Primary Research: Personality Theory and Questions

Personality directly affects a person's perception of the world; a person with an adventurous, enthusiastic, and compassionate personality will have a much more positive outlook on life compared to someone who is callous and obstinate. People's personalities influence their view of the world, personalities also influence what they search for in products/packaging design.  Supermarkets bombard us with a mass of information all from different packages claiming to be the best. Our brains can naturally filter out unnecessary information and our eyes are drawn to packages that 'speak to us'.  The packages that tend to speak to us are the ones that have a relatable or likeable personality for us.

Xander Becket writes about four personality types: competitive, spontaneous, humanistic, and methodical. People's different personalities means what they look for in a package will be different,

"Once you've identified their type, you can tweak your approach to the process to better suit their needs. Your potential clients are not all the same, so your strategy for communicating with them shouldn't be either." Xander argues that designer's must know the most effective way to design for the different personalities. 

Competitive Personality

People with competitive personalities are independent and highly driven, they like to be ahead of everyone else and want to be seen as a leader. They look for products which reflect their direct nature by clearly outlining the solution to their problem; they want to know that the product is going to maintain their top position.

Spontaneous Personality

People with spontaneous personalities don't care for competition; they love projects that they have a genuine interest in. They are creative and enthusiastic people who look at 'the bigger picture' rather than being weighed down with the details and intricacies. This means that they are more attracted to packaging that focuses on bold, eye-catching design rather than informational design. They look for products which give them a feeling of excitement; the product needs to be instantly interesting as they loose interest quickly.

Humanistic Personality

People with humanistic personalities are magnanimous; they consistently put the needs of others' ahead of their own. Their thoughtfulness means they search for products which make everyone happy. Testimonials are a great way of persuading them to purchase since they are people orientated they like to hear the success other have had after purchasing the product. 

Methodical Personality

People with methodical personalities love information as they naturally analyse facts and information before making an informed decision. Emotional drives don't have a strong hold over their decision process but rather rational drives, because of this they don't purchase on an impulse, instead they spend a lot of time considering their decision. They are the most inquisitive personality and will often as a lot of questions; they look for the facts and figures in the packaging design to affirm their judgement prior to purchasing.

Questionnaire

After critically analysing my original questionnaire design, I decided that asking people to state three of their personality types was too vague and hard to answer. If I was put on the spot and asked for three of my personality traits I would really struggle to list three and the three I picked probably wouldn't be that accurate! If people don't give accurate answers then it will skew the results and although their responses may point to aspirational personality traits it doesn't reflect them as a person. 

Instead I could give a few statements which they would then circle how strongly they agreed or disagreed with, this would give an insight into their personality and how they cope in certain situations. 

For example: Winning a debate is more important that making sure no-one gets upset.

Strongly Disagree  /  Disagree  / Somewhere in between  /  Agree  /  Strongly Agree

OR I could give two opposing options and they have to circle the one that they mainly relate to.

For example: You like organisation and structure OR You go with the flow (are laid back)

Changing the structure of how I ask about their personality will hopefully minimise wrong answers. If the questions are structured so there is no right or wrong answer then people will be more willing to answer honestly. I think using a scale will work better than a one or another option as the majority of people won't feel really strongly about everything and will sit somewhere between the two options. I don't want people to feel like neither of the options apply to them, by offering a scale it gives people the reassurance that they can sit in the middle. I don't want to have loads on the questionnaire as it needs to remain as short as possible, however I equally don't want to have so few that it doesn't produce good, useful results. To find the right balance and get the most out of these questions I need to carefully think what I am going to ask as I don't want the questions to be similar and repetitive. I also need to define what the answers would tell me in order to justify why they are being asked. 

Xander Beckets four personality types can be used to guide what sort of personality category respondents fall into. This is by no means a definitive personality guide, it only offers an insight into the consumer and what they may look for in products, personality is subjective and therefore difficult to measure. If I had more time, money, and experience I would like to explore this further and in more depth however the questionnaire is about producing a broad range of results, I can conduct interviews later on to get more in-depth research.

 You prefer going with the flow and being spontaneous over organising and structuring your day. 

Spontaneous personality 
This will be a big indicator into how they live day to day life; whether they prefer to plan everything and have a plan or if they prefer having a blank start and seeing where the day takes them. People who prefer structure I feel will need more convincing with a product, whilst still being swayed by emotion they will need to back it up with reasons and rationalisation i.e "its a good price" "it has healthy ingredients". Where as those who go with the flow will show a more spontaneous personality being drawn to packages with an initial wow factor, they will be much more willing to give products a try as they are driven by emotions.

Winning a debate is more important than making sure no-one gets upset.

Competitive personality
Humanistic personality
People with a competitive personality are direct and are more self focused; their interest is in self progression, they are sure in their views and are happy to stand up for what they believe even if others disagree. They like to see themselves as leaders and buy products to project this image to others, they like products that cut straight to the point and tell them the benefits; how they will remain on top. Humanistic personalities are more emotionally driven and as they care for those around them and believe that keeping harmony is more important than always being right. They are attracted to products with a level of honesty and only want the best, not for themselves, but for those around them.

You prefer to be surrounded by a group of people over spending time with yourself
Competitive personality
Humanistic personality

Both the competitive and humanistic personality enjoy spending time around others as they both have sociable natures. The competitive personality enjoys being in a social environment and receiving comments about their latest products, the compliments reinforce their brand loyalty. People who are happy in their own company tend to be less persuaded by what others are doing or buying; they are secure in themselves and use more rational logic when buying products.

Logic is more important than heart when making important decisions

Methodical personality
Humanistic personality 
Methodical personalities look for clearly outlined benefits, they don't want to hear the products the best - they want to know why its the best. They look for the reasons behind things and are ruled by logic over emotion. Humanistic personalities are swayed more emotionally and tend to decide what to do based on how they feel about it rather than the facts, their heart rules their brain.

You like to focus on the possibilities of the situation rather than the realities

Spontaneous personality
Methodical personality

Optimistic or Realistic

This question tries to gage the respondents outlook on life - whether they look at situations optimistically and try to see the best in everything or whether they look more realistically at things and consider the facts and figures, much like the methodical personality.