Modelling emotion and social norms for consumer simulations exemplified in social media

In line with empirical evidence from seminal research, we assume that emotions and social norms play a key role in consumers´ decisions. To this end, we develop a socio-cognitive agent to examine the psychological and sociological factors influencing consumer decision-making. The underlying assumptions are operationalized in a decision model that integrates motivation, emotion, and normative mechanisms using a unified activation and valuation framework. A simulation of prompting other consumers to switch to green electricity via social media demonstrates how the interplay of input parameters, given by the agent´s internal and external environment, memories, and personality determine the agent´s decision by activating and valuating actions. Such simulations enable examining the impact of social media messages on consumer decision.