James Bettman

About

Dr. James R. Bettman is the Burlington Industries Professor Emeritus of Business Administration and a member of the marketing area at the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University. He also holds a position as Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Duke University. He received his BA in mathematics-economics and his PhD in administrative sciences from Yale University. Prior to his appointment at Duke, he was on the faculty at UCLA. Professor Bettman’s teaching interests are in consumer behavior, and his research focuses on consumer information processing and decision making. His work explores constructive preferences, how decision makers adapt to different situations, the effects of emotion and stress on decision making, the role of non-conscious processes in consumer behavior, and how consumption is used in forming identities. He has authored two books, 'An Information Processing Theory of Consumer Choice' and 'The Adaptive Decision Maker,' as well as a monograph titled 'Emotional Decisions: Tradeoff Difficulty and Coping in Consumer Choice.' His research has resulted in over 120 publications appearing in journals across marketing, consumer research, psychology, management, and neuroscience. Professor Bettman has served on the editorial review boards for several prominent journals, including the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, and Journal of Consumer Psychology. He is an associate editor for the Journal of Marketing Research and has…

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Sociology
• Psychology
• Social Science
• Artificial Intelligence
• Social psychology
• Business
• Marketing
• Management science
• Economics

Selected publications

• Feeling Love and Doing More for Distant Others: Specific Positive Emotions Differentially Affect Prosocial Consumption

  Journal of Marketing Research · 2015-03-05 · 273 citations

  articleCorresponding

  Marketers often employ a variety of positive emotions to encourage consumption or promote a particular behavior (e.g., buying, donating, recycling) to benefit an organization or cause. The authors show that specific positive emotions do not universally increase prosocial behavior but, rather, encourage different types of prosocial behavior. Four studies show that whereas positive emotions (i.e., love, hope, pride, and compassion) all induce prosocial behavior toward close entities (relative to a…

  PublisherDOI

• Connecting With Celebrities: How Consumers Appropriate Celebrity Meanings for a Sense of Belonging

  Journal of Advertising · 2017-01-31 · 235 citations

  articleSenior author

  We propose that consumers appropriate brand symbolism that comes from celebrity endorsements to construct and communicate their self-concepts. We also argue that consumers with high need to belong (NTB) look to celebrities to a greater extent than those who have lower needs to belong, because high-NTB consumers are more likely to look to celebrities for cues about which brands may aid these consumers' attempts to meet their affiliation needs. High-NTB consumers are also prone to develop one-side…

  PublisherDOI

• <i>“</i>Paper or Plastic?”: How We Pay Influences Post-Transaction Connection

  Journal of Consumer Research · 2015-11-06 · 104 citations

  article

  Does the way that individuals pay for a good or service influence the amount of connection they feel after the purchase has occurred? Employing a multi-method approach across four studies, individuals who pay using a relatively more painful form of payment (e.g., cash or check) increase their post-transaction connection to the product they purchased and/or the organization their purchase supports in comparison to those who pay with less painful forms of payment (e.g., debit or credit card). Spec…

  PublisherDOI

• Consumer Decision Making

  2015-02-17 · 71 citations

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Managing Brand Meaning through Celebrity Endorsement

  2015-05-05 · 47 citations

  book-chapterSenior author

  Abstract Purpose We explore how marketers can manage brand meaning through the use of celebrity endorsements. We theorize that consumers look to celebrity endorsements for brand symbolism, which they appropriate to construct and communicate their self-concepts by forming self-brand connections (SBC). Methodology This research employs an experimental paradigm, with two empirical studies examining whether marketers can create meaning for their brands through the use of celebrity endorsements. Find…

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• John W. Payne

  60 shared

• Mary Frances Luce

  Duke University

  43 shared

• Eric J. Johnson

  Columbia University

  28 shared

• Rosellina Ferraro

  18 shared

• Jennifer Edson Escalas

  17 shared

• Tanya L. Chartrand

  Duke University

  15 shared

• Gavan J. Fitzsimons

  Duke University

  14 shared

• Mita Sujan

  14 shared

Awards & honors

• Duke University Dean’s Award for Excellence in Mentoring (20…
• NCNB Faculty Award for the Fuqua School
• Duke University Scholar/Teacher of the Year
• Fellow of the American Psychological Association
• Fellow of the American Psychological Society

Similar researchers at Duke University

• Dan Arielyh-97
• Ravi Bansalh-67
• Alon Bravh-57