Editorial

Editorial

We are into a new calendar year, but

still in the ®rst Ìssue Year' for the

Journal of Consumer Behaviour. Although

we are still `young', we have received

tremendously encouraging and positive

feedback on the issues to date. Thank

you for this ± but we would like more

feedback so we can strive to improve

further.

We are also attracting a good supply

of papers. Both Henry Stewart and I

have been surprised and delighted with

the large number of submissions. These

are coming in from around the world,

so to brand the Journal as Ìnternational'

is certainly appropriate. Each paper is

double-blind reviewed and we would

like to thank authors for their interest in

this new Journal and also the Editorial

Board members who, between them,

have reviewed more papers in a year

than for any other journal on the table.

As well as praise for the content of the

Journal and for how the Journal is

generally shaping up, one speci®c issue

has attracted comment. This concerns

the point made in Issue 1.1 about a

possible shift in the nature of consumer

understanding; away from the more

conceptual and toward the pure

behavioural. Several practitioners have

contacted me to say `yes' this is the new

marketing era; one of tracking consumer

behaviour via transactional data which

is more revealing and actionable than

research based on theories and

conceptual frameworks. I wonder if this

is the ®rst debate for the Forum for the

Future suggested in Issue 1.2?

Behavioural tracking is clearly

important when transactional data and

personalised response data is available,

but I wonder if it can lead to a myopia if

it is used to the exclusion of more

conceptual approaches and indeed to

research grounded in more qualitative

methodologies?

Take an example from our own

research in which charity mailings,

based on what was clearly well

analysed pro®le, and donation data

were received by the participants in one

of our group discussions. The older

women in this group all agreed that

they were receiving highly relevant

mailings in terms of the causes that

were important to them. This is

certainly strong support for tracking

transactional data and using the results

to target subsequent campaigns. The

point of this story is that many of the

women in this group became quite

upset as they delved (unprompted) into

the issue. They said they couldn't really

afford to continue to donate. When this

was related to a senior practitioner in

Charity Marketing, the reaction was `but

it works'. Yes, in the short term, but

what about the problems this might be

storing up for the future? A time may

come when these women will refuse to

donate further, or may even spread ill-

will (or `negative word-of-mouth

(WOM)') against the charity for its

continued pestering.

Is this an example of the unacceptable

face of the new marketing? Or just good

business? Qualitative research reveals

the more effective dimensions of

consumer behaviour as opposed to the

purely behavioural. Furthermore,

behavioural response analysis reveals

`which' marketing message consumers

respond to, but not necessarily `why'. If

different messages are developed with an

underpinning of information processing

styles of different consumers, there is

surely greater rigour for the ìnput' to the

campaign, but also more understanding

of the òutput' in the sense of explaining

why version A produces a higher

response rate than version B.

I oversimplify and accentuate to make

the points here, but also to elicit some

further response to what I believe is an

increasingly important issue. Let me

Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 213±215 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817 213

know if you agree and why or why

not. . ..

Now to the papers in this issue. It is

tempting to label this one as the

Conference Issue. There are several major

Marketing Conferences each year, eg,

the World Marketing Congress and the

Academy of Marketing, to name but

two.

This year we were lucky in having

struck up a good relationship with the

organisers of both of these and have

been able to publish some of the best

papers from the Consumer Behaviour

tracks of these international class

conferences. Indeed, Henry Stewart

Publishers offered a prize for the best

Consumer Behaviour paper at the

Academy of Marketing Conference.

So what's so special about these

conferences and their papers? Well, all

Competitive Papers are double-blind

reviewed, to ensure the selected papers

are of high quality. They are the result

of the hard work, conceptual thinking

and/or empirical research of the

authors, who might have been working

on their research projects for many

months and sometimes years.

The selected papers are not of the

esoteric navel gazing type, but have

been selected because they are not only

underpinned by appropriate theory and

informed by substantial reference to the

literature in the topic area, but also

because they have something practical

to say.

Best Paper

The paper, `Consumer loyalty: Testing

the Dick and Basu model', by Robert

East of Kingston University and Phil

Gendall of Massey University, won the

annual prize for best paper at the

Academy of Marketing Conference,

2001, in Cardiff. The prize was awarded

by Henry Stewart Publications and the

following is a synopsis of this paper

(currently under review with the

International Journal of Research in

Marketing).

Dick and Basu (1994) propose that

consumer loyalty has two components, an

attitude towards the brand and repeat

purchase behaviour. Both contribute to other

loyalty behaviours such as retention of the

brand, lack of search for alternatives and

recommendation of the brand. The two

components may also work interactively

together. We applied the Dick and Basu

model of loyalty to supermarket customers

in two countries and predicted:

recommendation of the main store, number

of stores used and retention of the main

store over 12 months. Recommendation was

predicted by attitude but not by repeat-

purchase behaviour; number of stores used

and retention was predicted by repeat-

purchase behaviour but not by attitude. In

no case was prediction improved

signi®cantly by the inclusion of a term for

the interaction of attitude and behavior.

Although the Dick and Basu model is widely

cited, we have been unable to ®nd any

thorough test. Thus, this evidence raises

problems for those who seek to explain

loyalty as an interaction between

components. The paper concludes with a

discussion of the nature and use of de®nition

in marketing.

REFERENCEDick, A. S. and Basu, K. (1994) `Loyalty:

Towards an Integrated Conceptual

Framework', Journal of the Academy of

Marketing Science, 22, Winter, 99±113.

Francis Buttle and Jamie Burton also

explore customer loyalty in a

particularly thorough literature review.

They conclude that companies need to

develop positive value-based exit

barriers to achieve loyalty. They also

explore recovery processes when service

failure occurs.

Miriam Catterall and Pauline

Maclaran provide an especially useful

discussion of the Òpportunities and

ethical dilemmas for researchers of

online ethnography in the context of

research into virtual communities'.

Caroline Oates, Mark Blades and

214 Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 213±215 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817

Editorial

Barrie Gunter's paper reports empirical

research into the effects of TV

advertising on children aged between 6

and 10. As children increasingly become

the targets of marketing activity, this is

an important area for marketers,

parents, children and indeed, society as

a whole.

Stella and Tony Proctor and Ioanna

Papasolomou-Doukakis explore another

highly topical area: post-modern

consumption and post-modern

advertising. They conclude that the

latter all to often merely confuses the

former and that other approaches are

now needed.

Helen Woodruffe-Burton, Sue Eccles

and Richard Elliott draw from

literatures spanning the social sciences,

as well as those closer to Marketing and

from this, they develop a conceptual

framework that moves us closer to a

more holistic theory of shopping.

Arjun Chaudhuri's paper comes from

the World Marketing Congress and we

thank the American Academy of

Marketing Science for allowing us to

publish the paper here. Arjun reports

his empirical research, based on a

strong conceptual underpinning, into

the currently topical issue of èmotion'

and more speci®cally the relationship

between this, reason and perceived risk,

in consumer behaviour. He concludes

that emotion can indeed enhance our

understanding of perceived risk.

The practitioner papers in this issue

cover neuro-psychology and the future

of consumption behaviour. Wendy

Gordon delves into the mind to examine

relationships between mental processes

and brand messages. She proposes that

marketers need to draw from the likes

of neurology to help develop the latter.

Michael Moynagh and Richard

Worsley provide a very useful

discussion of a range of issues likely to

be pertinent to the consumption

patterns of the future and which current

marketers should be addressing right

now.

Finally, I have recently moved from

Bristol Business School to Cardiff

Business School. I will respond to e-

mails sent to either of the following

addresses:

[email protected]

[email protected]

Martin Evans

Managing Editor

January 2002

Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 213±215 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817 215

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