Brand Choice in Behavioral Perspective

The study of consumer behavior has been given increasing attention in the context of the expansion of the study of marketing and marketing research over the past decades (e.g., Kotler et al., 2001; Jobber, 2004; Keith, 1960). Today, consumer researchers account for almost half of all marketing faculty in business schools (Simonson et al., 2001) and it is a growing area of research in other disciplines such as sociology, communication and anthropology (e.g., Miller, 1995). One of the reasons for the interest in the subject has been that markets and companies have been growing in size and hence there is no longer a great deal of proximity between sellers and buyers. Whereas selling for the most basic commodities like food used to be an everyday social experience, it largely has become an anonymous process with minimal personal interaction, possibly even without any face to face contact when shopping over the Internet. Most purchases for food items and other products, at least in urbanized areas, are done in supermarkets where there is little interaction between staff and customers.