Russia: Projective methods in marketing research

Dmitry Shimanov, General Director of MAR Consult Research Agency

Projective methods are becoming increasingly popular in the market research sphere. They provide ample opportunities to study individual specifics of people, their deep motives and subconscious behavior, i.e. mechanisms influencing such actions as choosing this or that particular product among several similar ones. Projective methods are generally based on defining projections and interpreting them. Projection as a research method was introduced by Lawrence K. Frank. Projective methods include: associative, interpretative, expressive, competitive, unfinished tasks, ranging, etc.

Projective methods are lowly estimated as psychometric tools by many researchers, because respondents may be affected by situational factors: instructions, influence of experimentalists, impetuses, temporary condition, etc. Besides, reliability and validity of projective tests may sometimes be doubtful due to unstable results and contradictory interpretation of data.

At the same time, numerous researchers claim that inner personality traits cannot be determined through direct questioning. Direct questions imply serious and reasonable answers. Information on inner reasons for choice can only be obtained through indirect methods, namely through projective techniques, which allow to have an insight into the most emotional areas of human mentality. As a matter of fact there are quantitative methods, which make it possible to use direct questions to investigate respondents' inner reasons of choice (multidimensional scaling, classification methods, etc.). It is important to use these quantitative methods because projective methods often produce erroneous results in independent research.

Projective methods are distinguished by such an important positive feature as their ability to entertain: original and unexpected impetuses and tasks add game elements to a group discussion or interview. Yet, unacquainted respondents participating in group projective tests are not always ready for various collective game situations.

Thus, projective methods stood the test of time and have a certain scope of application. For instance, one of their advantages is high efficiency in research with children: the younger the children, the less they are likely to answer direct questions. In any case, in order to obtain reliable and valid results, it is important to use qualitative methods together with quantitative to leverage their advantages and neutralize disadvantages.

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