personal finance Upon examination this proved to be due to the particular phrasing of one of the questions 'What type of luncheon would you like?' Respondents had freely interpreted this, some giving the lunch they normally had each day at home, others listing an imagined menu regardless of price, while yet another group theorized about the lunch they thought other shoppers would like to have, disregarding their own individual wishes. A more specific rewording of this question 'What type of luncheon do you require in this shop today?' limitpd the respondents to considering only their own lunch on that day in relation to possible factors which a day spent shopping might impose on them. An analysis of the answers which were subsequently obtained showed that most shoppers wanted quick and inexpensive snack lunches, but not served in a cafeteria. It was sufficient merely to add snacks to the menu, and when this was done business increased appreciably. Furthermore it is essential to keep a clear head in the matter of the interpretation of the statistics in terms of percentages that emerge from an analysis of market research in the field. A hypothetical case might be as follows : A manufacturer of branded confectionery wants to measure consumer acceptance. His sample has been carried out in a large city. The results show that sixty per cent of those interviewed prefer his brand to a competitor's product, which is roughly similar in price and quality. However, unless the respondents have been asked how much they have bought and how often over a given period, he should not be misled into thinking that his sales have necessarily been greater than his competitor's, because the forty per cent preferring the competitive product may have, on average, purchased larger quantities at more frequent intervals. This example emphasizes the paramount need for most scrupulous attention to the planning of both the questionnaire and the sample. Advertising campaigns based on a meretricious interpretation of market research are by no means rare occurrences. Discovery of reasons for the consumer's attitude to a product may demand the use of depth interviews, sentence completion, and wordassociation tests. 'Respondents' are sometimes shown a series of relatively ambiguous pictures, and then explanatory stories are sought. These various techniques make up what is called 'motivation' research the 'why' rather than the 'what' of human behaviour. The costs of such research are high because the services of trained psychologists are sometimes necessary, and because certain techniques, depth interviewing for example, require much time. People ari not easily persuaded to be subjects for motivation research, and thus valid sampling is difficult to achieve. It must always be remembered by those who utilize psychological techniques that the subconscious and unconscious are not necessarily more significant than the conscious. personal finance