Personality traits have been shown to be effective predictors of behaviour. What’s more, they are not difficult to collect. In this webinar ICG member Chris Harvey, Activate Research, will explore common personality tests and models and describe a range of specific applications to both qualitative and quantitative market research. Qual and quant researchers wanting to understand more about how personality traits can help us better understand, predict, and influence behaviour will benefit from attending.
Chris Harvey
Chris Harvey is the Founder of Activate Research, which inspires change and drives growth through enabling a deeper understanding of how people think and why they behave as they do. Drawing on an MSc Behavioural Science and 15 years research industry experience, Activate Research adds complementary insights and approaches from behavioural science – and psychology more broadly – to agencies’ research offer. This enables end clients to better understand, predict, and influence target audience behaviour.
Join ICG member Nic Bulois, Insight Angels, in this round-table online discussion about when and how to do segmentation studies and the range of models out there which could help.
Richard Clark has over 25 years of market research experience, on both the client and agency sides. Beginning his career at J Walter Thompson, he then specialised in online research, both qual and quant. He has run many projects around the world, and provided training for the MRS. In 2019 he created the Deepr online hybrid qual-quant methodology.
Why is it important? And how is it different to MR?
Why is research such a critical element?
And how do I make sense of the jargon?
About Claire
Claire is a partner at Hummingbird Insights Ltd, with over 20 years’ experience and a diploma in UX Design.
Hummingbird Insights was formed in 2020 by 3 former Kantar Directors, and they pride themselves on questioning and challenging their clients to identify the real issues, and creating meaningful simplicity through the most complex of challenges. Claire’s expertise lies in UX, innovation and all things financial.
Although well-known, System 1/2 theory is not the only perspective on decision making – there are several differing views in the behavioural science community, each with slightly different assumptions about human nature.
Much of the discourse in the applied behavioural science world and, to some extent, the spark for the global behavioural insights “movement” rests on the concept of System 1 and System 2. However, we need to keep in mind it’s not the only view on how people make decisions.
Nudging and bounded rationality
The basic premise of the influential nudge approach is the concept of bounded rationality – that human beings are fallible, poorly informed as well as suffering from myopia, inertia and self-control issues. In other words, human decision making is full of somewhat predictable flaws and consequently the scientific field should focus on studying them (and the applied world on fixing them).
Over the past 40 years, the heuristics and biases program (H&B) has uncovered a lot of systematic violations of reasoning and decision making which have led to a loose consensus that humans have innate cognitive limitations which lead us to instinctively rely on heuristics – and occasionally bias us to make predictable error, at least compared to the rational homo economicus benchmark.
This insight was originally the core idea of nudging: that the policy makers could leverage people’s cognitive and motivational inadequacies as a way to steering them to better decisions for their own long-term welfare – ones that are aligned with their ultimate goals.
However, it’s not the only view on how humans behave and decide – it has received plenty of criticism like everything in academia – something that is often missed in the conversations on the applied side of practitioners. In fact, the research on heuristics and biases was criticized early on in the 80s as the “psychology of first impressions” and that there is more to human decision making and problem solving than their first response in a given situation.
Cognitive misers in social psychology
Around the same time in the 80s, another research program emerged in social psychology focused on the dynamics of social influence and persuasion. It also viewed humans as cognitive misers but proposed that we can be persuaded to allocate more resources to engage with arguments.
This gave rise to the early persuasion models: the heuristic-systematic model and the elaboration-likelihood model (ELM), both of which broadly propose that information is processed more systematically only if it is highly relevant or the listener is highly motivated.
These are by no means the only dual-processing theories. Contrary to what many people think, Kahneman did not come up with System 1/2 and in Thinking Fast & Slow he credits it to Stanovich and West* – whenever you see people attributing S1/2 to Kahneman, you should be skeptical of their depth of knowledge (although it would be accurate to say he popularised the terms). Moreover, the debate over the exact nature of the dual processes is not settled – in the book In Two Minds you can find 15 chapters devoted to these debates.
Anyway, back to the 80s!
Lab vs real world decision-making
Another research program that started in the late 80s is naturalistic decision-making (NDM)– the study of how people make decisions in complex, high-stakes, real-world settings such as firefighting, nursing or aviation. In contrast to the H&B program, the premise was that norms of rational choice are not the right benchmark for challenging, complex decision-making required from e.g. firefighters in situations where high uncertainty and time pressure mean it’s not realistic to even expect the kind of effort required for a comprehensive evaluation of options. There is an interesting joint article by Daniel Kahneman and a prominent NDM researcher Gary Klein if you want to read more – reference at the end!
Design flaws or design features?
A little bit later in the mid-90s, yet another research program started in Europe (note that all of the previous ones originated in the US). Instead of seeing human decision-making as fundamentally prone to errors, the so-called fast and frugal heuristics (F&F) school studied which simple heuristics people use to make decisions and how good those decisions ultimately were. In essence, they viewed heuristics as design features of the mind – things that mostly get us to the right answer as quickly as efficiently as possible, but occasionally lead us down the wrong path. They view the cognitive system in our minds an “adaptive toolbox” of simple strategies and the key to good decisions lies in our ability to choose the right tools to the environment we find ourselves in.
There is, of course, much more to the history of decision-making psychology, but this short summary forms a background for future discussion on nudges and nudging – remember these schools of thought as we move forward!
Hertwig, R., & Grüne-Yanoff, T. (2017). Nudging and boosting: Steering or empowering good decisions. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 12(6), 973-986.
All too often in the market research industry, interpreting is an underused and undervalued tool in the market research tool box, being seen as just a bridge to cover the language gap. The process of finding and briefing an interpreters is also often patchy.
It can – and should be – a whole lot more than this. Using the right interpreters in the right way can add significantly to your project.
In this webinar, ICG member Iris Griffiths, a qualitative market research consultant, experienced conference interpreter and translator and a teacher of interpreting and translation modules for universities and courses, took us through;
how to improve and optimise the quality of the interpreting in international research projects when working with interpreters in-person, remotely or in hybrid situation.
The best way of briefing an interpreter to make sure you make the most of the interpreter as a tool to get more insights for your market research project.
Interpreting from the interpreter’s point of view: what impacts on the quality of the interpreter’s output.
She talked about Simultaneous Interpreting (RSI) and the changes in the interpreting industry which can be a benefit or a threat for market research projects. What are the advantages/disadvantages of having an interpreter “live” at a viewing facility vs. working remotely? There are many RSI platforms in the market that will enable researchers to get a bit more control of how they work with interpreters in the project.
In an ever-increasing globalised world, cultural sensitivity is essential. As more companies grow and the global market place becomes more accessible for small businesses, multinational and cross-cultural teams are becoming more common. This means that now more than ever, businesses who are looking to expand internationally need to be aware of the culture of their new market in order to succeed.
Culture is the beliefs, ideas, and social behaviour of a particular person or group within society. But how does culture affect international business? In a business context, culture relates to what behaviour is accepted as common practice professionally in a specific location, compared to another. What may be acceptable business practice in one country may be very different to the approach that is used by businesses overseas. Therefore, recognising how culture can affect international business is something that should be understood in order to avoid misunderstandings and miscommunication between colleagues and clients. Understanding culture also ensures that the business is presenting itself to its new market in the best way it can.
Attitude
Businesses need to be aware that different cultures have different attitudes towards business practices.
Scandinavian countries such as Sweden emphasise social equality and therefore they tend to have a relatively flat organisational hierarchy. This relates to their informal approach to communication, and cooperation is normally at the heart of their organisations. In Japan, their traditional values of relative status and respect for seniority are reflected in their organisations as reflected in their clear organisational structure. This means that senior management command respect at all times and expect a level of formality from junior members of their teams.
These different cultural attitudes towards management can therefore make it difficult to define roles in multinational teams. Therefore, it is important for businesses to be aware of their target market’s cultural approach towards organisational structure, and clearly identify their organisations approach so that all team members can act accordingly.
Etiquette
Workplace etiquette is something else that businesses need to be aware of if they are working internationally.
The formality of address is another key thing to consider within international businesses when communicating with colleagues and clients form different cultures. Are they comfortable with being approached on a first-name basis or do they prefer titles and surnames? Asian countries such as China seem to prefer the latter, where as Americans usually use first names. Things such as formality of address may not seem that important, but if you get off on the wrong foot with a potential foreign client then that could ruin your chances of ever working with them in the future. Therefore, it is important for businesses to know that their level of formality will differ depending on the culture of the person they’re communicating with.
Workplace etiquette in some cultures also means they have a different approach towards workplace confrontation, rules and regulations, and working hours. While some may consider working long hours a sign of commitment and achievement, others may consider these extra hours a demonstration of a lack of efficiency or the lack prioritisation of essential family or personal time.
Communication
Communication plays an important role in international business, and sometimes effective communication can be the difference between succeeding or failing in a new market. Effective communication is particularly important for international businesses as there is risk of your messages getting ‘lost in translation’. There are several things that need to be considered when looking at how effective your business’ communication is at an international level.
The first thing that should be considered when looking into communication is any language barriers that may hinder the communication between you and your new market. However, this goes deeper than just the language that is used to communicate, it’s how the messages are conveyed that’s important. Language barriers not only relate to people speaking different languages, but also to the different tone used within those languages. For example, in countries like the US or Germany, it is common for people to speak loudly and be more assertive when sharing ideas amongst colleagues. However, in countries like Japan people typically speak more softly and have a more passive tone when making suggestions to colleagues.
Another thing to consider are the basic customs, mannerisms and gestures that are commonly accepted in that culture. Behaviour that might be commonplace in one culture could be unusual or potentially offensive to a client or colleague overseas. Professor Jean Vanhoegaerden gives the example of a business handshake being the norm in European and US cultures, but in some Middle Eastern cultures handshakes are seen differently.
Businesses who are looking to operate internationally need to be aware of language barriers, tone and body language. Cross-cultural communication can be a challenge, but approaching cultural differences with sensitivity, openness, and curiosity can help businesses succeed internationally.
Don’t get lost in translation
Don’t let an international deal fall apart due to cultural misunderstandings: businesses should do plenty of research and be open to new cultural experiences and expectations when doing business across borders. Businesses aren’t alone in this process, translation and localisation servicescan help businesses communicate internationally ensuring they have the best chance at succeeding in new markets.
Understand how cultural factors shape the behaviour of employees, customers or service users.
Dr. John Curran is a leading global business anthropologist and executive trainer and facilitator. He was recently asked to give a TEDx talk about his work in understanding how culture shapes the way consumers think and act and how this ultimately affects brands, how they perform and how they interact with their customers.
"We are making a big mistake by simplifying how culture works. It shapes how we live our lives, the values we hold, the relationships we form and the decisions we make. Culture is also complex, it’s messy, it’s unpredictable, it’s irrational. In order to innovate new creative possibilities, we need to embrace the complexity of culture."
Watch John's talk here. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community.
