Hierarchical Bayesian Methods in Psychology of Consumer Behavior

对于人们为什么会做出这样的选择，心理学家和营销专家有不同的理论。虽然心理学理论更准确地描述了个人在简单情况下的选择行为，但它们通常没有考虑营销理论必须能够处理的变量范围，如产品特征、消费者因素和供应商战略。他们也没有考虑到这样一个事实，即个人的行为相互作用，形成并影响市场需求。在这个项目中，心理学家、营销专家和统计学家将合作融合这些理论。这种合作将通过更好的营销理论和更完整的人类选择心理学理论来更深入地理解消费者行为。统计学是这项研究的核心，它提供了统一的概念工具，通过分层贝叶斯模型等模型将各种理论和数据集结合起来。层次化的贝叶斯结构使人们能够同时和连贯地描述个人和集体行为，并将不同的心理学和营销理论和数据结合在一起。这些模型的贝叶斯性质允许人们根据已知的影响进行调整，即使在中等规模的实验中也是如此。这些模型还允许人们从实验环境转移到预测市场行为。人类行为反映了一个复杂的、多阶段的过程，从分配个人的资源来影响他或她的环境并改善他或她的生存状态。这项研究将提高对人类在市场和一般情况下行为的理解。这项研究将在统计学、营销学和心理学这三个学科的结合点进行，对这三个领域都有好处。该项目具有强烈的教育重点，将为参与其中的许多学生提供一个独特的跨学科培训机会。这将有助于他们在学术界、工业界或政府的职业生涯。该奖项是2004财政年度数学科学优先领域数学社会科学和行为科学特别竞赛的一部分。

Psychologists and marketing experts have different theories about why people make the choices they do. While psychological theories more accurately describe individual human choice behavior in simple circumstances, they do not typically consider the range of variables, such as product features, consumer factors, vendor strategies, that marketing theories must be able to handle. Nor do they consider the fact that individuals' behaviors interact to form and influence marketplace demand. In this project, psychologists, marketing experts, and statisticians will collaborate to merge these theories. This collaboration will result in a deeper understanding of consumer behavior through better marketing theories and more complete psychological theories of human choice. Statistics is at the heart of the research, providing the unifying conceptual instrument for combining the varied theories and data sets through models such as the hierarchical Bayesian model. The hierarchical Bayesian structure allows one to describe simultaneously and coherently individual and aggregate behavior and to combine the disparate psychological and marketing theories and data. The Bayesian nature of these models allow one to adjust for known effects, even in experiments of modest size. The models also allow one to move from experimental settings to forecasting behavior in the marketplace.Human behavior reflects a complex, multi-stage process that begins with the allocation of an individual's resources to affect his or her environment and to improve his or her state of being. This research will improve understanding of human behavior both in the marketplace and in general. The research will take place at the nexus of the three disciplines, statistics, marketing and psychology, with benefits to all three fields. The project has a strong educational emphasis and will provide the many students involved with a unique opportunity for cross-disciplinary training. This will aid them in their careers in academics, industry, or government. This award was supported as part of the Fiscal Year 2004 Mathematical Sciences priority area special competition on Mathematical Social and Behavioral Sciences (MSBS).