1.

Introduction
Obesity is an issue that has impacted dramatically the developed world. During the last decades
this issue has been intensified, attacking not only adults but kids as well (Let's face the real,
2014). According to O'Dea and Eriksen (2011) obesity is defined as the excess of body fatness
and overweight to weight in excess of a weight standard (p. 3). It is believed that nearly 70% of
the Australian population will suffer of this epidemic by 2025 (Naughton, 2016), and this issue is
costing annually more than $ 55 billion in terms of loss of productivity, health system cost and
carer cost (Australia Bureau of statistics, 2013). To understand its cause, it is essential mention
some human behaviours such as sedentary lifestyle, junk food consumption or stress. This re-
search seeks to understand the consume behaviour of Australian families at food courts, to identify
patterns that can impact the development of bad habits in early australian generations.

2. background information

Date of observation Time of observation Place of observation

Saturday 20/08/2016 Garden City

Fang Tang Sunday 21/08/2016 11:30am13:oopm Garden City

Xueting Li Saturday 20/08/2016 16:0019:00pm Sunnybank

Timetable

Food courts is a mixed place, which provide different style food, and it attracts many people form
different countries sit here to choose food for lunch or dinner, so it is a good place to observe the
customer behavior. In additional, at weekend, parents always take their children to food courts,
which is convenient to observe the difference behavior between mother and father, and get more
information to know the factors that affect the customer behavior.

The way of data collection mainly comes from the former research and this observation. The for-
mer researches provide a basic understanding and some useful points about how to observe the
customer behavior. From the observation, about the majority of parents take their children look
around to compare different food, 30% parents just pay more attention on the fast food, and they
were waiting in line to check-out and other fathers or mothers sit here and discuss with other chil-
dren.

Research objectives:
The reason why parents choose fast food at food courts
Whether culture has a significant influence on customer behavior
personality traits

Findings
The reason for choose fast food
From the observation, most parents prefer to fast food for themselves and children, such as KFC,
Hungry Jacks, there are several reasons about why the majority customers choose fast food, includ-
ing the price, convenient, or follow others, which are associated with motivation. According to
Sheth, et al (1999), customer demands and customer motivation are the main factors that affect he
customer behavior, and motivation is from the demands. When parents searched food for lunch or
dinner, this is their physiological need, but they make decision to purchase fast food is depend on
motivation, therefore, they would like to consider the price, and advertisements or just follow other
people.
The impact of culture on customer behavior
Culture is an important factor that affect customer behavior, and people from different countries,
which is difficult to get enough information to research and should spend much time to understand-
ing their behavior (Mattila, 1999). According the observation, Australian parents always purchase
fast food for the whole family, they chose the different sets, including chips, burgers and soft
drinks.However, Asian parents often think fast food dont suitable for lunch or dinner, they would
like to buy rice with vegetables or noodle. In additional, Australian parents and Asian parents are
all communicated with their children, but they have different attitude, Australian parents respect the
opinions of children
and make them have opportunities to choose the food they like, Asian parents often think fast food
isnt health and refuse.

Personality traits
In observation, there also have some difference among parents, for instance, some mothers take
their children look around and contact with staff or other customers to know which food is popular,
but others just walked to the fast food check-out counter directly, because many people are in wait-
ing line, and some parents preferred to take away for children and purchase other food for them-
selves. The personality traits have a significant effect on customer behavior, there are several differ-
ent types of customers, such as extensive type is easily attracted by the advertisements and promo-
tion, Fixed customers are aways purchase the same products, random type is easily affected by the
environment and other customers behavior (Brown, Mowen, Donavan & Licata, 2002).

Research Opportunity
After analysis the data through a deep observation, there is one interesting question that emerge in
the research. It is evident that the target audience observed in this study possess positive associa-
tions with colors, shapes, animals and cartoons. Therefore, it was possible to conclude the prefer-
ence of happy meals of McDonalds and chicken and buffalo fries of Hungry jacks among them.
These fast food organizations have been persuaded kids through showy boxes. As a result, kids
are adopting habits that might have strong repercussions in their health condition. That is why, we
would like to propose a next research in order to observe whether this trend persist in organic food
(Showy packing). it is believed that early age of life is ideal to establish habits that might persist
during all life (Tips for helping kids, 2008), so if this trend persist with organic food would be pos-
sible adopt it to change bad eating habits.

Conclusion
Through analysis the observation of customer behavior,

Reference
Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2013). Research and experimental development, Gender Indica-
tors, Australia (no. 4125.0). Canberra, Australia: Author. Retrieved from
http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/4125.0main+features3330Jan%202013
Let's face the real issues of childhood obesity. (2014, Aug 27). Western Daily Press. Retrieved
from http://search.proquest.com.libraryproxy.griffith.edu.au/docview/1556215079?ac-
countid=14543
Naughton, J. (2016, July 15). This is what obesity is costing Australia. The huffington post.Re-
trieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2016/02/24/this-is-what-obesity-is-costing-australia/
O'Dea, J. A., Eriksen, M. P., & Oxford University Press. (2010;2011;). Childhood obesity preven-
tion: International research, controversies, and interventions. New York;Oxford [U.K];: Oxford Uni-
versity Press. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199572915.001.0001
Tips for helping kids develop healthy habits. (2008, Aug 20). Daily Herald Retrieved from
http://search.proquest.com.libraryproxy.griffith.edu.au/docview/313332833?accountid=14543

Sheth, J. N., Mittal, B., & Newman, B. (1999). Consumer behavior and beyond. NY:
Harcourt Brace.

Mattila, A. S. (1999). The role of culture and purchase motivation in service encoun-
ter evaluations. Journal of Services Marketing, 13(4/5), 376-389.

Brown, T. J., Mowen, J. C., Donavan, D. T., & Licata, J. W. (2002). The customer
orientation of service workers: Personality trait effects on self-and supervisor perfor-
mance ratings. Journal of Marketing Research, 39(1), 110-119.