The Learning objectives of the chapter The Family and its Social Standing are as follows:

To understand the family as a consumer socialization agent

To understand family decision-making and its members consumption-related roles
To understand the role of the family life cycle in market segmentation and targeting
To understand the consumption patterns of nontraditional families and non-family
households
To understand the impact of social stratification on consumer behavior
To understand how to measure social class and segment consumers accordingly

In this context, there exists two reference which have a significant impact on consumer behavior.
Two reference groups are: Family and Social Class.

LO1: The Family as a Socialization Agent

Socialization refers to the behavior of the people acceptable to their society and how the interact
within the society. The aspect of childhood socialization which is very important for the study of
consumer behavior is consumer socialization. Consumer socialization is defined as way from
which they children learn their skills, attitudes, awareness of surroundings and experiences which
helps them to take decision as a consumer.
A socializing agent is a person or organization involved in the socialization process because of
frequency of contact with the individual and control over the rewards and punishments given to
the individual. Three aspects of consumer socialization are:

1. Parental Style and Consumer Socialization:

This means the impact of parenting on childrens development. On the basis of various attitudes
of parents towards advertising, consumption and childrens buying, parental styles can be
divided into four categories:
Indulgent Permissive and Very nurturing
Neglecting Permissive and Not nurturing
Authoritative Restrictive and Very nurturing
Authoritarian Restrictive and Not nurturing
 2. Consumer Socialization is learning:
Children learn the importance of possessions at an early age. Childrens Development as
Consumers happens in various stages as follows:
Shopping with parents and observing - 12 to 15 month
Request while shopping with parents - 2 Years
Involves in selection by taking permission from parents - 3 Years
Independent purchases while shopping with parents (no permission taken) - 5 Years
Shopping independently - 8 Years

3. Adult and Intergenerational Consumer Socialization:

The process of socialization is ongoing, beginning in early childhood and extending throughout a
persons life. While going from one generation to other there are many products preferences and
brand loyalties that gets transferred.

The Familys Supportive Roles:

It includes:
Economic Well-being provide financial resources to its members. There are some
products/services/events which family can afford and some they are not able to afford.
Emotional Support providing its members with love, affection and intimacy
Suitable Family Lifestyles parents priorities regarding learning and education,
recreational activities, setting of career goals etc.

LO2: Family Decision-making and Consumption-related Roles

Husband-Wife Decision-making In this case the product or the service category plays an
important role in consumer decision. It includes four decision patterns Husband-dominated, Wife-
dominated, Joint and Autonomic.
Childrens influence on Family Decision-making There are lot of purchases done by consumers
is basically because of the influence of children. This type of purchasing has increased over the
past few decades. The tactics typically used by children are Pressure, Exchange, Rational,
Consultation and Ingratiation.
Children can be seen as a Three Markets Children should be divided into three separate markets
namely Influencers, Primary market and Future consumers.
Measuring Family Decision-making It is complex, because family members may not agree with
each others perspective about their relative influence during purchase decisions.
Roles of each Family members Family members can take up roles such as Influencers,
Gatekeepers, Deciders, Buyers, Preparers, Users, Maintainers and Disposers.

LO3: Family Life Cycle

It represents the various life stages of a typical family combining marital status, size of family etc.
These family life cycle stages are:
Bachelorhood College educated young single men and women, who have incomes that
allow them to establish their own households.
Honeymooners Newly married couple, who have combine income. There is a possibility
in this stage that only men, only women or both are the bread earners in the family.
Parenthood This is the stage which span for longer period of time in comparison to other
stages. These are basically couples with at least one child.
Post-parenthood Older married couples with no children living at home.
Dissolution Family with one surviving spouse.

Nontraditional Families and Non-Family Households

Nontraditional families are basically are those families which is not fit into the family life cycle
and Non-family households are defined as living situations in which a couple, single parent are
staying together and having a family but with no legality.
Nontraditional families include:
Childless couples
Divorced single parents

Non-family households include:

Single parents
Unmarried couples
LO4: Consumer behavior of Nontraditional Families and Households
A house-hold undergo some status changes in the family life cycle at some stage due to which
their consumption patterns and preferences also change. One study pointed out that children in
newly formed single-parent households have greater influence in the choice of the large items than
children from intact families.

Advertising to Nontraditional Households:

Advertising should be design in such a way so that both the families (traditional or non-traditional)
will not get offended by it.

LO5: Social Standing and Consumer Behavior

Social class is the differentiation of members of society into various hierarchy and how society
perceives them in the first place. This hierarchy or status is derived from social status, which is
defined as how much superior is a one member of the society in comparison to the different
member of the society. Status is composed of wealth, power and esteem. We marketers follow the
practice of segmenting consumers on the basis of social status or class. The reason for doing this
king kind of segmentations is because they share same values, priorities, lifestyles, attitudes etc. It
also strongly influences the purchase of product types, services, and brands due to similar
consumer attitudes in a particular social class.

LO6: Measurement of Social Class

Subjective versus Objective Measures
Subjective measures include by taking interviews of customers so that we can get to know about
their social class or how they perceive themselves socially. It often measures ones social-class
consciousness as people usually identify themselves incorrectly, as belonging to the middle class.
If we look at the objective measure, its all about asking factual questions to specific demographics.
Objective measures of social class include one or more of the following variables:
Occupation
Education
Income
There can be more than one demographic variable along with several socioeconomic factors, called
as multivariable index, to determine social-class standing. Most widely used multivariable
measures are:
Index of Status Characteristics (Warners ISC)
Socioeconomic Status Score (SES)

Social Classes Characteristics and Consumer Behavior

There exist no uniform distinction of social classes depicting the class structure of the U.S.
population. There are a few factors that are homogenous within and heterogeneous among social
classes such as lifestyles, consumption patterns etc. American population can be divided into seven
social classes as follows:
Upper-Upper Inherited wealth and privilege
Nouveau Rich Money is king
Upper-Middle Achieving professionals
Lower-Middle Faithful followers
Upper-Lower Security-Minded
Working Poor The insecure
Underclass Rock Bottom

Upward Mobility:
It is defined as the opportunity to move from a lower to a higher social class. In America, higher
social classes are considered as reference groups for ambitious men and women of lower social
since it is possible to achieve upward mobility in the American society.

Rich (Affluent) customers:

These household have enough amount of disposable incomes to spend on various luxury items and
normal products as well. These households are generally the target market for various companies
who are providing customers with luxury products like cars, sport bikes etc. These are healthier,
have higher life expectancies and marketers consider them as customers for life. The affluent and
non-affluent differ in their media habits, buying patterns etc. Also, the affluent consumers are not
uniform.
Middle-class Consumers:
They are divided into two categories: The upper or professional middle class and the lower
middle class.

Downscale Consumers:
These are working class or blue-collar people typically defined as households earning less than
$40,000 annually.

Communications:
The communication in each and every marketing proposition is also vary between the social
classes. You can also observe the various social classes for example idle class people generally
have a broader view of the world whereas lower class consumers perceive world only from first
hand experiences.

Downward Mobility:
It is like moving down the social class ladder. In America, trends what we have observed are that
incomes of young men and women starts declining when they reach the age of 30s, regardless of
ethnicity, education etc.