The Influence of Personality and Attitude on Consumers Behaviour

Introduction

Personality and attitude are both internal factors (inner characteristics) that influence a consumers’ behaviour. Research has been done on these internal factors and researchers have come to the conclusion that inner characteristics are those characteristic that distinguish one individual from another such as mannerisms. Some research implies that early childhood experiences and dual influence of genetics can have an influence on the development of one’s personality; other implies that personality develops over time and thus does the social and environment have an influence on one’s personality (Shiffman & Kanuk, 2010:136). According to Shiffman and Kanuk (2010:136) personality can be defined as the following: “those inner psychological characteristics that both determine and reflect how a person responds to his or her environment”. Rousseau and du Plessis (2007:215) link the following concepts to personality: purchasing behaviour, product choice, social influence, opinion leadership, attitude change, risk-taking and last media choice.

Unlike personality, attitudes are learned and thus can it change. Attitude might drive a consumer toward or drive them away form a particular behaviour (Shiffman & Kanuk, 2010:247). According to Shiffman and Kanuk (2010:246) and Rousseau (2007:194) attitude are defined as follows: “attitude is a learned predisposition to behave in a consistently favourable or unfavourable way with respect to a given object, subject, idea or behaviour”. A consumer’s attitude can vary from situation to situation. Rousseau (2007:194) states that attitude is formed through the learning process.

According to de Mooij (2011:20) consumer behaviour is the process involved when consumers select, purchase, use...

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