Research Instruments
In collecting primary data, marketing researchers have a choice of two main research instruments—the questionnaire and mechanical devices. The questionnaire is by far the most…
Research Instruments
Psychological Factors Affecting Buying Behaviors
A person’s buying choices are further influenced by four major psychological factors: motivation, perception, learning, and beliefs and attitudes. Motivation We know that Lucy became…
Maslow’s Theory of Motivation
Abraham Maslow sought to explain why people are driven by particular needs at particular times. Why does one person spend much time and energy on…
Types of Buying Decision Behavior
Buying behavior differs greatly for a tube of toothpaste, a tennis racket, an expensive camera, and a new car. More complex decisions usually involve more…
Policy implications
Suppose that government wished to encourage individuals to work for longer hours. How might this be done? One method operates by shifting upwards the schedule…
Utility and consumer preferences
Utility refers to the satisfaction or enjoyment which comes from the consumption of goods over some interval of time. For simplicity, suppose that only two…
The individual’s budget constraint
As individuals are utility maximisers, each person seeks to be on an indifference curve as far away from the origin as possible. The extent to…
An indifference curve shows all combinations of the two goods which yield a particular level of utility.
The shape of an indifference curve will depend upon the utility function of the individual concerned. One likely shape for an indifference curve is shown…
Utility maximisation subject to a budget constraint
For a consumer with a limited income (and that is all of us once our work-leisure choices have been made), the best or efficient allocation…
The efficient allocation of a consumers budget
We have just seen how a utility maximising consumer allocates a budget between two goods. It is possible to generate a simple rule from this…