Do consumer s tastes differ final 1.7. - HEC

Tastes are the same. Are tastes really the same?
D O C ONSUMER’ S T ASTES D IFFER?
Introduction
When talking about taste, we first have to ask ourselves “What is taste?” Our main interest here is to
analyse the meaning of taste as being a
“liking or preference” 1 .
Preferences are a key element in consumer research as they form the basis of purchase intentions,
actual choice and consumption. This is why a lot of research has been done about preferences,
evidently having an important impact on demand. On the other hand, this explains why studies take
actual purchasing behaviour as an indicator for preferences and therefore also for taste.
Just thinking of the variety of different cultures, one would be tempted to say that differences in taste
must exist. By contrast, economists have analysed this issue in the light of demand curves. Most of
them have concluded that tastes are similar.
This is a rather surprising result, considering that consumption behaviour seems to be obviously
different when comparing India with Scandinavia, for example. In which way would taste be assumed
to differ?
1. First, taste should differ across space, like from Asia to Europe.
2. Second, taste could differ across time in the individual life-cycle, as an individual develops and
taste changes with the years.
3. Third, taste may differ across generations, as grandparents, parents and grandchildren have
different preferences.
On the contrary, an argument speaking for a rapprochement of tastes is globalization. The
liberalization of the world market leads to an increased availability of a larger range of products,
available at places they had not been some years ago. This development might induce more and more
similar tastes between cultures.
The question whether tastes differ is also of economic importance for the more and more growing
global trade. In case of slight differences, adapting a product to the specific local circumstances would
be sufficient. In case of severe differences, it might even be better not to introduce a specific product
on another market at all.
The objective of the present paper is to carry out a survey of literature on preference. As preferences
can be expressed by utility functions, the first part of the present paper introduces ways to measure
preferences via utility or consumption. In order to enlighten different possible aspects, theoretical as
well as empirical literature is going to be introduced. Therefore, the second part discusses the
approaches of several authors and the models used. Finally, a comparative study on consumption of
yoghurt in Belgium and Poland provides an empirical example.
1 Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary, 1989
B EKE T INNEBERG 2
19 MARCH 2003