Research On Agent-based Modeling And Simulation For Consumer Behavior Under Website Promotion

With the rapid development of electronic commerce, more and more consumers choose online shopping. So how to analyze and predict network consumer behavior has become an important research field, and which method to choose has also become the key problem.This thesis applies agent-based modeling and simulation method to study the consumer purchasing behavior under the website promotions. With combination of empirical research and agent simulation methods, the research of consumer behavior under online shopping environment has been taken out. The factors that influence consumer behavior have been analyzed and described, and a questionnaire is designed based on the former discussion. On the basis of the consumer behavior model architecture design, the consumer model, website model and context model are built. Based on a questionnaire survey, consumer preference rules and purchase decision rules are designed. An agent-based simulation model is developed to analyze the consumer purchase decisions under different promotion strategies and context. The model takes purchase probability as the ultimate basis for decision-making. This thesis focuses on the consumers’purchase decision difference which is made under different promotion strategies, promotion context and merchandise, in the meanwhile different personality and demographic characteristics of consumers’are also taken into consideration. The model simulates consumers’different purchase behavior and is implemented under REPAST simulation environment.Network consumer behavior model reveals dynamic changes of the consumer purchase process effectively. In the final part of the thesis, the result of running simulation model is analyzed. The simulation results show that the emergence of consumer purchasing behavior can be used to analyze and predict the effects of different strategies and context.Finally, empirical research method and agent simulation modeling method are described in detail. Based on this advantages and disadvantages of the two methods are compared in four aspects which are data collection, principles, result analysis and advantages under network situation. It concludes that agent simulation modeling method is suitable for researching network consumer behavior. The method used in the paper that combining questionnaire survey and agent simulation modeling is a new research idea for researching consumer behavior under the electronic commerce environment.