Christopher Hsee

Christopher K. Hsee received his PhD in social psychology from Yale, and is now the Theodore O. Yntema Professor of Behavioral Science and Marketing at Chicago Booth. He is a leading scholar in the fields of judgment and decision making, consumer psychology and marketing, subjective wellbeing and happiness, and culture and China-related psychology issues. His research has been published in many top academic journals. His recent publications include “The Teasing Effect: An Underappreciated Benefit of Inducing and Resolving a Curiosity” (Journal of Marketing Research), “The Fun and Function of Uncertainty” ” (Journal of Marketing Research), “Hedonic Nondurability Revisited” (Journal of Experimental Psychology: General ), “The Pandora Effect: The Power and Peril of Curiosity” (Psychological Science), and “Lay Rationalism: Individual Differences in Using Reason versus Feelings to Guide Decision (Journal of Marketing Research).

Hsee is a fellow of the Association for Psychological Science (APS), has served as President of the Society for Judgment and Decision Making (SJDM), and received the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award from the Society for Consumer Psychology (SCP). Hsee has also been awarded the Phoenix Teaching Award and the McKenzie Excellence in Teaching Award.

Research Interests

Behavioral decision theory; consumer behavior; happiness; cross-cultural psychology.

Academic Areas

• Behavioral Science
• Marketing

Selected Publications

Hsee, C. K., Yang, Y., & Li, X. (2019). Relevance insensitivity: A new look at some old biases. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes.

Li., X. & Hsee, C. K. (2019). Beyond preference reversal: Distinguishing justifiability from evaluability in joint versus single evaluations.Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes.

Li., X. & Hsee, C. K. (2019). Being “rational” is not always rational: Encouraging people to be rational leads to hedonically suboptimal decisions. Journal of the Association for Consumer Research.

Lu, Z. & Hsee, C. K. (2019). Less willing to pay but more willing to buy: How the elicitation method impacts the valuation of a promotion. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making.

Shen, L, Hsee, C. K. & Talloen, J. (2018). The fun and function of uncertainty: Uncertain incentives reinforce repetition decisions. Journal of Consumer Research.

Yang, A. X., & Hsee, C. K. (2018). Idleness versus Busyness. Current opinion in psychology.

Ruan, B., Hsee, C. K. & Lu, Y. (2018). The teasing effect: An underappreciated benefit of creating and resolving an uncertainty. Journal of Marketing Research.

Zhu, M., Yang, Y. & Hsee, C. K. (2018). The mere urgency effect. Journal of Consumer Research.

Tu, Y. & Hsee, C. K. (2018). Hedonomics: On subtle yet significant determinants of happiness. In E. Diener, S. Oishi, & L. Tay (Eds.), e-Handbook of Well-Being. Noba Scholar encyclopedia series: Subjective well-being. Salt Lake City, UT: DEF publishers.

Zhang, S., Hsee, C. K. & Yu, S. (2017). Small economic losses lower total compensation for victims of emotional losses. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes.

Tennant, R. & Hsee, C. K. (2017). Hedonic non-durability revisited: A case for two types. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.

Shen, L. & Hsee, C. K. (2017). Numerical nudging with an accelerating nonsense number. Psychological Science.