though exposure
has already taken place.

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 Perceptual Organization

People do not experience the numerous stimuli they select from the environment as
separate and discrete sensations; rather, they tend to organize them into groups and
perceive them as unified wholes.
The principles underlying perceptual organization are often called Gestalt psychology (in
German, Gestalt means “pattern or configuration”). Three of the basic principles of
perceptual organization are figure and ground, grouping, and closure.

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 Perceptual Organization
Figure and Ground
• The term figure and ground refers to the interrelationship between the stimulus itself (i.e.,
figure) and the environment or context within which it appears (i.e., ground).
• Stimuli that contrast with their environment are more likely to be noticed.
• Prior experiences affect how figure and ground pattern are perceived. For example, a short
time following the destruction of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, by hijacked
airplanes, one of the authors came across an ad for Lufthansa (Germany’s national airline) that
featured a flying jet, photographed from the ground up, between two glass high-rise buildings.
Rather than focusing on the brand and the jet (i.e., the figure), the only thing the viewer could
think about was the two tall glass towers in the background (i.e., the ground), and the
possibility of the jet crashing into them. When the author presented the ad to his students,
many expressed the same thoughts. Clearly, this figure–ground reversal was the outcome of
the painful events that occurred in September 2001.

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 Marketers must test their advertisements in order to
ensure that they do not confuse consumers by not
making a clear indication of which is figure and which
is ground.

Figure 4 . 6
Figure and Ground Reversal 24
 Perceptual Organization
Figure and Ground
• A marketing technique based on the principle of figure and ground consists of inserting
advertisements into entertainment content. Product placement takes place when the
advertised product (i.e., the figure) is deliberately integrated into the TV show or film (i.e., the
ground).
https://youtu.be/_A8epvOfdLY?t=1957

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 Perceptual Organization
Grouping
• Grouping refers to people’s instinctive tendency to
group stimuli together so that they become a unified
picture or impression.
• Marketers use grouping to imply certain desired
meanings in connection with their products. For
example, an advertisement for tea may show a young
man and woman sipping tea in a beautifully appointed
room before a blazing hearth. The overall mood
implied by the grouping of stimuli leads the consumer
to associate the drinking of tea with romance, fine
living, and winter warmth.
• Grouping has implications for placing products in
supermarkets.

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 Perceptual Organization
Closure
• Closure is people’s instinct to organize pieces of sensory input into a complete image or
feeling. Individuals need closure, which means that if they perceive a stimulus as incomplete,
they are compelled to figure out its complete meaning; they consciously or subconsciously fill
in the missing pieces.
• Examples of ads that induce closure include:
1. Asking consumers to unscramble words.
2. Showing pictures and asking consumers to name the activities or items shown.
3. Including sentences with missing words and asking consumers to fill in the blanks.
4. Asking consumers to match, for instance, occupations with people shown wearing
different styles of clothes.
5. Showing incomplete pictures so that consumers imagine the complete picture.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8zJdJMox-8

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 Interpretation: Cues
The interpretation of stimuli is uniquely individual because it is based on what individuals
expect to see in light of their previous experiences, the number of plausible explanations they
can envision, and their motives and interests at the time of purchase. Consumers explicate
marketers’ offerings using two types of their features.
1. Integral Indicators: Intrinsic cues are physical characteristics of the product itself, such as
size, color, flavor, or aroma. In some cases, consumers use physical characteristics (e.g., the
flavor of ice cream or cake) to judge product quality. Consumers like to believe that they
base their evaluations of product quality on intrinsic cues, because that enables them to
justify their product decisions (either positive or negative) as being “rational” or “objective”
choices.

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 Interpretation: Cues
2. External Indicators: More often than not, however, consumers use extrinsic cues—that is,
characteristics that are not inherent in the product—to judge quality. In the absence of actual
experience with a product, consumers often evaluate quality on the basis of cues that are
external to the product itself, such as price, brand image, manufacturer’s image, retail store
image, or even the perceived country of origin.

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 Interpretation: Cues
3. Stereotyping: Individuals carry biased pictures in their minds of the meanings of various
stimuli, which are termed stereotypes. Sometimes, when presented with sensory stimuli,
people “add” these biases to what they see or hear and thus form distorted impressions. The
triggers of stereotyping are physical appearance, descriptive terms, first impressions, and the
halo effect.

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 Interpretation: Cues
3. Stereotyping:
i. Physical Appearance: Advertisers must ensure that there is a rational match between the
product advertised and the physical attributes of the model used to promote it.
Products’ physical appearance often influences consumers’ judgments.

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 Interpretation: Cues
3. Stereotyping:
ii. Descriptive Terms: Stereotypes are often reflected in verbal
messages.
Although distinct brand names are important to all products
or services, associations that consumers make with certain
names are particularly crucial in marketing services, because
services are abstract and intangible.
For example, names such as “Federal Express” is an excellent
name because it is distinctive, memorable, and relevant to
the services that they offer. In contrast, “Allegis”—a
short-lived brand name aimed at creating a business travel
concept by combining United Airlines, Hertz, and Hilton and
Westin Hotels under one umbrella—failed because it
conveyed nothing to consumers about the type of services it
offered.
Figure 4 . 8
MADD: Dispelling a Negative Stereotype Caused by Descriptive Terms 33
 Interpretation: Cues
3. Stereotyping:
iii. First Impression: Because first impressions are often lasting, introducing a new product before
it has been perfected may prove fatal to its ultimate success; subsequent information about
its advantages, even if true, will often be negated by the memory of its early poor
performance.
When one retailer put a picture of an aloe vera leaf and the wording “Aloe Vera” on the
surface of its mattress, at first impression consumers assumed that aloe vera was a
component of the ticking (the mattress cover), and the retailer had great difficulty in dispelling
this initial impression.

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 Interpretation: Cues
3. Stereotyping:
iv. Halo Effect: The halo effect refers
to the overall evaluation of an
object that is based on the
evaluation of just one or a few
dimensions.
For example, consumers who
admire Porsche cars will be willing
to spend a lot of money on
sunglasses and other accessories
sold under the same brand name.

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 Next Class

Chapter 5
Consumer Learning

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