Education for Children in Consumer Decision Making
Anastasia Wulandari and Lovely Dena Pratiwi Putri
Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, Bandung, Indonesia
Keywords: Education, Decision Making, Consumer.
Abstract: Children will not only become consumers today, but also become consumers in the future. This is due to the
habits of childhood that will somewhat affect the behavior of adults, including when they are being
consumers. Thus, it is important for the mother to introduce the consumer function to the early childhood by
involving the child in the process of purchasing or shopping. This research uses descriptive qualitative
research method. The study respondents were mothers with children aged 3-7 or at a perceptual stage, in
which the mother was confronted with a child's demand based on minimal product information. The method
used in data collection is in-depth interview. The results of the study found that the mother has started to
introduce the function of the consumer since early childhood. Mom introduces to the child the buying
process, purchase priority, money use efficiency to consideration in buying decision making.
1 INTRODUCTION
Mothers and children are partners in daily shopping
activities (Cook, 2003), so often a mother invites her
child to shop for the purpose of making the shopping
experience as a way of mother education to
introduce consumer function (Ward, 1979) product
introduction learning (Pettersson et al, 2004). In
response, the market began to focus attention on
children, who are already more active in family
purchasing decisions (Ali et al, 2013). For example,
when shopping for everyday purposes, the family
also openly provides opportunities for children to
express opinions about the goods to be purchased
(Norgaard et al, 2007).
In addition, children have become consumers for
their own favorite products such as toys, cereals,
snacks, and clothing by asking and declaring which
products they like directly (Kaur and Singh, 2006).
Children will not only become consumers today, but
also become consumers in the future. This is due to
the habits of childhood that will somewhat affect the
behavior of adults, including when a consumer
(Coakley, 2003). Thus, it is important for the mother
to introduce the consumer function in children early
(Ward, 1979).
In introducing the consumer function to the
child, a mother should use her spare time with the
child. When mothers go shopping with children, the
opportunity is not wasted to introduce products that
are in the supermarket or market. Based on an
interview to a mother regarding the importance of
consumer education to children, she said from
childhood her children have to be taught to sort out
which items are needed, which are not. Which goods
are considered expensive or not. How children make
decisions about how important a product is. It aims
to make children accustomed to shopping effectively
and economically.
Suwandinata (2011) said that a child first gets to
know the supermarket and learns to be a consumer
of his family. The family is a place where a child
knows various socialization processes, especially as
a consumer. The learning process is called consumer
socialization, where children acquire skills,
knowledge, and attitudes relevant to their function as
consumers in the market (John, 1999). There is
research that reveals the same thing that parental
behavior is perceived as a socialization agent who
teaches his child to be a rational consumer
(Setiawati, 2004). In the study also revealed that the
behavior of parents will be seen and imitated by
children so that children will more easily understand
what is seen and then imitated by it. Djamaludin
(1995) states that the child's consumptive behavior is
formed because children imitate the parental
consumptive behavior through parental education in
appreciating money and fulfilment of consumption
to meet their needs. Television has a persuasive
influence on what children see and how they react to
Wulandari, A. and Putri, L.
Education for Children in Consumer Decision Making.
In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Educational Sciences (ICES 2017) - Volume 2, pages 153-156
ISBN: 978-989-758-314-8
Copyright © 2018 by SCITEPRESS – Science and Technology Publications, Lda. All rights reserved
153

certain brands. However, families, especially
parents, remain a very important institution in the
process of socializing children as consumers.
According to Hurlock (1980), a child who
develops normally at the age of 2-6 years has a
behavioral development in mimicking the attitudes
and behavior of the person he admires or is closest
to himself. Children begin to be taught to work
together, along with increasing opportunities to play
with other children. Cognitively, children 2-6 years
of age also have started on the colors and forms of
interest. The things that stimulate her sensory
development make her feel called to pay attention to
the object. Based on interviews with a mother who
has a 5-year-old child said, every time he took his
children to the mall or a walk to a place, then the
interest of the child is something colorful, music and
something fragrant, so they always ask to be bought.
According to John (1999), children at the
perceptual stage (3-7 years) tend to buy based on
limited information such as shape, color and still
egocentric because they have not been able to accept
the views of others. While in marketing, children are
often served with color, shape, and cartoon
characters that attract attention. It makes the child
interested to buy and collect the product by urging
his parents to buy (Turner et al, 2006).
While on the mother's side, purchasing patterns
are usually influenced by their knowledge of
children's preferences (Kaur and Singh, 2006), but
children play a role only in the first two stages of
purchasing decisions-problem identifiers and
information retrieval. The role of the child will be
reduced in the final stages, namely the choice on the
buying decision (Gupta, 2012).
The decision to buy consumers according to
Kotler and Keller (2009) is divided into 5 Phases.
First, the introduction of the problem. At this stage,
the child becomes interested in getting to know a
product and is motivated to own the product (Turner
et al, 2006). In this case the family should show the
priority needs scale that emphasizes the different
needs and interests of the child. The second stage
emphasizes the search for information to support
those needs. In addition to information from
advertisements, display in stores, or through
playmates (Martensen and Gronholdt, 2008),
children are also given information from the
experience and habits of parents buying a product. In
the third stage of evaluation, consumers analyze
some products that become alternative products to
meet the needs other than the main product. This
stage is the stage performed by the mother. Mother
manages information pertaining to the product
(Amin, 2012). In the fourth stage of the purchase
decision, consumers begin to determine whether a
product will be purchased or not. If the mother does
not approve of the product the child is requesting,
the mother will usually explain her reasons and
views to the product to the child (Kaur and Singh,
2006) or may eventually be affected and give in to
the child's desire to buy the product (Solomon
1996).
2 METHODS
This research will use a descriptive qualitative
approach because this type of research allows
researchers to get in-depth information on a topic
with unlimited participant responses (Yin, 2011) and
allows the description of the role of the child can be
presented in detail, complete, and objective
(Sugiyono, 2012).
Participants were done by purposive sampling
technique in which the selected participants were in
accordance with the purpose of the study (Mulyana,
2013), a mother who had children aged 3 - 7 years.
Data collection method used in this research is in
depth interview. While the research instrument in
this study is the researchers themselves, so
researchers will play a role in setting the focus of
research, selecting participants as a source of data,
collecting data, analyzing data, to interpret data
obtained from the research (Sugiyono, 2012).
Data analysis technique is done by open axial
coding technique. This technique is used so that the
data can be explored widely and deeply to get a
pattern of the problem (Vaismoradi et al, 2013).
Then, the researchers test the validity of data by way
of check. This method is done by the respondent to
check the data that has been collected by the
researcher as the interviewer (Sugiyono, 2012).
3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
3.1 Respondent I-H
H often invites children to shop to the minimarket
because the demand of children who always want to
go shopping. However, H hopes when inviting
children to spend, the child is not too much demand
for purchases because the expenses will increase.
According to H, when shopping with children,
many purchases outside the plan. H revealed that his
son only asked for the preferred product, generally
ICES 2017 - 1st International Conference on Educational Sciences
154

the product information obtained from the television
ad. The process is a stage in purchasing decisions,
where desirable preferred product is the form of
problem recognition (Turner et al, 2006). While
getting product information from advertising is an
information search by process (Martensen and
Gronholdt, 2008).
H minimize the impact of uncontrolled
purchasing requests by teaching children that buying
something needs money. H reminds his son to
always save in order to buy the desired product. In
addition, H always teaches his son to choose which
products are the top priority. H does not allow her
child to buy multiple products at once. These things
are used as a place for consumer education in
children. However, sometimes it does not work.
If the child is still nagging, crying, and angry if
his request is not met, to overcome it H negotiate
with the child to discuss the settlement. The
evaluation phase (Amin, 2012) is done by delaying
the purchase and suggesting to save first. Sometimes
also H gives alternatives to other products to buy if
they do not agree or reject the child's request.
When a child cries because his request is not
met, H reveals that he always tries not to waver and
remain on his decision. However, sometimes H
melts with the cry of a child out of pity, so as not to
make a scene, and there is something to be done
right away.
However, H revealed that it is not uncommon for
her children to participate in making purchasing
decisions, especially in daily home needs such as
toiletries. Child H gives a product preference which
then becomes the consideration of H in determining
whether the product should be purchased or not
(Kaur and Singh, 2006).
3.2 Respondent II – S
S always invites his son to shop with the aim of
taking children walking and spending time together.
When shopping, activities at the cashier S used as a
learning for their children about the process of
buying and selling. S introduce to the child that to
get the product must be purchased using money and
money obtained by working. S said that her son
always has a buying request while shopping. The
request begins with the introduction of a problem in
which the child is always interested in something
new, then wants to buy it (Turner et al, 2006). While
the product information obtained from television ads
impressions (Martensen and Gronholdt, 2008).
However, the demand is not immediately
satisfactory, since S considers whether the product is
suitable for its child and has an educative side as the
evaluation stage (Amin, 2012). If the product does
not meet the criteria S apply, then S will reject the
purchase request. The impact S children sometimes
respond with angry and silent. S dealt with this by
telling the reason why the request was rejected and
telling the real situation in the outside environment
that there are still many people who are less
fortunate and should not have the product purchased
because it is not a priority. S admitted sad and pity
when he did not meet the demand for the purchase
of his son, but S disclose that it is also a learning
material for children that not all requests must
always be met.
4 CONCLUSIONS
The results of the study found that children at the
perceptual stage are now able to negotiate lightly in
an attempt to fulfil their desires, in contrast to
research conducted by Pettersson et al (2004) which
revealed that negotiations were conducted in the
adolescent stage.
Based on interviews of two mothers as
respondents, researchers found that mothers play a
major role as purchasing decision makers in the
family. In addition, children play a fairly active role
in the first two stages of the purchase decision,
namely the introduction of problems and
information search. These two stages are the first
stage in which an individual knows there is a
product that he wants to buy or have. Thus, both
respondents agreed to instil consumer values to
control the child while at that stage.
These values include that if you want to buy
something, it takes money as a medium of exchange.
So, required to work and save for the product can be
purchased. Then the application of the priority scale
becomes one of the values that the respondents teach
to their children, the purchased product must have
the value of the benefit so that the fair purchase is
done.
REFERENCES
Ali, A., Ravichandran, N., Batra, D. K., 2013. Children’s
Choice of Influence Strategies in Family Purchase
Decisions and the Impact of Demographics. Vision, 17
1.
Amin, A. D., 2012. A Study on Influence of Children on
Family Buying with Respect to Selected Products in
Gujarat State. Thesis. The Maharaja Sayajirao
University of Baroda. Gujarat.
Coakley, A., 2003. Food or virtual food? The construction
of children’s food in a global economy. International
Journal of Consumer Studies, 27.
Education for Children in Consumer Decision Making
155

Cook, W. L., 2003. Quantitative methods for deductive
(theory-testing) research on parent-child dynamics.
Handbook of dynamics in parent-child relations, CA.
Sage.
Djamaludin, A., 1995. Nuansa Psikologi Pembangunan,
Pustaka pelajar. Yogyakarta.
Gupta, M., 2012. Children's influence in family buying
process in India. Young Consumers, volume 12 issue
1.
Hurlock, E. B., 1980. Psikologi Perkembangan Suatu
Pendekatan Sepanjang Rentang Kehidupan, Erlangga.
Jakarta, Edisi 5.
John, D., 1999. Consumer socialization of children: a
retro- spective look at 25 years of research. Journal of
Consumer Research, 26.
Kaur, P., Singh, R., 2006. Children in Family Purchase
Decision Makin in India and the West. A Review.
Academy of Marketing Science Review, volume 8.
Kotler, P., Keller, K. L., 2009. Manajemen Pemasaran,
Erlangga. Jakarta, edisi 13.
Martensen, A., Gronholdt, L., 2008. Children’s influence
on family decision making. Innovative marketing,
volume 4 issue 4.
Mulyana, D., 2013. Metodologi Penelitian Kualitatif,
Remaja Rosdakarya. Bandung.
Norgaard, M. K., Bruns, K., Christensen, P. H.,
Mikkelsen, M. R., 2007. Children’s influence on and
participation in the family decision process during
food buying. Young Consumers, volume 8 issue 3.
Pettersson, A., Olsson, U., Fjellstrom, C., 2004. Family
life in grocery stores – a study of interaction between
adults and children. International Journal of
Consumer Studies, 28.
Setiawati, D., 2004. Peran Orang Tua Dalam Sosialisasi
Anak Menjadi Konsumen yang Bertanggung Jawab.
http://file.upi.edu/Direktori/FPTK/JUR._PEND._KES
EJAHTERAAN_KELUARGA/195407261980022AS
_AS_SETIAWATI/Hasil_Penelitian_Sosialisasi_Kons
umen.pdf Diakses tanggal 18 Oktober 2013.
Solomon, M., 1996. Consumer Behavior, Prentice-Hall.
New Jersey.
Sugiyono, 2012. Memahami penelitian kualitatif,
Alfabeta. Bandung.
Suwandinata, H., 2011. Children’s Influence on the
Family Decision-Making Process in Food Buying and
Consumption: An Empirical Study of Children‟s
Influence in Jakarta-Indonesia. Desertation.
Universitas Giessen.
Turner, J., Kelly, J., McKenna, K., 2006. Food for
thought: parent’s perspectives of child influence.
British Food Journal, volume 108 issue 3.
Vaismoradi, M., Turuen, H., Bondas, T., 2013. Content
analysis and thematic analysis: Implications for
conducting a qualitative descriptive study. Nursing
and Health Science.
Ward, S., 1979. Consumer socialization. Journal of
Consumer Research, 1.
Yin, R. K., 2011. Qualitative Research from Strat to
Finish, The Guilford Press. New York.
ICES 2017 - 1st International Conference on Educational Sciences
156