Perception

(Chapter-2)

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 Chapter Objectives
When you finish this chapter, you should understand why:
Perception is a three-stage process that translates raw
stimuli into meaning.
Products and commercial messages often appeal to our
senses, but we won’t be influenced by most of them.
The design of a product today is a key driver of its
success or failure.
Subliminal advertising is a controversial—but largely
ineffective
We interpret the stimuli to which we do pay attention
according to learned patterns and expectations.
Marketers use symbols to create meaning.
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Sensation and Perception
Sensation is the immediate
response of our sensory
receptors (eyes, ears, nose,
mouth, and fingers) to basic
stimuli (light, color, sound,
odor, and texture).

Perception is the process by

which sensations are selected,
organized, and interpreted
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 The brain makes the
The brain receives input sense out of that input
from sensory organs from sensory organ
Sensation Perception
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Sensory Systems
The perceptual process is made up of three stages:
– Exposure
– Attention
– Interpretation
 Stimuli- Thing or event that evokes a specific functional reaction in an
organism
 External stimuli, or sensory inputs, can be received on a
number of channels. (Eyes, Ears, Skin, Tongue, Nose)
Internal stimuli- comes from factor within an organism
(germs, pain, lack of energy, headache)
The inputs picked up by our five senses constitute the raw
data that begin the perceptual process.

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 Hedonic Consumption
 Hedonic consumption: multisensory, fantasy and
emotional aspects of consumers’ interaction with
product.
 Consumption of products by individual for experiencing
happiness or targeting people through emotions
 Marketers use impact of sensations on consumers’
product experience.

Magnum & Slice ad appeals to people

need for pleasurable consumption
 Vision
• Marketers rely on visual elements in advertising, store
design, and packaging.
• Meanings are communicated on the visual channels
through product’s size, brightness and distinctiveness
from competitors product.
• Colors may directly influence emotions.
• Evidence suggests that some colors (RED) create
feeling of arousal
• Colors are rich in symbolic value and cultural meaning.

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Vision

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 Vision
• According to research- products presented against
a backdrop of BLUE in advertising are better liked
than those shown with red background.
• Cross cultural research indicates a consistent
preference for BLUE as consumers’ favorite color
• American Express chose to name its new card
BLUE after research showed the color evoke a
sense of excitement about the future
• RED means good luck to the Chinese and red is
also their traditional color.
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 Vision
In western countries BLACK is the color of mourning,
while in some eastern white plays this role.
The color black is associated with power and may even
have an impact
Women tend to be drawn to brighter tones and are
more sensitive to subtle shadings and patterns
Age also influence response to color
Colors look duller to older people, so they prefer white
and other bright tones
Eastman Kodak has a trade dress of yellow, black, and
red 11
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 ETUDE
cosmetics(Korean
brand)

Romantic and
Feminine color

sense of
achievement

Fascinating feminine
products

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 Smell/Odors
Odors can stir emotions or create a calm feeling.
Odors can invoke memories or relieve stress.
Smell is a directly link to feeling of happiness,
hunger and nostalgic memories. (childhood
years).
At least to some extent, consumers reactions to
odors depend on their cultural background
Many multinational companies adjust the scents
of their products from country to country

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 Smell/Odors
Vidal Sassoon products sold in Asia include pine
aroma that smells like floor cleaner to Americans.
A vanilla smell diffused into a women’s clothing
store and a spicy honey smell diffused into men’s
clothing store doubled sales.
When the scents were reversed, sales fell to level
below what they were when no scent was
infused.

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 Sound
Consumers buy millions of dollar worth of sound recording
each year.
Advertising jingles maintain brand awareness.
Background music creates desired mood.
Many aspect of sound affect people feelings and behaviors
 The Muzak Corporation estimates that 80 million people
hear their “background” music everyday.
Research has shown that workers tend to slow down during
midmorning and mid-afternoon.
Muzak uses upbeat tempo music during these times to
stimulate activity. This is called “stimulus progression”.
(shopping-slow beat, fast food-fast beat) 16
 Touch
 Moods are relaxed or stimulated on the basis of sensation to
skin
 In one study diners who were touched by waiters gave bigger
tips
 New research identify the important role of haptic (touch)
senses in consumer behavior
 Haptic senses appear to moderate the relationship between
product experience and judgment confidence (smart phones)

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 Touch
 Brittan's grocery chain removed the wrapping from sample package
of several brands of toilet tissue in its store so that shoppers could
feel and compare textures (Charmin “P&G”)
 Results : the retailer says that there was significant increase in sales
up to ( 33%)

• Clothing brands- People associate the textures of fabrics and other

surfaces with product qualities (e.g., smooth, rough, silky)

• Fabrics that comprise scarce materials or that require a high degree

of processing to achieve their smoothness or fineness tend to be
more expensive and being higher class
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This ad is for
Lubriderm lotion
relies on the
imagery of rough
tactile sensation
to communicate
a primary
product benefit
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 Taste
 Our taste receptors contribute to our
experience of many products
(products and their flavors)
 Specialized companies (called “flavor
houses”) try to develop new
concoctions to please the ever
changing and demanding palates of
consumers
 New fads with respect to taste include
products that taste “hotter”( spicy, or
stronger mint) and those that avoid
harmful additives.( natural, organic)
 Coke/ Pepsi blind test
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 Sensory Thresholds
The science that focuses on how the physical
environment is integrated into our personal,
subjective world is known as psychophysics.
Physical stimuli and response to it

When we define the lowest intensity of a stimulus

that can be registered on a sensory channel, we
speak of a threshold for that receptor.
The point where stimulus begin to produce a
sensation

The absolute threshold refers to the minimum

amount of stimulation that can be detected on a
sensory channel. 22
Absolute Threshold
The lowest level at which a stimulus
can be detected.
As the intensity of stimulus
increases, the likelihood that it will
sensed, also increases
The sound of dog whistle is too high
to be detected by human ears so,
this stimulus is beyond over absolute
threshold.
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Subliminal Perception
 Refers to presenting a stimulus below
the level of conscious awareness in an
attempt to influence behavior and
feelings.
Characteristics of Subliminal perception
 Perception of stimuli or message
without awareness
 Need of attention.
 Influence over people’s behavior
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 Types of Subliminal Perception
1.Visual Subliminal perception/ “priming
2.Auditory

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The pools of
condensation
spell out the word
sex.
The letters SEX
are, admittedly,
upside down.
 Differential Threshold
 The ability of a sensory
system to detect changes or
differences between two
stimuli
 Minimum difference
between two stimuli is the
J.N.D(just noticeable
difference)
 Example: packaging updates
must be subtle enough over
time to keep current
customers
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 Marketing Applications
of the JND
Need to determine the relevant JND. for their
products
So that negative changes are not readily
discernible to the public
So that product improvements are very apparent
to consumers
 Marketing examples of J.N.D
Pricing:
When raising price, move less than JND
When lowering the price for sale, move more than JND

Sales Promotion:
Make coupons larger than JND

Product Packaging :
Make decreases in size of packaging less than JND
when the word new is used make sure the product change is greater than JND
To update package styling and logo keep within JND
To change Image, make styling changes greater than JND
Betty Crocker (JND)
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 Gradual
Changes in
Brand Name Fall
Below the J.N.D.
 Perceptual selection.
The brain’s capacity to process information is limited,
consumers are very selective about what they pay
attention to.
Perceptual selection means that people attend to
only small portion of stimuli to which they are
exposed. Personal and stimulus factors help to
decide which stimuli will be received and which will
be avoided.
One factor that determines how much exposure to a
particular stimulus a person accepts is experience
 Exposure

 It’s the degree to which people notice a stimulus

that is within range of their sensory receptors.
 An initial stage of perception
 Consumers concentrate on some stimuli that they
are aware of and even go out of their way to ignore
some messages.
 Zipping has enhanced the need for advertising
creativity
 Stimulus Selection Factors

Contrast
External stimuli that
stands out against the
background or that are
not what people are
expecting will receive their
attention
 Attention Factor in selectivity

Contrast:
Created by Saatchi & Saatchi NY, the clever campaign consists of delicious
looking photos of coffee printed on vinyl and placed on top of steaming
manhole covers around New York. Holes cut out of the photographs allow the
steam
 Stimulus Selection Factors
Repetition
Repeated external stimulus is more attention
getting than a single one
Advertisers trying to create unique image for a
product from its competitors rely heavily on
repetitious advertising (Telefun ad)
 Stimulus Selection Factors

Novelty Principles
 Either novel or familiar external
situation can serve as an attention
seeker
 New objects or events in a familiar
setting or familiar objects or events
in a new setting will get attention
Examples of Novelty principles
 Perceptual Organization
 Gestalt psychologists attempt to identify the
rules that govern how people take
disjointed stimuli and make sense out of
them.
 Max Wertheimer, Wolfgang Kohler, and Kurt
Koffka (founders)
 It refers to theories of “visual perception”
developed by German psychologist in 1920’s
 These principles are based on gestalt
psychology (meaning is derived from totality
of a set of stimuli). In German, Gestalt
means whole, pattern, or configuration.
 https://
www.coursera.org/learn/effective-content-st
rategy/lecture/dfa04/part-1-understanding-g
estalt-theory
 Figure/Ground

 The first, figure and ground,

has to do with contrast.
 An advertiser wants just
enough contrast so that the
figure is noticed but that the
background adds a sensory
effect.
Billboard for Wrangler Jeans Makes Creative
use of the Figure-Ground Principle
FIGURE-GROUND
FIGURE-GROUND

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 Proximity

What you are likely to

notice fairly quickly is that
this is not just a square
pattern of dots but rather
is a series of columns of
dots
The principle of
proximity is that features
which are close together
are associated
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 Similarity
 Here the little circles and
squares are evenly spaced
both horizontally and
vertically so proximity does
not come into play.
 However, we do tend to see
alternating columns of circles
and squares.
 This is because of the
principle of similarity -
features which look similar
are associated. Without the
two different recurrent
features we would see either
rows or columns or both
Similarity
 Continuity
 This principle is that
contours based on
smooth continuity are
preferred to abrupt
changes of direction.
 Here, for instance, we are
more likely to identify
lines a-b and c-d crossing
than to identify a-d and c-
b or a-c and d-b as lines.
Continuity.
 Closure
• People have a need for
closure and organize
perceptions to form a
complete picture.
• Will often fill in missing
pieces
• Incomplete messages
remembered more than
complete
This Ad Demonstrates the Use of Closure: People
Have to Mentally Fill in the Gaps in the Sentence
These ads are using the
cropping technique where it
is showing the incomplete
picture by showing male and
female relaxing and having
fun instead of car itself thus
shows the impact of Beetle
in their lives. They cant get
out of the thoughts of it
anywhere.
Semiotics: The Symbols Around Us
• The investigation of symbols and their meaning is called
semiotics
• This field of study analyze how people obtain meaning from
signs, words, gestures, pictures, product, and logos used to
communicate information from one person to another
• Even non verbal sound can communicate meaning
• Example: Harley Davidson ‘s distinctive sound made by its
motorcycles
• That sound symbolizes much more than motorcycle itself
• It stands for the Harley Davidson image of macho,
independent men and women
Semiotics: The Symbols Around Us
The object is a thing whose meaning is to be
communicated ( a product, a person, an idea)
Sign is the symbol or set of symbols used to
communicate meaning of the object
Interpretant is a person’s reaction to and
meaning derived from the sign
Semiosis Analysis