Psychographics

A technique for gathering information to better understand and analyze your audience is using psychographics. “Psychographics [focus] on psychological concepts such as standpoints, values, attitudes, and beliefs” (Coopman 82).

A standpoint is a person’s perspective of the world and everything in it. Standpoint can be broken down in to two words, which can make the word more easily understandable…”stand” and “point”. When you have a standpoint, you are essentially taking a “stand” on your “point” of view. Standpoints are most often a product of personal experiences such as family life, status, age, sex, ethnicity, occupation etc. The analysis of standpoints is useful in determining commonalities as well as differences in your audience.

A value is basically a person’s sense of what is good, important, and right. Similarly to the standpoint, values also stem from personal experience, as well as media and societal influences. This is not entirely coincidental. Values and standpoints are tightly connected. Values directly influence your point of view (standpoint). Being able to identify values will help you to determine what is important to your audience, which will aid you in choosing a topic that they are interested in and that they will find entertaining and relevant.

An attitude is how a person feels about something. These feelings can be either positive or negative and are subject to change. Like standpoints and values, attitudes often come from personal experiences and past bias.

A belief is something that someone accepts as being true. Like attitudes, beliefs are subject to change. When confronted with new evidence or a compelling argument, it is possible for a belief to change. However, beliefs are often strongly engrained and are not often swayed or manipulated.