Eric J. Johnson
Norman Eig Professor of Business
Marketing
Director
Center for the Decision Sciences
BA, Rutgers, 1976; MS, Carnegie Mellon, 1978; PhD, 1980
Joined CBS in 1999
Office:
727
Kravis
Phone:
212-854-5068
E-mail:
[email protected]
Fax:
212-854-7647
Curriculum Vitae
Biography
Eric Johnson is a faculty member at the Columbia Business School at Columbia University where he is the inaugural holder of the Norman Eig Chair of Business, and Director of the Center for Decision Sciences. His research examines the interface between Behavioral Decision Research, Economics and the decisions made by consumers, managers, and their implications for public policy, markets and marketing. Among other topics, Johnson has explored how the way options are presented to decision-makers affect their choices in areas such as organ donation, the choice of environmentally friendly products, and investments. Prof. Johnson’s research and comments have appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Money, Discover, Business Week and The Financial Times, and on The CBS Evening News and National Public Radio. His research has been published in the Science, Psychological Review, Psychological Science, Nature Neuroscience, Harvard Business Review, the Journal of Economic Theory, and many other consumer, economic, marketing and psychology journals. He has co-authored two books: Decision Research: A Field Guide, published by Sage Publications and The Adaptive Decision-Maker published by Cambridge University Press, and is currently working on a book on choice architecture. After graduation from Rutgers University, he received his M.S. and PhD. in Psychology from Carnegie-Mellon University, and was a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellow at Stanford.
He previously has taught at Carnegie Mellon, was a visiting professor at the Sloan School at MIT, was the inaugural holder of the David W. Hauck Chair in Marketing, and a Professor of Operations and Information Management and Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania. The National Science Foundation, The National Institutes of Health, The Alfred P. Sloan and Russell Sage Foundations, and the Office of Naval Research have supported his research. He was awarded the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award from the Society for Consumer Psychology, and named a Fellow by the Association for Consumer Research, was awarded an honorary doctorate in Economics from the University of St. Gallen, and is a Fellow of the TIAA-CREF Institute Fellow and the Association for Psychological Science. According to the Institute for Scientific Information, he is one of the most highly cited scholars in Business and Economics. He has been an Associate Editor of the Journal of Consumer Psychology, and is a member of several editorial boards as well as the Senior Editor for Decision Sciences at Behavioral Science and Policy and an Editor at Frontiers in Decision Neuroscience.
Memberships & Affiliations
Named a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science
Dean's Award for Innovation in the Classroom with Steven Zeldes for Psychology and Economics of Consumer Finance, 2013
Teaching
Spring 2022
The Psychology and Economics of Consumer Finance
(MBA)
Behavioral Economics & Decision Making
(EMBA)
(PhD) Consumer Behavior II
(PHD)
Spring 2021
The Psychology and Economics of Consumer Finance
(MBA)
Spring 2020
The Psychology and Economics of Consumer Finance
(MBA)
(PhD) Consumer Behavior II
(PHD)
Fall 2020
Behavioral Economics & Decision Making
(EMBA)
Behavioral Economics & Decision Making
(MBA)
Spring 2019
The Psychology and Economics of Consumer Finance
(MBA)
Spring 2018
The Psychology and Economics of Consumer Finance
(MBA)
Becoming Better Choice Architects
(MBA)
Fall 2018
Becoming Better Choice Architects
(MBA)
Behavioral Economics & Decision Making
(EMBA)
Columbia Caseworks cases
CommonBond and Student Loan Refinancing
(2021)
Coauthor(s): Eric J. Johnson, Stephen P. Zeldes
Keep the Change: Bank of America’s Savings Program
(2012)
Coauthor(s): Eric J. Johnson, Stephen P. Zeldes
Betterment
(2017)
Coauthor(s): Eric J. Johnson, Stephen P. Zeldes
Selling CFLs at Wal-Mart
(2011)
Coauthor(s): Eric J. Johnson, Daniel Bartels
The 2-28 Mortgage: When Business and Psychology Intersect in a New Consumer Product
(2011)
Coauthor(s): Eric J. Johnson, Chris Mayer
Research
Journal articles
A Consensus-Based Transparency Checklist
In Nature Human Behavior
(2020)
Coauthor(s): B. Aczel, B. Szaszi, A. Sarafoglou, Z. Kekecs, D. Benjamin, Eric Johnson
What's the Catch? Suspicion in Bank Motives and Sluggish Refinancing
In The Review of Financial Studies
(2019)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Stephan Meier, Olivier Toubia
Behaviorally Informed Policies for Household Financial Decisionmaking
In Behavioral Science & Policy
(2017)
Coauthor(s): Stephan Meier, Brigitte Madrian, Hal Hershfield, Abigail Sussman, Saurabh Bhargava, Jeremy Burke, Scott Huettel, Julian Jamison, Eric Johnson, John Lynch, Scott Rick, Suzanne Shu
The Price Does Not Include Additional Taxes, Fees, and Surcharges: A Review of Research on Partitioned Pricing
In Journal of Consumer Psychology
(2016)
Coauthor(s): Eric Greenleaf, Eric Johnson, Vicki Morwitz, Edith Shalev
The price does not include additional taxes, fees, and surcharges: A review of research on partitioned pricing
In Journal of Consumer Psychology
(2016)
Coauthor(s): Eric Greenleaf, Eric Johnson, V. Morwitz, Edith Shalev
Using Framing Effects to Inform More Sustainable Infrastructure Design Decisions
In Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
(2016)
Coauthor(s): Tripp Shealy, Leidy Klotz, Elke Weber, Eric Johnson
Connecting cognition and consumer choice
In Cognition
(2015)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
Healthcare.gov 3.0 — Behavioral Economics and Insurance Exchanges
In New England Journal of Medicine
(2015)
Coauthor(s): Peter Ubel, David Comerford, Eric Johnson
Time to Retire: Why Americans Claim Benefits Early and How to Encourage Them to Delay
In Behavioral Science and Policy
(2015)
Coauthor(s): Kirstin Appelt, Melissa Knoll, Eric Johnson, Jonathan Westfall
How warm days increase belief in global warming
In Nature Climate Change
(2014)
Coauthor(s): Lisa Zaval, Elizabeth Keenan, Eric Johnson, Elke Weber
How warm days increase belief in global warming
In Nature Climate Change
(2014)
Coauthor(s): Lisa Zaval, Elizabeth Keenan, Eric Johnson, Elke Weber
Sound credit scores and financial decisions despite cognitive aging
In <a href="http://www.pnas.org/content/112/1/65.full?tab=author-info">Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</a>
(2014)
Coauthor(s): Ye Li, A. Zeynap Enkavi, Lisa Zaval, Elke Weber, Eric Johnson
Complementary Cognitive Capabilities, Economic Decision-Making, and Aging
In Psychology and Aging
(2013)
Coauthor(s): Ye Li, M. Baldassi, Eric Johnson, Elke Weber
Life Expectancy as a Constructed Belief: Evidence of a Live-To or Die-By Framing Effect
In Journal of Risk and Uncertainty
(2013)
Coauthor(s): John W. Payne, N Sagara, Suzanne B. Shu, Kirstin Appelt, Eric Johnson
Choice theories: What are they good for?
In Journal of Consumer Psychology
(2013)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
Dynamic Experiments for Estimating Preferences: An Adaptive Method of Eliciting Time and Risk Parameters
In Management Science
(2013)
Coauthor(s): Olivier Toubia, Eric Johnson, Theodoros Evgeniou, Philippe Delquie
Beyond Nudges: Tools of a Choice Architecture
In Marketing Letters
(2012)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Suzanne B. Shu, Benedict G. C. Dellaert, Craig Fox, Daniel Goldstein, Gerald Häubl, Richard Larrick, John W. Payne, Ellen Peters, David Schkade
Choice without Awareness: Ethical and Policy Implications of Defaults
In Journal of Public Policy & Marketing
(2012)
Coauthor(s): C Smith, Daniel Goldstein, Eric Johnson
Partitioning Default Effects: Why People Choose Not to Choose
In Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied
(2011)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Isaac Dinner, Daniel Goldstein, Kaiya Liu
Local Warming: Daily temperature changes influences belief in global warming
In Psychological Science
(2011)
Coauthor(s): Ye Li, Eric Johnson, Lisa Zaval
Choice by value encoding and value construction: Processes of loss aversion
In Journal of Experimental Psychology: General
(2011)
Coauthor(s): M. Willemsen, Ulf Böckenholt, Eric Johnson
Query Theory: Knowing What We Want by Arguing with Ourselves
In Behavioral and Brain Sciences
(2011)
Coauthor(s): Elke Weber, Eric Johnson
A Dirty Word or a Dirty World? Attribute Framing, Political Affiliation, and Query Theory
In Psychological Science
(2010)
Coauthor(s): D. Hardisty, Eric Johnson, Elke Weber
Lateral prefrontal cortex and self-control in intertemporal choice
In Nature Neuroscience
(2010)
Coauthor(s): Bernd Figner, Daria Knoch, Eric Johnson, Amy R. Krosch, Sarah H. Lisanby, Ernst Fehr, Elke Weber
The Silver Lining Effect: Formal Analysis and Experiments
In Management Science
(2009)
Coauthor(s): Peter Jarnebrant, Olivier Toubia, Eric Johnson
Mindful Judgment and Decision Making
In Annual Review of Psychology
(2009)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Elke Weber
Man, My Brain Is Tired: Linking Depletion and Cognitive Effort in Choice
In Journal of Consumer Psychology
(2008)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
Process Models Deserve Process Data: Comment on Brandstatter, Gigerenzer, and Hertwig (2006)
In Psychological Review
(2008)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
Choosing Outcomes Versus Choosing Products: Consumer-Focused Retirement Investment Advice
In Journal of Consumer Research
(2008)
Coauthor(s): Daniel Goldstein, Eric Johnson, William Sharpe
Postscript: Rejoinder to Brandstatter, Gigerenzer, and Hertwig
In Psychological Review
(2008)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
Asymmetric Discounting in Intertemporal Choice: A Query-Theory Account
In Psychological Science
(2007)
Coauthor(s): Elke Weber, Eric Johnson, Kerry Milch, Hannah Chang, Jeff Brodscholl, Daniel Goldstein
Aspects of Endowment: A Query Theory of Loss Aversion
In Journal of Experimental Psychology-Learning Memory and Cognition
(2007)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, G. Haeuble, Anat Keinan
Things That Go Bump in the Mind: How Behavioral Economics Could Invigorate Marketing
In Journal of Marketing Research
(2006)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
Let's Get Personal: An International Examination of the Influence of Communication, Culture and Social Distance on Other Regarding Preferences
In Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization
(2006)
Coauthor(s): Nancy Buchan, Eric Johnson, Rachel Croson
Let's get personal: An international examination of the influence of communication, culture and social distance on other regarding preferences
In Journal of Economics and Behavior in Organizations
(2006)
Coauthor(s): Nancy Buchan, Rachel Croson, Eric Johnson
Designing Marketplaces of the Artificial with Consumers in Mind: Four Approaches to Understanding Consumer Behavior in Electronic Environments
In Journal of Interactive Marketing
(2006)
Coauthor(s): Steve Bellman, Eric Johnson, Gerald Lohse, Naomi Mandel
Making Better Decisions: From Measuring to Constructing Preferences
In Health Psychology
(2005)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Mary Steffel, Daniel Goldstein
On the Depth and Dynamics of Online Search Behavior
In Management Science
(2004)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Wendy Moe, Peter Fader, Steve Bellman, Gerald Lohse
Defaults and Donation Decisions
In Transplantation
(2004)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
International Differences in Information Privacy Concerns: A Global Survey of Consumers
In Information Society
(2004)
Coauthor(s): Steve Bellman, Eric Johnson, Stephen Kobrin, Gerald Lohse
Rediscovering Risk
In Journal of Public Policy and Marketing
(2004)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
When Do Fair Beliefs Influence Bargaining Behavior? Experimental Bargaining in Japan and the United States
In Journal of Consumer Research
(2004)
Coauthor(s): Nancy Buchan, Rachel Croson, Eric Johnson
Cognitive Lock-In and the Power Law of Practice
In Journal of Marketing
(2003)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Steve Bellman, Gerald Lohse
Do Defaults Save Lives?
In Science
(2003)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Daniel Goldstein
Defaults, Framing and Privacy: Why Opting In-Opting Out
In Marketing Letters
(2002)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Steve Bellman, Gerald Lohse
Detecting Failures of Backward Induction: Monitoring Information Search in Sequential Bargaining
In Journal of Economic Theory
(2002)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, C. Camerer, Sankar Sen, T. Rymon
When Web Pages Influence Choice: Effects of Visual Primes on Experts and Novices
In Journal of Consumer Research
(2002)
Coauthor(s): Naomi Mandel, Eric Johnson
Digitizing Consumer Research
In Journal of Consumer Research
(2001)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
To Opt-In or Opt-Out: That Depends on the Question
In Communications of the ACM
(2001)
Coauthor(s): Steve Bellman, Eric Johnson, Gerald Lohse
Consumer Buying Behavior on the Internet: Findings from Panel Data
In Journal of Interactive Marketing
(2000)
Coauthor(s): Gerald Lohse, Steve Bellman, Eric Johnson
Agents to the Rescue?
In Marketing Letters
(1999)
Coauthor(s): P. West, Dan Ariely, Steve Bellman, Eric Bradlow, Joel Huber, Eric Johnson, B. Khan, John Little, David Schkade
Anchoring, Confirmatory Search, and the Construction of Values
In Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes
(1999)
Coauthor(s): G. Chapman, Eric Johnson
Predictors of Online Buying Behavior
In Communications of the ACM
(1999)
Coauthor(s): Steve Bellman, Eric Johnson
Divide and Prosper: Why Firms Divide Prices Instead of Charging a Single Price
In Journal of Marketing Research
(1998)
Coauthor(s): V. Morwitz, Eric Greenleaf, Eric Johnson
Choice in Computer-Mediated Environments
In Marketing Letters
(1997)
Coauthor(s): Russell Winer, J. Deighton, Eric Johnson, B. Mellers, V. Morwitz, T. O'Guinn, A. Rangaswamy, Alan Sawyer
A Comparison of Two Process Tracing Methods for Choice Tasks
In Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes
(1997)
Coauthor(s): Gerald Lohse, Eric Johnson
Mere-Possession Effects Without Possession in Consumer Choice
In Journal of Consumer Research
(1997)
Coauthor(s): Sankar Sen, Eric Johnson
Watching Customers Decide: Process Measures Add Insights to Choice Modeling Experiments
In Marketing Research
(1997)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, John van Rossen, Bruce G. S. Hardie, P. Anderson
Empirical Generalizations in the Modeling of Consumer Choice
In Marketing Science
(1995)
Coauthor(s): John van Rossen, Eric Johnson
Preference Reversals in Monetary and Life Expectancy Evaluations
In Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes
(1995)
Coauthor(s): G. Chapman, Eric Johnson
Framing, Probability Distortions, and Insurance Decisions
In Journal of Risk and Uncertainty
(1993)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, J. Hershey, J. Meszaros, Howard Kunreuther
Correlation, Conflict, and Choice
In Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition
(1993)
Coauthor(s): James Bettman, Eric Johnson, M. F. Luce, John W. Payne
Does Measuring Intent Change Behavior?
In Journal of Consumer Research
(1993)
Coauthor(s): V. Morwitz, Eric Johnson, D. Schmittlein
Reference Dependence, Loss Aversion, and Brand Choice
In Marketing Science
(1993)
Coauthor(s): Bruce G. S. Hardie, Eric Johnson, Peter Fader
Behavioral Decision Research: A Constructive Processing Perspective
In Annual Review of Psychology
(1992)
Coauthor(s): John W. Payne, James Bettman, Eric Johnson
A Constructive Process View of Decision Making: Multiple Strategies in Judgment and Choice
In Acta Psychologica
(1992)
Coauthor(s): John W. Payne, James Bettman, Eloise Coupey, Eric Johnson
Gambling with the House Money and Trying to Break Even: The Effects of Prior Outcomes on Risky Choice
In Management Science
(1990)
Coauthor(s): R. Thaler, Eric Johnson
Bias in Utility Assessments: Further Evidence and Explanations
In Management Science
(1989)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, David Schkade
Cognitive Processes in Preference Reversals
In Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes
(1989)
Coauthor(s): David Schkade, Eric Johnson
Information Overload and the Nonrobustness of Linear Models: A Comment on Keller and Staelin
In Journal of Consumer Research
(1989)
Coauthor(s): John van Rossen, Eric Johnson
When Choice Models Fail: Compensatory Representations in Negatively-Correlated Environments
In Journal of Marketing Research
(1989)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, John van Rossen, S. Ghose
Adaptive Strategy Selection in Decision Making
In Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition
(1988)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson
Information Displays and Preference Reversals
In Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes
(1988)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, John W. Payne, James Bettman
Effort and Accuracy in Choice
In Management Science
(1985)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, John W. Payne
Compensatory Choice Models of Noncompensatory Processes: The Effect of Varying Context
In Journal of Consumer Research
(1984)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, R. J. Meyer
Product Familiarity and Learning New Information
In Journal of Consumer Research
(1984)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, J. E. Russo
Books
The Adaptive Decision Maker
(1993)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, James Bettman, John W. Payne
Decision Research: A Field Guide
(1990)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, J. S. Carroll
Chapters
Computational and Process Models of Decision Making in Psychology and Behavioral Economics
In Neuroeconomics: Decision Making and the Brain
(2013)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, R. Ratcliff
Explicit and Implicit Strategies in Decision Making
In Better Than Conscious? Decision Making, the Human Mind, and Implications for Institutions
(2008)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Christian Keysers, Robert Boyd, Jonathan Cohen, Merlin Donald, Werner Güth, Robert Kurzban, Lael J. Schooler, Jonathan Schooler, Elizabeth Spelke, Julia Trommershäuser
Decisions under Uncertainty: Psychological, Economic, and Neuroeconomic Explanations of Risk Preference
In Neuroeconomics: Decision Making and the Brain
(2008)
Coauthor(s): Elke Weber, Eric Johnson
Consumer Behavior and Marketing
In Social Psychology: Handbook of Basic Principles
(2007)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Michel Tuan Pham, Gita Johar
Constructing Preferences From Memory
In The Construction of Preference
(2006)
Coauthor(s): Elke Weber, Eric Johnson
Gain and Loss Ultimatums
In Advances in Applied Microeconomics, Volume 13: Experimental and Behavioral Economics
(2005)
Coauthor(s): Nancy Buchan, Rachel Croson, Eric Johnson, George Wu
Thinking About Attention in Games: Backward and Forward Induction
In The Psychology of Economic Decisions
(2003)
Coauthor(s): C. Camerer, Eric Johnson
The Process-Performance Paradox in Expert Judgment: How Can Experts Know So Much and Predict So Badly?
In Toward a General Theory of Expertise: Prospects and Limits
(1991)
Coauthor(s): C. Camerer, Eric Johnson
Web-only articles
Can Consumers Make Affordable Care Affordable? The Value of Choice Architecture
In PLOS ONE
(2013)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Ran Hassin, Tom Baker, Allison Bajger, Galen Treuer
Working papers
Measuring individual-level loss aversion using simple experiments
(2014)
Coauthor(s): S. Gachter, A. Herrmann, Eric Johnson
Distribution Builder: A Tool for Measuring Preferences for Investment Risk
(2010)
Coauthor(s): Daniel Goldstein, Eric Johnson, William Sharpe
Mediators of Loss Aversion
(2010)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, S. Gaechter, A. Herrmann
Observing Unobserved Heterogeneity: Using Process Data to Enhance Choice Models
(2010)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Bruce G. S. Hardie, R. J. Meyer, John Walsh
Pricing Add-Ons as Totals: How Changing Price Display Can Influence Consumer Choice
(2010)
Coauthor(s): Mark Heitmann, Eric Johnson, Andreas Herrmann
Your Preferences May be Hazardous to Your Wealth: How False Consensus and Overconfidence Influence Judgments of Product Success
(1995)
Coauthor(s): Marjorie Adams, Eric Johnson, Deborah Mitchell
Case studies
The 2/28 Mortgage: When Business and Psychology Intersect in a New Consumer Product
(2011)
Coauthor(s): Eric Johnson, Christopher Mayer
Ideas and Insights
In The Media
Making Choices Is Complicated. Here’s What to Know to Make More Informed Decisions
Conversations: Eric J. Johnson, "The Elements of Choice: Why the Way We Decide Matters"
Among Social Scientists, a Vigorous Debate over Loss Aversion
Apple Bets on Users Opting in to Be Tracked, Rather Than Opting Out
What Happens When You’re Vaccinated and Your Partner Isn’t?
Press Releases
Awards And Honors
Named a Fellow by the Association for Consumer Research, 2012
Awarded from the Society for Consumer Psychology, 2011
Honorary Doctorate in Economics awarded from the University of St. Gallen, 2009.
Awarded Columbia AMA Award for Class Most Useful After Graduation, 2007
Awarded a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship in Psychology, Department of Psychology, Stanford University
Named an Institute Fellow of TIAA-CREF