Evolutionary Consumption

Abstract

Evolutionary consumption is a nascent discipline that applies principles of evolutionary psychology in the study of consumer behavior. The same evolutionary forces that are responsible for the evolution of countless biological phenomena have shaped consumers' minds and bodies. Many consumer phenomena could be mapped onto four overriding Darwinian meta‐drives: survival, reproduction, kin selection, and reciprocal altruism. By studying the contents of cultural products (e.g., song lyrics, literary narratives, movie plotlines), one can identify universal themes that are indicative of a shared human nature that is invariant to time or place. Notwithstanding some staunch resistance from those who possess a poor understanding of the field, the practical and theoretical benefits of Darwinizing consumer research are innumerable. Homo consumericus is a biological creature driven in large part by an evolved consuming instinct.

How price moderates assessments of coffee quality across profiles of gender and experience

“…Certainly, gender effects may vary depending on product class, and possibly price range. Additional studies have also demonstrated gender differences in pathologies such as gambling and pornographic addiction (dominated by men) versus eating disorders and compulsive shopping (dominated by women) (Saad, 2013). More so we know little of how different user-segments respond to hedonic-type products like ice-cream, chocolate and cheese, and little of how cues like brands, retailer and area-of-origin are differentially processed with respect to price.…”

“…Adults will display a variety of sexual cues to flag their value as potential mates to the opposite sex, and conspicuous forms of consumption are rooted in this type of behaviour (Saad, 2013). The driving of certain luxury cars will, for example, yield increased levels of testosterone in men (Saad & Vongas, 2009).…”

“…This associativeexperiential system is hedonically motivated and affect driven, tasked to achieve positive ends and avoid negative ones. It is believed to have been adopted over millennia by most animal forms including humans as a Darwinian strategy aimed at either survival, reproduction, kin selection or reciprocal altruism (Montague, 2006;Saad, 2013, Taleb, 2007. Observe here that unless the conditioned stimulus can be employed to predict the unconditioned one, an organism acquires no ecological benefit in learning an association between the two (Abrahamson, 1994).…”

“…With automatic cognition still a part of Homo consumericus (Saad, 2013), this paper follows the recent injunction to examine pricing as a component of neuro-marketing research (Lee, Broderick & Chamberlain, 2007). So doing we explore cue-driven detection errors as a contemporary driver of consumer behaviour.…”

A Single-Item Measure Approach to Consumer-Based Brand Equity Based on Evolutionary Psychology and Neuroscience

“…Thus, being healthy, strong, powerful, and possessing the willingness to invest in the partner's and offspring's life are indicators of whether a mate meets these requirements. In contrast, being weak, ill, feeble, and self-interested indicates the opposite (Buss, 2009;Fetchenhauer & Bierhoff, 2004;Saad, 2013). To assess whether a potential partner has sufficient capabilities for survival and qualities for successful common breeding, humans depend on various signals which are important cues to gain an archetypical perception of certain mates(Bliege Bird & Smith, 2005).…”