[1] The term Psychographic is derived from Psychography which is the study of associating and classifying people according to their psychological characteristics.
[2] In marketing or social research, information received from a participant’s response is compared with other participants’ responses and the comparison of that research is designed to predict preferences based upon similarities or differences in perception.
[3] Examples of psychological characteristics which determine a psychographic profile are personality, lifestyle, value system, behavior, experience and attitude.
The categories (psychographic profiles) used to assign people, reflect personality characteristics which the researchers can analyze and use for their particular purposes.
[3] Major problems with this type of research are whether it can be applied to items which are constantly changing in scope and updated regularly and whether people will participate sufficiently to create psychographic profiles.