Although psychoanalytic theory is promising to get a full understanding of customers' motives, it has received little attention in the marketing field. Notwithstanding Dichter (1964)'s pioneering work incorporating psychoanalytic concepts to consumer motivation and desire, still few marketing theorization has been developed to gain full insights into inner conflicting motives. Drawing on psychoanalytic paradigm, this paper discusses customer ambivalence as a psychic conflict. It reviews existing models of ambivalence, and develops a new theoretical framework, built upon the structural division of ego, id and superego and the typological structure of consciousness, pre-consciousness and unconsciousness.
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