A lecture hosted by the College of Business on Friday afternoon encouraged students and faculty to consider the role consumer motivation plays when marketing products to the public.

Dr. David Stewart, a professor of marketing from the University of Southern California, delivered his lecture “Threats to Hope and the Motivated Reasoning of Product Information” to an audience of 13 people who gathered in 2117 Gerdin.

“Consumers see products as a means to attain a certain goal,” Stewart said.

“They buy products that make dubious, unsubstantiated claims and yield no proven results.”

Stewart cited the high popularity of products for hair, weight loss, wrinkle removal, alternative medicines and therapies as evidence of the faith consumers put into products which are not likely to work as they are advertised.

“There is a lot of information that says these things won’t work,” Stewart said.

Stewart said there is no relationship between education or income level and the likelihood of purchasing questionable products.

Rather, consumers are motivated by the hope that the products they purchase will help them to attain certain goals.

Stewart said consumers often end up making ill-advised decisions about the products they purchase because of a need to reach a predetermined conclusion.

He illustrated his point with the example that many consumers are able to conclude they could lose weight by exercising and eating well, but end up turning to weight loss products because lifestyle changes are difficult to implement.

Stewart said for many consumers, the credibility of information often takes a back seat to what the product claims it can do.

“Source credibility or source favorability, what is more important?” Stewart asked.

“There might be a page full of information on side effects. In motivated reasoning, you just don’t turn [to] that page.”

Stewart said the perceived level of goal attainability is manipulated by several factors. These include product attainability, how relevant the goal is to the consumer’s life and the number of products available on the marketplace.

Even if a product doesn’t work, Stewart said using it may help maintain a consumer’s illusion that they are reaching a goal.

Stephen Kim, associate professor of marketing, said he felt Stewart’s research was very stimulating because of its unique approach to looking at consumer behavior.

“It defies common sense,” Kim said.

Stewart concluded his lecture by saying that continued research, including risk assessment and product satisfaction, is necessary to get a better idea of consumer motivation.

Ryan Young, senior in pre-advertising, hoped to take away real-world information from Stewart’s lecture.

“He seems to have a lot of knowledge about marketing,” Young said.