Values + how they affect consumer behaviour

A definition for Values can be the important beliefs or ideals shared by the members of a culture about what is good or desirable and what is not. Values play a major influence on the behavior of an individual and serve as broad guidelines in all situations. (Business Dictionary)

How values affect consumer behaviour

Marketers  have  long  acknowledged  the importance  of  attitudes  and  attitude change in  the study  of marketing  and  consumer  behavior, but  the  role  of  values  has not received as much attention as expected. While  it seems  that  personal  values  have  important  implications for  marketing   researchers, values and  the ways in  which they influence  the  behavior  of  consumers  who look  at  and  choose  brands, product  classes,  and product  attributes  is  not  clear.  In order  to  investigate these relationships, it  is necessary to operationally  define  what  values  are,  and  to  identify  methods  available  for examining the connections  between  personal  values  and  consumer  behavior. 

The Role of Personal Values in Marketing and Consumer Behavior

Author(s): Donald E. Vinson, Jerome E. Scott, Lawrence M. Lamont

Source: Journal of Marketing, Vol. 41, No. 2, (Apr., 1977), pp. 44-50

Published by: American Marketing Association

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1250633

A way in which values affect consumer behaviour is that broad-based concepts such as freedom, security, or inner harmony are more likely to affect general purchasing patterns than to differentiate between brands within a product category. For this reason, some researchers have found it convenient to make distinctions among broad-based cultural values such as security or happiness, consumption-specific values such as convenient shopping or prompt service, andproduct-specific values such as ease of use or durability, that affect the relative importance people in different cultures place on possessions. (Cited)