Lecture 6 – Identity and personality
1. Psychological perspective on personality
Consumer society – Central to how people define and think about themselves, and also how they
think and feel about others
o Marketers know that people’s purchasing decisions are influenced by their perception of
themselves and how they would like to be seen
o Using brands to communicate our identity
Personality (psychological perspective): Combination of the characteristic patterns of thoughts,
feelings and behaviours that make up an individual’s distinctive character
o Psychological characteristics that determine and reflect how a person responds to their
environment
o Emphasises deeply ingrained inner characteristics, which are those specific qualities,
attributes, traits, factors, and mannerisms that distinguish you from others
o Stems from within the individual and remains fairly stable throughout life
Freud’s Psychoanalytic theory – The human psyche/mind is like an iceberg
o (Main contribution Emphasizing the importance of unconsciousness in guiding
our behaviours)
o Human mind can be divided into 3 domains: Conscious (feeling, experiences or
thoughts), pre-conscious (feelings, ideas and experiences stored in the memory we
can retrieve) and unconscious (feelings, thought, urges that we do not have access
to)
o Much of one’s adult personality stems from a fundamental conflict between a person’s
desire to gratify their physical needs and the necessity to function as a responsible member
of society (our behaviour is guided by this conflict; we are not aware of it)
1. Psychological perspective on personality
Consumer society – Central to how people define and think about themselves, and also how they
think and feel about others
o Marketers know that people’s purchasing decisions are influenced by their perception of
themselves and how they would like to be seen
o Using brands to communicate our identity
Personality (psychological perspective): Combination of the characteristic patterns of thoughts,
feelings and behaviours that make up an individual’s distinctive character
o Psychological characteristics that determine and reflect how a person responds to their
environment
o Emphasises deeply ingrained inner characteristics, which are those specific qualities,
attributes, traits, factors, and mannerisms that distinguish you from others
o Stems from within the individual and remains fairly stable throughout life
Freud’s Psychoanalytic theory – The human psyche/mind is like an iceberg
o (Main contribution Emphasizing the importance of unconsciousness in guiding
our behaviours)
o Human mind can be divided into 3 domains: Conscious (feeling, experiences or
thoughts), pre-conscious (feelings, ideas and experiences stored in the memory we
can retrieve) and unconscious (feelings, thought, urges that we do not have access
to)
o Much of one’s adult personality stems from a fundamental conflict between a person’s
desire to gratify their physical needs and the necessity to function as a responsible member
of society (our behaviour is guided by this conflict; we are not aware of it)
