Memory and Cognitive Learning

Session 4

Memory
. . . affects the exposure, attention, and comprehension stages . . . allows consumers to anticipate the stimuli they might encounter

Multiple-Store Model of Memory

Three different types of memory storage:
Sensory Memory Short-Term Memory Long-Term Memory

Inputs Sensory memory

Short Term Memory ( Working Memory

Available Capacity
Affect and arousal Encoding Long Term Memory Retrieval

A Simplified Memory Model

Multiple-Store Model of Memory

. Sensory memory happens in the pre-attention stage where a stimulus is briefly analyzed to determine if it will receive additional processing Short-term memory is where information is temporarily stored while people are actively processing it. Is like RAM in a computer. Long-term memory is connected to short-term memory through encoding and retrieval processes. Is like the disk drive in a computer. Memory works like parallel processors

The Memory Process

3-6

4/27/2012

Multiple-Store Model of Memory

Encoding is the transfer of information from short-term memory to long-term memory for permanent storage. Retrieval is the process of accessing information stored in long-term memory so that it can be utilized in short-term memory. Retrieval is a constructive process. Information in ads received after product experience can change the perception of the experience

Short-Term Memory
is the site where information is temporarily stored while being processed. Is also called working memory.
Rehearsal is silently repeating information to encode it into long-term memory. If information in short-term memory is not rehearsed it is lost within 30 seconds

The Limited Capacity of Short-Term Memory

Millers Law is the recognition that people can handle 7 (+/- 2) bits of information at a time. In consumer contexts, however, STM is closer to 5 +/- 2 bits of information. Information Overload describes the situation in which more information is received than can be processed in short-term memory. Well illustrated in XEROX 8200 case. Is a major issue with engineers who know system thoroughly and know little about customers.

Involvement & Short-Term Capacity

High involvement makes the consumer more aroused expanding the short-term memory capacity to full and attentive, 7 +/-2 bits. Low involvement tends to keep a consumers arousal levels low so the consumer focuses relatively little memory capacity on the stimulus. Under low involvement, which is common in CB contexts, capacity is at 5 +/1 bits

Marketing Implications
Television advertising In low involvement keep copy points maximum to four ( copy point is considered equivalent to chunk) . Companies that advertise on TV and radio the lesson is keep your message simple

Discussion Questions
How do advertisers drive consumers to rehearse information? When does this work against the advertiser? Can you think of examples of advertisements which drive you to rehearse?

Time Required to Transfer Information Is Influenced by

the consumer's goal to either recognize or recall a task. It requires 2-5 seconds for recognition task and 510 second for recall task to transfer the information to LTM.

Recognition and Recall

Recognition tasks are when information is placed before the consumer. The goal is to determine if the information has been seen before. Recall tasks are when the consumer must retrieve the information from long-term memory without any prompting. Requires greater depth of encoding. Recall impacts the size of the consideration set, which is the set of product choices retrieved from memory that are deemed satisfactory options

Universe of potential brands

Awareness Set Known Brands

Unawareness set

Consideration Set: Brands given consideration

Inert Set Brand viewed with Indifference

Inept Set Unacceptable brands

 Clutter is when there are too many stimuli making recall more difficult

Long-Term Memory
. . . has essentially unlimited capacity to store information permanently.
Stored information is either semantic or visual. Semantic memory deals with the encoding and storage of words and meanings. Visual deals with the storage of images. Long term memory is essentially permanent.

Relative Superiority of Picture Versus Word Memory

Visual images or pictures tend to be more memorable than their verbal counterparts, especially when there is low-involvement on the part of the consumer. Words that have high-imagery content are easier to encode and retrieve than words low in imagery and concreteness. Words and pictures should be used to complement each other in ads. Verbal material is better recalled in high involvement conditions. In high involvement information processing advertisers usually get better results if they present different information via verbal and pictorial means

Memory-Control Processes
are the methods of handling information which may operate consciously or unconsciously to influence the encoding, placement, and retrieval of information

Encoding Process
Rehearsal influences whether or not information will be transferred from STM to LTM The way information is coded will have great impact on speed of transfer as well as on the placement of that information For a new topic repetition of stimulus during rehearsal or attempt to link it to other information already present in the LTM is required. With familiar topic person becomes more adept at coding information on it by drawing associations between it and the information they already have in memory, and storage process speeds up proportionally

Encoding Process
Marketing Implications:
i. Understanding of encoding process in developing brands ii. The closer the brand name fits with consumers association about the product class, the better will be able to recall the name iii. Highly concrete name ( ocean, orchestra, frog, and blossom) that are easily visualized and remembered better than less concrete names (history, truth, moment) because they are coded both visually and verbally and also because they fit better into consumers existing knowledge structure,.

Retrieval and Response Generation

Response generation is when a person develops a response by actively reconstructing the stimulus. Information received after exposure to a stimulus (e.g., ads) can impact response generation of the original stimulus. Retrieval cues create a response by providing a means of assisting the active reconstruction of the stimulus.

A picture is worth a thousand words. Product icons like jolly Green Giant, who has appeared in ads and on package for more than 30 years are a significant factor in product recognition

Retrieval and response Generation

Marketing Implications A major goal of advertiser is to improve consumers ability to retrieve information from memory i. Provide retrieval cues on the packaging of product to assist consumers memories during decision making. ii. Assisting consumers retrieval and response generation to employ music in advertisements. There is evidence that people retrieve sung messages better than spoken one

Consumer Knowledge
is the amount of experience with and information a person has about particular products or services.
As knowledge increases, a consumer can think about a product across a greater number of dimensions and make finer distinctions between brands.

Three Types of Knowledge

Objective knowledge is the correct information about a product class that a consumer has stored in long-term memory

Subjective knowledge is the consumers perception of what or how much he or she knows about a product class. Knowledge of others is what information a consumer knows about another

How Do Consumers Gain Knowledge

Cognitive Learning: process of forming associations, solving problems, and gaining insights. Learning Through Education. Obtaining info from firms who are trying to teach the consumer. Learning Through Experience. Actual contact/use of products

Consumer Knowledge
Marketing Implications i. As consumers knowledge increases, consumers become better organized, grow more efficient and accurate in their information processing, and display better recall of information. Managers need to consider the state of consumer knowledge when they are developing a product ii. Information on the extent of consumer knowledge should influence promotion strategy. A message targeted to knowledgeable prospect can be much more complex than addressed to a novice

Gestalt Theory of Cognitive Knowledge

Gestalt psychologists believe that biological and psychological events do not influence behavior in isolation of each other.

People perceive the inputs from the environment as part of the total context. Focused on the active, creative nature of learning and action. Key idea: whole is greater than sum of parts.

Associationist Approaches to Cognitive Knowledge

Serial learning concerns how people put into memory and recall information that is received in a sequential manner. Serial-position effect occurs when the order of presentation of information in a list influences recall of the information in the list. The S-P effect is the basis for the higher price paid for book-end adsI.e., ads at the beginning and end of a commercial TV break.

Serial Position Effect

Explanation: Beginning and end of the list become anchors in learning. Because of limitation of STM, people pick reference points for when to start and end the learning process. Since only limited amounts of information can be stored in STM at a time, it is those items right around the beginning and end of the list the reference points that are recalled most readily. Many more repetitions of the material may be required before items in the middle can be recalled

Serial Position Effect

Marketing Implication i. Key information in the advertisement should be placed at the beginning and end of the message ii. Advertisers should strive to get their commercials placed either at the begging or the end of series of television ads

Law of Contiguity
Stimuli that are experienced together become associated in memorye.g., Nike-Tiger Woods. Called paired associate learning. Some findings:
Make pairs (I.e. stimulus-response words) easily pronounceable, familiar, meaningful. Use visual images to link stimulus-response words together.

Remember: negative associations can occur between product and another stimulusattack style political ads seek to create such associations for opposing candidates.

Semantic Memory Networks . .

Refer to how people store the meanings of verbal material in long-term memory.

Semantic memory is organized into networks each of which is a series of memory nodes that represent the stored semantic concepts. Information is recalled via spreading activation.

5 Types of Information Stored in Nodes

Types of information
Brand names Brands characteristics/attributes Ads about brand Product category Evaluative (affective) reactions to the brand and the ad.

This information represents a consumers brand knowledgeI.e., a brand node and the associations in memory connected to it.

Measuring Semantic Memory Networks

Guided Associations Think of your university/college
What are the first three words or images that come to mind. (e.g., cowboys, MBA program, sports) Select one of words (e.g., MBA), now think of three words or images that you associate with MBA program, etc.

Semantic Memory Network:

important for semiosis analysis.
OSU Cowboys MBA Program Sports

Walt Garrison
Dallas

Football

Jobs
New job

Academics Bball Golf

Best value Sutton Holder winning

Berry Sanders class

Drugs Crime

money

my daughter

An Associative Networks for Perfumes

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Schemas . . .
. . . are organized sets of expectations and associations about an objects.
When new information is inconsistent with a schema, consumers engage in more diligent processing and, consequently, have improved memory about the stimulus. Can derive from network analysis. Try to influence with communications.

Forgetting
People forget because even though information has been placed in long-term memory, it may be extremely difficult to retrieve. This is called a retrieval failure.

Interference Processes
Retroactive interference occurs when later learned material interferes with the recall of information learned earlier.

Proactive interference occurs when earlier learned material interferes with learning and recall of information learned later.

The von Restorff Effect . . .

. . . occurs when a highly unique item in a series is recalled more easily. Illustrated by absurdism in advertisements, e.g., the Bud frogs. Also illustrates information salience, which is the idea that unique, novel, moving, contrasting, colorful, etc. stimuli are more easily encoded and retrieved.

The Zeigarnik Effect . . .

. . . occurs if a task is interrupted, material relevant to the task tends to be remembered. E.g., stories that are cut in the middle--tasters choice. Bud--frogs and Tasters Choice.

Here, build a story About a person doing Something difficult, and Then stop just before Climax. Will increase Interest in and recall Of story.

Time and Forgetting

The recall of verbal information decreases over time. Rapid forgetting that occurs immediately after learning has been shown to occur in advertising as well.

Time and Forgetting

After people learned a list of words, the percentage of words they could remember decreased dramatically at first, and then leveled off. The rapid forgetting takes place in advertising as well. Zielske had an advertisement for a product run for a group of housewives once a week for 13 weeks. At the end of 13 weeks period 63% of respondents could recall having seen the ad. The ad was not shown to them for 13 weeks. After 20 weeks, those who could recall had dropped to under 30%, by the 9th month fewer than 10% of respondent could remember the ad. In another experiment one group of housewives was shown the ad 4 weeks apart. In this group the ability to recall the ads increased slowly, by the end of year 48% of respondents could remember the ad.

Time and Forgetting

Marketing Implication If advertisers goal is awareness of a product, than high frequency of ads over short period of time will be most effective. However consumer will rapidly forget the commercial message after the burst of advertisements end ii. If advertisers goal is to build long-term awareness of the ad, the commercial should be pulsed so that ads are seen by consumers over long period of time iii. Some advertisers prefer to combine these approaches by using high-intensity ad campaign to bring out a product, and then pulsing regularly after the introduction to maintain consumers awareness of the ad.

Affect and Memory

People are better able to recall information that has the same affective quality as their mood state.
Affect refers to the feelings, emotions, and moods that consumers may experience. Mood is a transient feeling state that occurs in a specified situation or time.

How can Marketers help consumers to remember

Reminders Involves reminding them of what the company wants them to remember Retrieval cues at the point of purchase Saying it again and again: The value of Repetition Encourage Elaboration Stimulus is linked or related to various concepts in memory( Kar Part Outlet Radio Advertising: KAR is what you drive, Part as in what you do to your hair, Outlet, as is what you stick plug in) Self referencing : relating a stimulus to ones own self and experience ( This product is for people just like you who are--------------)

How companies can help consumers remember

Encourage Multiple Representation in Memory Information stored in long term memory may be represented semantically and visual imagery Depending on how people typically represent the to-beremembered information in memory, efforts to encourage additional forms of representation may be worthwhile Importance of consistency Consistency facilitates remembering. Greater consistency among elements within an advertisement increases what consumer remembers about the ad and advertised product The product benefits described within an ad are better remembered when these benefits are consistent with those suggested by the advertised product name

How Companies can help consumers remember

Use Easy-to-remember stimuli Use of concrete words instead of Abstract words Stimuli that are distinctive or unique are also easier to remember. Put Consumer in Good Mood

Brand Image and Product Positioning

Brand Image

Schematic memory of a brand It contains the target markets interpretation of the products attributes, benefits, usage situations, users and manufacturers / marketer characteristics It is what we think and feel when we hear or see a brand name o Product Positioning A decision taken by marketer to try to achieve a defined brand image relative to competition within a market segment Product positioning decisions are strategic decisions The term product positioning involves a explicit reference to brand image relative to another brand. Brand image considers firms image without comparison

Perceptual Mapping and Product Repositioning

Product Positioning A useful technique in measuring and developing products positioning Takes consumers perception of how various brands are to each other and relates these perception to product attributes Product Repositioning: Refers to deliberate decision to significantly alter the the way a product is viewed by the market This could involve its level of performance, the feelings it evokes, the situation in which it should be used, or even who uses it

Perceptual Mapping of Automobiles Volvo 850 R Chrysler LHS

Buick Park Avenue Staid, Conservative Older Nissan Sentra Plymouth Voyger

Stylish, Prestigious, Distinctive Mercedes 400 SE Porsche 914 TM2 Lexus LS 400 Jeep Grand Cherokee Acura Integra Ford Taurus TM1 Fun Sporty Fast

Dodge Caravan
Geo Metro Kia Sephia

TM3 Honda Civic Dodge Neon

Practical, Common, Economical

Brand Equity and Brand Leverage

Brand Equity The value consumer assign to a brand above and beyond the functional characteristics of the product Brand Equity is nearly synonymous with the reputation of the brand Is based on the image consumers have of the brand Brand Leverage( family branding. Brand extension, or umbrella branding) Refers to marketers capitalizing on brand equity by using existing brand for new products If done correctly , consumers will assign characteristics of existing brand to the new brand