The application of multivariate statistical methods for understanding food consumer behaviour

Abstract

Understanding consumer behaviour is a necessary precondition for a targeted communication strategy. The behaviour is a complex phenomenon and research needs to undertake a rigorously apply sophisticated methods. This article entails the combined utilisation of categorical principal component analysis and cluster analysis to determine the major, relatively homogenous consumer groups and this is coupled with confirmatory factor analysis and structural model building to understand consumer behaviour, based on Fishbein and Ajzent’s theoretic model.Categorical principal component analysis, cluster analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, consumers’ segmentation, structural model building, Research Methods/ Statistical Methods,