Consumer Behavior: The Millennial Generation

In the present day scenario, Generation Y or the millennial generation is of vital importance in all walks of life be it fashion, employment, family, social outlook. DeVaney, S.A. (2015), describes that there is no prescribed date about the rise of this generation. Most of the researchers use a birth year from the early 1980s to early 2000s. According to the researcher, the concept of a millennial generation become prominent from early1980s to 2000s. In the global context, there are four generations starting from the silent generation(1930-1945), the baby boomers(1946-1964), Generation X(1965-1979 or 1981) and Generation Y(1981-2000). The Millennials are the generation who are different from other generation in many respects like technological

R. (2014). describes that consumer behaviour is the sub-category of the marketing concept. It includes customer value, satisfaction and retention. Consumer behaviour starts with the customer research for the product and ends with the purchase of the product. According to Kotler, P. (2003), process and tools under customer research are used to study the buying behaviour of the consumer. This buying decision process includes three different stages - input, process and output. Input includes external influences which are firm 's marketing efforts and socio-cultural environment. The process includes consumer decision making process and output involves the final purchase of the product and post-purchase behaviour of the consumer. Arndt, J. (1968), state that the behaviour of the consumer is versatile in nature at the time of purchase, services, understanding and knowledge of the consumers about the product. Studies related to consumer behaviour include different variables like demographics, psychographics. Also, it is the mixture of cultural, social, economics, sociology and other sciences. Demographic variables involve factors like age, income, educational qualification, employment status and location and psychological factors like attitude, personality, values, interest or lifestyle. Consumer behaviour studies also focus on the buying decision-making process of the individual, family, group or an organisation. According to research, buying decision making includes six different stages. These stages are: - need recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase decision, final purchase and post-purchase behaviour. (Mowen, J., & Minor, M., 2003).Consumer behaviour is characterised under two different paradigms, one is positivist and the other is non-positivist. For better understanding, we have to know the main ideas of these two paradigms. (Banyte, J., Paunksniene, Ž., & Rutelione, A.,