Rebecca Ratner

Rebecca Ratner is the Dean's Professor of Marketing at the Robert H. Smith School of Business. She recently served as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs for the Smith School. Dr. Ratner received a Ph.D. in social psychology from Princeton University, and has been a visiting scholar in the marketing departments of the Harvard Business School, Chicago Booth Graduate School of Business, and the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to her position at Maryland, she was assistant professor and associate professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Ratner has taught courses on consumer behavior, marketing management, marketing for social value, and marketing research to MBA students, undergraduate students, and executives.

Professor Ratner’s research explores factors underlying suboptimal consumer decision making and focuses on memory, variety seeking, and the influence of social norms. Her research has appeared in marketing, psychology, and decision-making journals, including the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Journal of Experimental Psychology, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Her research has been featured in the media including The New York Times, Washington Post, CBS News: This Morning, and NPR’s Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me. Prof. Ratner has served as Associate Editor at the Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Marketing Research and co-Editor of Journal of Marketing Research.