Classical Conditioning Vs Instrumental Conditioning

                               

Learning is relatively permanent change in behaviour caused by experience (Solomon, 2015). It is important to understand how consumers learn about the products and services in marketing. In our daily life, we will always meet with some products, services and experiences through TV commercial or social media which may link to our emotions and feelings to memory. In order to build the brand loyalty, building the connection between products and the memory of consumers is a forceful way to achieve this. Some companies might use the logo, slogan, music and some interesting video to advance the learning of the consumer.  There are two behavioural learning theories which can help consumers learn about products. The followings are:

                                                                                    

Classical Conditioning

Classical conditioning occurs when a stimulus that elicits a response is paired with another stimulus that initially does not elicit a response on its own (Solomon, 2015). Ivan Pavlov is a Russian physiologist who have put forward his research in animals to prove this theory, one of the example that he have used is dogs (picture above).  Through the unconditional stimulus (food), it can cause the salivation response from the dog. Over the time, the bell will become a conditional stimulus, this do not affect the salivation of the dog but it will make the dog to associate that it is a time to have food. Therefore, sound can make the dog felt that is a dinner time, thereby defining as a conditioned response.

Here is another example which can apply to the marketing concept.

Cadbury Dairy milk chocolate have produced a commercial which shows that with the kids and with the wired eyes. This commercial are using the music and the wired eyes of the kids (conditional stimulus) to promote the Cadbury Dairy milk chocolate (conditional stimulus). Through the music and the wired eyes of the kids, consumers might feel that is an interesting advertisement and attract more kids to buy this chocolate. 

 (YouTube.com, 2016)

Instrumental Conditioning

Instrumental Conditioning (or operant conditioning) occurs when we learn to perform behaviours that produce positive outcomes and avoid those that yield negative outcomes (Solomon, 2015). There is one example from the student which reflects the concept on instrumental conditioning.

When students are having the exam:

No studies before  ----->   fail the exam

Do read do studies ----->  get the good result

In this example, we can see that if students want to gain the positive outcome in their exam, they have to struggle with reading and studying on the studies to get a good result which can avoid the negative outcomes.

Moreover, there is another example that I found when I had a field trip in Malta. Malta can be seen as a very small island in Europe but it has many attractions for tourist to travel in their country. One of the main factors that attracts the tourist to travel is their local cuisine. As the gastronomy are continuously developing in Malta, it attracts many tourists to visit this country and understand more about their culture and traditional food.  Malta also constantly hold some of the international events, such as Malta International Food Festival and Malta International Fireworks Festival (Malta Tourism Authority, 2016). These kinds of events effectively advance the gastronomic development and tourism development in Malta. Therefore, although Malta is a small island and have a smallest population, it can also succeed on the gastronomic development and tourism development (gaining the positive outcome).

References:

Malta Tourism Authority. (2016). Annual Festivals & Traditions. Retrieved from: http://www.visitmalta.com/en/annual-festivals

Solomon, M. R. (2015). Consumer behavior: buying, having, and being (11th ed.). Boston: Pearson