We are consumers, making numerous choices in our daily life. A primary goal of our lab is to understand the biological basis of consumers’ decision making, by combining ideas and tools from neuroscience, economics, psychology, and marketing. Specifically, we use functional MRI and machine learning techniques to decode the mind of the consumer. For example, we use a participant’s brain activities to predict which brand she is thinking about. As researchers in business schools, another goal of our lab is to put our findings in neuroscience/economics/psychology/marketing to work in the real world, where theory can meet application. We conduct field experiments and apply the implications to help companies or consumers to achieve their goals. For example, we study possible behavioral interventions that help patients control their blood glucose, and implement our findings on a diabetes app.
1. Chen, Y. P., Nelson, L. D., & Hsu, M. (2015). From “where” to “what”: distributed representations of brand associations in the human brain. Journal of Marketing Research, 52(4), 453-466.
2. Kuo, W. J., Sjöström, T., Chen, Y. P., Wang, Y. H., & Huang, C. Y. (2009). Intuition and deliberation: two systems for strategizing in the brain. Science, 324(5926), 519-522.