BUU33710 Consumer Behaviour (5 ECTS)

(5 ECTS)

Lecturer:

Dr. Stephen Murphy

Email: stephen.murphy@tcd.ie

Tutor: Matthew Jackson

Email: jacksom4@tcd.ie

Module Prerequisite:
BUU22520 Principles of Marketing (SF Year)

Available to Exchange students

Module Description / Content:

Consumption isn’t just about the acquisition of good and services to satisfy needs and wants. People consume to make meaning, establish identities, connect with others, and sometimes just for the experience. Consumption plays a big part in daily routines and habits, and yet it is also central to the extraordinary experiences that consumers seek to escape from this monotony.

This module explains consumer behaviour as a social, cultural and psychological phenomenon, with the aim of developing a rich understanding of how and why people consume.

BUU33710 draws from sociological, anthropological and psychological theory to provide a contemporary view of consumer behaviour that moves beyond predominant behaviourist approaches to the subject.

Students will be introduced to cutting edge research methods, while also putting these methods into action in a live project where they will do primary research on real life consumers and develop marketing strategies that stand out.

Learning Outcomes:

Having successfully completed this module, the student should be able to:

To grasp and know how to apply research methods designed to study actual consumer behaviour in the market.
To understand, critically evaluate and apply contemporary consumer behaviour theory to make sense of your own consumer behaviour.
To understand, critically evaluate and apply contemporary consumer behaviour theory to make sense of actual consumer behaviour in the market.
To appreciate how consumer research is used to inform effective marketing strategy.
To develop a critical understanding of the role that consumption plays in organising society, and to appreciate some of the broader social, economic, environmental and cultural consequences of this.

Relation to Degree:

Consumers are central to contemporary business and marketing practices. This module introduces students to the cultural complexities of consumer behaviour. Understanding consumer behaviour is essential for marketing students and practitioners. For these reasons, consumer behaviour is a crucial sub-discipline of the wider field of marketing

The insights from this module may also inform the study and practice of other areas of marketing, including marketing strategy, segmentation, targeting, and positioning, B-to-B interactions, and branding. Such insights can also inform the other courses the students take including: strategy, operations management, human resource management, organizational theory and change management.

Workload:

*Content*	*Indicative Number of Hours*
Lecturing hours	24
Preparation for lectures	24
Individual assignment	26
Group assignment	26
Reading of assigned materials and active reflection on lecture and course content and linkage to personal experiences	25
Final exam preparation	0
*Total*	*125*

Essential Texts/Key Reading:

Students should read materials prior to attending lecture sessions and tutorials. There is no preparatory reading for the first week of lectures. Students should use this time to prepare for the second week’s topic.

Recommended Reading List By Topic:

Module Introduction
Consumer Culture Theory

Askegaard, S., & Linnet, J. T. (2011). Towards an epistemology of consumer culture theory: Phenomenology and the context of context.
Marketing Theory, 11(4), 381-404.

Ethnographic / Netnographic Research Methods

Valtonen, A., Markuksela, V., & Moisander, J. (2010). Doing sensory ethnography in consumer research.
International Journal of Consumer Studies, 34(4), 375-380

Murphy, S., Patterson, M., & O’Malley, L. (2019). Learning how: Body techniques, skill acquisition and the consumption of experience.
Marketing Theory, 19(4), 425-445.

Consumer Habits, Rituals, and Meanings

Shove, E. (2012). Habits and their creatures.

Tadajewski, M. (2019). Habit as a central concept in marketing.
Marketing Theory, 19(4), 447-466.

Consumer Identity Projects

Belk, R. W. (1988). Possessions and the extended self.
Journal of consumer research, 15(2), 139-168.

Belk, R., (2014) Digital consumption and the extended self.
Journal of Marketing Management, 30(11-12), pp.1101-1118.

Thompson, C. J., & Üstüner, T. (2015). Women skating on the edge: Marketplace performances as ideological edgework. Journal of Consumer Research, 42(2), 235-265.

Subcultures, Brand Communities, and Tribes

Canniford, R. (2011). A typology of consumption communities.
Research in consumer behavior, 13, 57-75.

Muniz, Albert M. and Thomas C. O’Guinn (2001) “Brand Community,” Journal of Consumer Research, 27(March), 412-432.

Schouten, John W. and James H. McAlexander (1995) “Subcultures of Consumption: An Ethnography of the New Biker”,
Journal of Consumer Research, 22(1), 43-61

Cova, B. (1997), "Community and consumption: Towards a definition of the “linking value” of product or services",
European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 31 No. 3/4, pp. 297-316.

The Experience Economy

Pine, B. J., & Gilmore, J. H. (1998). Welcome to the experience economy. Harvard business review, 76, 97-105.

Lanier Jr, C. D., & Rader, C. S. (2015). Consumption experience: An expanded view. Marketing Theory, 15(4), 487-508.

Joy, A., Charters, S., Wang, J. J., & Grohmann, B. (2020). A multi-sensory and embodied understanding of wine consumption.
Journal of Wine Research, 31(4), 247-264.

Hultén, B. (2011). Sensory marketing: the multi‐sensory brand‐experience concept. European business review, 23(3), 256-273

Consuming Emotions & Atmosphere

Illouz, E. (2009). Emotions, imagination and consumption: A new research agenda. Journal of consumer culture, 9(3), 377-413.

Murphy, S., Hill, T., McDonagh, P., & Flaherty, A. (2022). Mundane emotions: Losing yourself in boredom, time and technology.
Marketing Theory, 14705931221138617.

Consuming Experiences: Flow & Edgework

Celsi, R. L., Rose, R. L., & Leigh, T. W. (1993). An exploration of high-risk leisure consumption through skydiving.
Journal of consumer research, 20(1), 1-23.

Hoffman, D. L., & Novak, T. P. (2009). Flow online: lessons learned and future prospects. Journal of interactive marketing, 23(1), 23-34.

The Marketplace and I: Understanding Disabled Consumer Experiences

Downey, H. and Catterall, M. (2006) ‘Self-care, the Body and Identity: The Non-Ableist Consumer Perspective’,
Asia-Pacific Advances in Consumer Research 7: 127–132.

Higgins, L. (2020) ‘Psycho-emotional disability in the marketplace’, European Journal of Marketing 54(11): 2675-2695.

Kearney, S., Brittain, I. and Kipnis, E. (2019) ‘“Superdisabilities” vs “disabilities”? Theorizing the role of ableism in (mis) representational mythology of disability in the marketplace’,
Consumption Markets & Culture 22(5-6): 545-567.

Pavia, T. M. and Mason, M. J. (2012) ‘Inclusion, exclusion and identity in the consumption of families living with childhood disability’,
Consumption Markets & Culture 15(1): 87-115.

Assessment:

Module Participation:

Worth 20% of overall grade – see CW1 brief on blackboard.

Workshops will be of significant importance for this component of assessment,

Workshop attendance, preparation, participation and contributions to group activities will be of primary importance for this component of assessment. This evaluation will also consider lecture attendance, completion of preparation activities, contribution to discussions and in-class activities.

See further details in CW1 brief and participation rubric

Group Project:

Worth 80% of overall grade – see CW2 brief on blackboard.

Late submission policy: Students unable to submit assessments at the submission date will only be excused on the basis of extenuating circumstances. Students must produce suitable documentation to Trinity Business School and to the lecturer within three working days of the missed submission date.