Goal-Directed Consumer Behavior: Motivation, Volition, and Affect

Consumer behavior, like other human endeavors, is unmistakably goal-directed. As Aristotle (1953, p. 3) said, “every act and every investigation, and similarly every action and pursuit, is considered to aim to some good,” with the nal aim of goal-directed behavior being happiness. “Happiness, then, is found to be something perfect and self-su cient, being the end to which our actions are directed” (Aristotle, 1953, p. 15). Yet, between the daily activities of consumers and the ultimate ends to which they aspire there is a vast terrain in which more specic and mundane goals and a ect provide direction and energy to behavior. It is this terrain that the present chapter explores. at is, we focus on the motivational and volitional properties of goals and the interplay between goals and a ect in consumer behavior.