Chapter 14, Section 14-4, Customers as Decision Makers, presents Exhibit 14.6, the Simplified Model of Consumer Behavior, illustrating the impact that psychological and sociological influences have on the four stages of the customer decision-making process.

1. For your initial post, briefly describe the four stages of the decision-making process. Explain why the first stage is so vital and relevant to consumer behavior.
2. Please review the general participation rules. For full credit, you must post an initial response to the prompt and post reply messages to at least two (2) other students. To reply to classmates, enter your response in the "reply" section.
3. A minimum of 100 words total is required for your initial post. Subsequent contributions (responses to your classmates) should be a minimum of 50 words.