Gideon Nave

• Julian De Freitas, Gideon Nave, Stefano Puntoni (2025), Ideation with Generative AI—in Consumer Research and Beyond, Journal of Consumer Research, 52 (1), pp. 18-31. https://doi.org/10.1093/jcr/ucaf012 Abstract

  The use of generative AI (genAI) in consumer research is rapidly evolving, with applications including synthetic data generation, data analysis, and more. However, their role in creative ideation—a cornerstone of consumer research—remains underexplored. Drawing on the human creativity literature, we propose that ideation with genAI is facilitated by its productivity and semantic breadth, which are psychologically analogous to the dual pathways of persistence and flexibility in human ideation. Further, we distinguish between the utility of genAI as a key ideator versus humans as key ideator, conceptualized through the genAI ideation roles of Designer and Writer and of Interviewer and Actor. While genAI excels in generating incremental improvements, its potential for groundbreaking innovation could be unlocked by leveraging its ability to prompt human creativity. This article advances the theoretical and practical understanding of genAI in ideation for consumer research, offering numerous practical guidelines for integrating generative AI into research while emphasizing human–AI collaboration to achieve radical insights.

• Lennart Meincke, Gideon Nave, Christian Terwiesch (2025), ChatGPT decreases idea diversity in brainstorming, Nature Human Behaviour. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41562-025-02173-x
• Gideon Nave and Remi Daviet (2024), The Value of Genetic Data in Predicting Preferences: A Study of Food Taste, Journal of Marketing Research, 61 (6). https://doi.org/10.1177/00222437241244736 Abstract

  The exponential expansion of consumer genetic testing has led to an accumulation of massive genomic data sets owned by governments and firms. The prospect of leveraging genetic data for enhancing consumers’ health, well-being, and satisfaction through improved personalization, segmentation, and targeting is promising. Nonetheless, this potential has not been studied empirically to date, and it is unknown whether and when firms should invest resources into incorporating genetic data into strategies and processes. The authors address this gap in a study of taste preferences, important drivers of food and beverage consumption. Using a large U.K.-based sample, they find that with sample sizes currently available, genetic data are expected to significantly improve prediction of taste preferences above traditionally used metrics such as demographics, behavioral variables, and even past consumption, especially for tastes that are uncommon in the local diet (e.g., spicy, sour), as they are less expressed behaviorally. The authors conclude that genetic data show immense promise for prediction-based applications when other data sources are limited or uninformative. These findings could have significant implications for public health initiatives, potentially aiding development of personalized nutrition plans and dietary interventions.

• Michal Gilad, Diana H. Fishbein, Gideon Nave, Nizan Geslevich Packin (2023), Science for policy to protect children in cyberspace, , 379 (6639), pp. 1294-1297. 10.1126/science.ade9447 Abstract

  Children are not miniature adults. A broad range of scientific studies establish developmental, biological, cognitive, and emotional differences between children and adults that are so substantial that many legal systems recognize their bearing on the rights, liabilities, and protections afforded to children by law. Yet, in some respects, lawmakers are behind the private sector in learning, understanding, and incorporating scientific findings regarding children. The failure to use science-based policy-making and regulations compromises the law’s ability to protect children and account for their distinctive attributes, needs, and vulnerabilities. These failures are particularly evident in the protection of children in digital spaces. Despite recognized benefits of some digital technologies for children, these same technologies, when lacking appropriate regulation and monitoring, risk causing substantial harm and can be exploited by entities that prioritize profit over consumers’ long-term well-being, especially when vulnerable populations, such as children, are concerned.

• Uri Barnea, Robert Meyer, Gideon Nave (2022), The Effects of Content Ephemerality on Information Processing, . Abstract

  Many marketing communications, from verbal conversations to messaging and content sharing via apps such as Snapchat, limit the number of times people can view content. How do such restrictions affect consumers’ information processing? Building on the proposition that people strategically allocate cognitive resources, the authors hypothesize that consumers of content that cannot be viewed repeatedly consider the risk of failing to process it sufficiently and, consequently, allocate more cognitive resources to its processing (e.g., by increasing viewing time). The authors test this hypothesis in ten preregistered online studies (total N = 17,620), an exploratory analysis of eye-tracking data, and a field study on Facebook’s advertising platform. Across the studies, they find that making content ephemeral elevates consumers’ perceived risk of missing information; consequently, it increases attention allocation, prolongs voluntary viewing time, and magnifies focus on relevant information. These effects have important downstream consequences, including improved content comprehension and recall, enhanced positive attitudes, and increased efficiency of sponsored content placement on social media. Taken together, the findings indicate that marketers can communicate information more effectively by restricting consumers from viewing it again.

• Jonah Berger, Grant Packard, Reihane Boghrati, Ming Hsu, Ashlee Humphreys, Andrea Luangrath, Sarah Moore, Gideon Nave, Christopher Olivola, Matt Rocklage (2022), Marketing Insights from Text, Marketing Letters, 33 (), pp. 365-377.
• Remi Daviet, Gideon Nave, Jerry (Yoram) Wind (2021), Genetic data: potential uses and misuses in Marketing, Journal of Marketing.
• Gokhan Aydogan, Remi Daviet, Richard Karlsson Linner, Todd A Hare, Joseph W. Kable, Henry R Kranzler, Christian C Ruff, Philipp D Koellinger, Gideon Nave (2021), Genetic underpinnings of risky behavior relate to altered neuroanatomy, Nature Human Behaviour. Abstract

  Previous research points to the heritability of risk-taking behaviour. However, evidence on how genetic dispositions are translated into risky behaviour is scarce. Here, we report a genetically informed neuroimaging study of real-world risky behaviour across the domains of drinking, smoking, driving and sexual behaviour in a European sample from the UK Biobank (N = 12,675). We find negative associations between risky behaviour and grey-matter volume in distinct brain regions, including amygdala, ventral striatum, hypothalamus and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC). These effects are replicated in an independent sample recruited from the same population (N = 13,004). Polygenic risk scores for risky behaviour, derived from a genome-wide association study in an independent sample (N = 297,025), are inversely associated with grey-matter volume in dlPFC, putamen and hypothalamus. This relation mediates roughly 2.2% of the association between genes and behaviour. Our results highlight distinct heritable neuroanatomical features as manifestations of the genetic propensity for risk taking.

• Amos Nadler, Colin Camerer, David Zava, Triana L Ortiz, Neil V Watson, Justin M Carre, Gideon Nave (2019), Does testosterone impair men’s cognitive empathy? Evidence from two large-scale randomized controlled trials, Proceedings of the Royal Society B. Abstract

  The capacity to infer others’ mental states (known as ‘mind reading’ and ‘cognitive empathy’) is essential for social interactions across species, and its impairment characterizes psychopathological conditions such as autism spectrum disorder and schizophrenia. Previous studies reported that testosterone administration impaired cognitive empathy in healthy humans, and that a putative biomarker of prenatal testosterone exposure (finger digit ratios) moderated the effect. However, empirical support for the relationship has relied on small sample studies with mixed evidence. We investigate the reliability and generalizability of the relationship in two large-scale double-blind placebo-controlled experiments in young men (n = 243 and n = 400), using two different testosterone administration protocols. We find no evidence that cognitive empathy is impaired by testosterone administration or associated with digit ratios. With an unprecedented combined sample size, these results counter current theories and previous high-profile reports, and demonstrate that previous investigations of this topic have been statistically underpowered.

• Uri Barnea, Robert Meyer, Gideon Nave, You Only Get One Shot: Restricting the Number of Times Consumers Can Access Content Increases Their Resource Allocation During Information Processing. Abstract

  Many social media platforms, including leading apps such as Snapchat, Facebook Messenger and Telegram, limit the number of times audience can view content. We investigate how this restriction affects processing of received information. Building on the notion that people strategically allocate cognitive resources (Schneider and Shiffrin 1977), we propose that receivers increase resource allocation when processing information that they cannot reexamine. In six pre-registered studies (N = 7,048) we demonstrate that restricting people to a single view (vs. multiple views) leads to increased attention, better content recall (both cued and free recall), improved comprehension, and more favorable attitudes towards the content, as well as longer voluntary viewing time, both of the content and of ads preceding it. These results suggest that marketers can affect meaningful metrics by communicating with consumers via channels that limit their repeated access to the message.

• All Research from Gideon Nave »

Past Courses

• MGMT6560 - Global Immersion Program

  The Global Immersion Program is a pass/fail, 0.5 credit course that is designed to provide students with an in-depth exposure to international business practices and first-hand insights into a foreign culture. In past years, programs were offered in India, the Middle East, China, South America, Southeast, Asia, and Africa. The program offers students the opportunity to learn about a foreign business environment by way of academic lectures and a multi-week study tour, allowing students to visit with corporate and government officials, network with alumni, and take cultural excursions.

• MKTG2120 - Data & Anlz For Mktg Dec

  This course introduces students to the fundamentals of data-driven marketing, including topics from marketing research and analytics. It examines the many different sources of data available to marketers, including data from customer transactions, surveys, pricing, advertising, and A/B testing, and how to use those data to guide decision-making. Through real-world applications from various industries, including hands-on analyses using modern data analysis tools, students will learn how to formulate marketing problems as testable hypotheses, systematically gather data, and apply statistical tools to yield actionable marketing insights.

• MKTG2340 - Creativity

  The ability to solve problems creatively and generate change is a recognized standard of success and plays an important role in gaining a competitive advantage in many areas of business management. This course is designed to teach students several creative problem solving methodologies that complement other managerial tools acquired in undergraduate and graduate studies. The course offers students the opportunity to learn how to solve problems, identify opportunities, and generate those elusive ideas that potentially generate enormous benefits to organizations. The objectives of this course are to enhance the students' (a) creativity, (b) ability to innovate and (c) ability to identify, recruit, develop, manage, retain, and collaborate with creative people. The course includes: 1. A review of the literature on creativity, creative people, innovation, and design as well as the leadership and management of creative people and innovation. 2. Hands on learning of approaches for generating creative ideas. Students will have the opportunity of implementing the techniques studied in class. 3. Applications of creativity to selected management domains - Approaches to the generation of creative options are not limited to the development of products and services or businesses, but can be applied to all areas of management, business, and life. The purpose of these sessions is to explore the applications of creative approaches to marketing, advertising, organizational design, negotiations, and other management challenges. 4. Integration - Both via individual assignments and a group project in which interdisciplinary teams of students generate a creative product/service/customer.

• MKTG2380 - Consumer Neuroscience

  How can studying the brain improve our understanding of consumer behavior? While neuroscience made tremendous strides throughout the past few decades, rarely were meaningful applications developed outside of medicine. Recently, however, breakthroughs in measurement and computation have accelerated brain science, and created an array of opportunities in business and technology. Currently, applications to marketing research and product development are experiencing explosive growth that has been met with both excitement and skepticism. This mini course provides an overview of the neuroscience behind and the potential for these developments. Topics will range from well-known and widely used applications, from eye-tracking measures in the lab and the field, to emerging methods and measures such as mobile technologies, face-reading, and neural predictors of market response. This course is self-contained and has no prerequisites. However, students with some background in business, economics, psychology, and/or neuroscience are likely to find some of the material covered in this course complementary to their existing knowledge. Much of the foundational work in consumer neuroscience and neuroeconomics involves laboratory experiments. Accordingly, we will read and discuss several experimental papers and the craft of designing an experiment will occasionally be discussed. However, we will not dedicate significant time to the methodology of experimental design and analysis. As will become clear as the course progresses, “consumer neuroscience" can be used to study almost any aspect of consumer behavior.

• MKTG3500 - Special Topics

  CONSUMER NEUROSCIENCE: How can studying the brain improve our understanding of consumer behavior? While neuroscience made tremendous strides throughout the 20th century, rarely were meaningful applications developed outside of medicine. Recently, however, breakthroughs in measurement and computation have accelerated brain science and created a dizzying array of opportunities in business and technology. Currently, applications to marketing research and product development are experiencing explosive growth that has been met with both excitement and skepticism. This mini-course provides an overview of the neuroscience behind and the potential for these developments. Topics will range from well-known and widely used applications, such as eye-tracking measures in the lab and field, to emerging methods and measures, such as mobile technologies, face-reading algorithms, and neural predictors of marketing response. The course will also discuss applications in branding and product development, including wearable physiological devices and apps, sensory branding for foods and fragrances, pharmaceuticals and medical devices, and neuroscience-based products designed to enhance cognitive functions. These applications stem from many subfields of cognitive neuroscience, including attention, emotion, memory, and decision making. This course is self-contained and has no prerequisites. However, students with some background in business, economics, psychology, and/or neuroscience are likely to find the material covered in this course complementary to their existing knowledge.

• MKTG7120 - Data & Anlz For Mktg Dec

  This course introduces students to the fundamentals of data-driven marketing, including topics from marketing research and analytics. It examines the many different sources of data available to marketers, including data from customer transactions, surveys, pricing, advertising, and A/B testing, and how to use those data to guide decision-making. Through real-world applications from various industries, including hands-on analyses using modern data analysis tools, students will learn how to formulate marketing problems as testable hypotheses, systematically gather data, and apply statistical tools to yield actionable marketing insights.

• MKTG7340 - Creativity

  The ability to solve problems creatively and generate change is a recognized standard of success and plays an important role in gaining a competitive advantage in many areas of business management. This course is designed to teach students several creative problem solving methodologies that complement other managerial tools acquired in undergraduate and graduate studies. The course offers students the opportunity to learn how to solve problems, identify opportunities, and generate those elusive ideas that potentially generate enormous benefits to organizations. The objectives of this course are to enhance the students' (a) creativity, (b) ability to innovate and (c) ability to identify, recruit, develop, manage, retain, and collaborate with creative people. The course includes: 1. A review of the literature on creativity, creative people, innovation, and design as well as the leadership and management of creative people and innovation. 2. Hands on learning of approaches for generating creative ideas. Students will have the opportunity of implementing the techniques studied in class. 3. Applications of creativity to selected management domains - Approaches to the generation of creative options are not limited to the development of products and services or businesses, but can be applied to all areas of management, business, and life. The purpose of these sessions is to explore the applications of creative approaches to marketing, advertising, organizational design, negotiations, and other management challenges. 4. Integration - Both via individual assignments and a group project in which interdisciplinary teams of students generate a creative product/service/customer

• MKTG7380 - Consumer Neuroscience

  How can studying the brain improve our understanding of consumer behavior? While neuroscience made tremendous strides throughout the past few decades, rarely were meaningful applications developed outside of medicine. Recently, however, breakthroughs in measurement and computation have accelerated brain science, and created an array of opportunities in business and technology. Currently, applications to marketing research and product development are experiencing explosive growth that has been met with both excitement and skepticism. This mini course provides an overview of the neuroscience behind and the potential for these developments. Topics will range from well-known and widely used applications, from eye-tracking measures in the lab and the field, to emerging methods and measures such as mobile technologies, face-reading, and neural predictors of market response. This course is self-contained and has no prerequisites. However, students with some background in business, economics, psychology, and/or neuroscience are likely to find some of the material covered in this course complementary to their existing knowledge. Much of the foundational work in consumer neuroscience and neuroeconomics involves laboratory experiments. Accordingly, we will read and discuss several experimental papers and the craft of designing an experiment will occasionally be discussed. However, we will not dedicate significant time to the methodology of experimental design and analysis. As will become clear as the course progresses, “consumer neuroscience" can be used to study almost any aspect of consumer behavior.

• MKTG8500 - Special Topics

  CONSUMER NEUROSCIENCE: How can studying the brain improve our understanding of consumer behavior? While neuroscience made tremendous strides throughout the 20th century, rarely were meaningful applications developed outside of medicine. Recently, however, breakthroughs in measurement and computation have accelerated brain science and created a dizzying array of opportunities in business and technology. Currently, applications to marketing research and product development are experiencing explosive growth that has been met with both excitement and skepticism. This mini-course provides an overview of the neuroscience behind and the potential for these developments. Topics will range from well-known and widely used applications, such as eye-tracking measures in the lab and field, to emerging methods and measures, such as mobile technologies, face-reading algorithms, and neural predictors of marketing response. The course will also discuss applications in branding and product development, including wearable physiological devices and apps, sensory branding for foods and fragrances, pharmaceuticals and medical devices, and neuroscience-based products designed to enhance cognitive functions. These applications stem from many subfields of cognitive neuroscience, including attention, emotion, memory, and decision making. This course is self-contained and has no prerequisites. However, students with some background in business, economics, psychology, and/or neuroscience are likely to find the material covered in this course complementary to their existing knowledge.

• MKTG8960 - Global Modular Course

  Open to MBA, Executive MBA and, in some instances, Undergraduate students, these modular courses are intended to provide unique educational experiences to students in a regional context that has particular resonance with the topic. Taught around the globe, the modular courses help us enrich the curriculum and research on our own campuses in Philadelphia and San Francisco.

• MKTG9430 - Research Methods Mktg B

  This course provides an introduction to the fundamental methodological issues that arise in experimental and quasi-experimental research. Illustrative examples are drawn from the behavioral sciences with a focus on the behavior of consumers and managers. Topics that are covered include: the development of research ideas; data collection and reliable measurement procedures; threats to validity; control procedures and experimental designs; and data analysis. Emphasis is placed on attaining a working knowledge of the use of regression methods for non-experimental and quasi-experimental data and analysis of variance methods for experimental data. The primary deliverable for this course is a meta-analysis of a research problem of the students choosing that investigates the effects of research methods on empirical results.

• MKTG9950 - Dissertation

  Dissertation

• Association For Consumer Research (ACR) Early Career Award, 2024
• Poets & Quants Selection, “World’s Best 40 B-School Professors under the Age of 40”, 2021
• National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER), 2020 Description

  The Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is a Foundation-wide activity that offers the National Science Foundation’s most prestigious awards in support of early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education and to lead advances in the mission of their department or organization. Activities pursued by early-career faculty should build a firm foundation for a lifetime of leadership in integrating education and research.

• APS Rising Star Award, 2020

• Study: ChatGPT's creativity gap, Axios - 06/18/2025
• How to better brainstorm with ChatGPT in five steps, Washington Post - 06/13/2025
• 23andMe’s DNA data is going up for sale. Here’s why companies might want it, CNN - 03/30/2025
• Cutting back on final drink of day ‘could improve brain health’, The Guardian - 03/04/2022
• Just one drink per day can shrink your brain, study says, CNN - 03/04/2022
• 2021 Best 40-Under-40 Professors: Gideon Nave, The Wharton School, Poets & Quants - 05/03/2021
• Scientists identify the region of the brain associated with risk-taking - and it could explain why some people are more likely to smoke and drink, Daily Mail - 01/28/2021
• Risk-taking behavior has a signature in the brain, big data shows, Penn Today - 01/28/2021
• Loneliness can help grow parts of brain tied to imagination, study finds, CNN - 12/16/2020
• This Is how loneliness actually changes your brain, Huffington Post - 12/15/2020
• Science has been in a “replication crisis” for a decade. Have we learned anything?, Vox - 10/14/2020
• Study challenges idea that autism is caused by an overly masculine brain, Science Magazine - 09/03/2019
• Autism theory overturned: no link between male hormones and empathy, Newsweek - 09/03/2019
• The origins of economic decision biases and how they may relate to the 2017 Bitcoin bubble, Cryptopotato - 01/21/2019
• Are bigger brains smarter? Barely, says study led by Penn scholar., The Philadelphia Inquirer - 01/03/2019
• Bigger brains are smarter, but not by much, Penn Today - 11/30/2018
• Experts are good at betting which scientific experiments can replicate, The Economist - 08/30/2018
• The science behind social science gets shaken up - again, WIRED - 08/27/2018
• Online bettors can sniff out weak psychology studies, The Atlantic - 08/27/2018
• Attempt to replicate major social scientific findings of past decade fails, The Guardian - 08/27/2018
• In psychology and other social sciences, many studies fail the reproducibility test, NPR - 08/27/2018
• More social science studies just failed to replicate. Here’s why this is good, Vox - 08/27/2018
• Five ways high testosterone impacts men's behavior, Newsweek - 07/08/2018
• Is testosterone the luxury hormone?, Forbes - 07/07/2018
• Personality predicts musical preference, The Economist - 04/05/2018
• One Facebook ‘like’ is all it takes to target adverts, academics find, The Guardian - 11/13/2017
• Testosterone makes men more impulsive, The Economist - 08/17/2017
• Testosterone on the Brain, Psychology Today - 06/29/2017
• Men can be so hormonal, New York Times - 06/24/2017
• Nothing worse at work than a man convinced he's right, Chicago Tribune - 05/08/2017
• This is a man's brain on testosterone, CBS Money watch - 05/04/2017
• Testosterone supplements may impair decision-making, Newsweek - 05/01/2017
• Everything you’ve heard about sniffing oxytocin might be wrong, New Scientist - 05/16/2016
• A far from dismal outcome, The Economist - 03/02/2016
• The weak science behind the wrongly named moral molecule, The Atlantic - 11/03/2015

Knowledge @ Wharton

• Damian Valdes, Spotify’s Global Consumer Product Marketing Lead, Knowledge @ Wharton - 07/03/2025
• The Hiring Trade-off Behind Startup Growth, Knowledge @ Wharton - 07/02/2025
• How the First Sale Rule Helps Offset Tariff Costs, Knowledge @ Wharton - 07/02/2025
• Using Data to Model NBA Performance With Seth Partnow, Knowledge @ Wharton - 07/02/2025
• Why Women Are Leaving Male-dominated STEM, Knowledge @ Wharton - 07/01/2025
• Does AI Limit Our Creativity?, Knowledge @ Wharton - 07/01/2025
• Visual Marketing | Barbara Kahn and Zab Johnson, Knowledge @ Wharton - 07/01/2025
• Markets Brace for Tariffs and Look to AI for Relief, Knowledge @ Wharton - 06/27/2025
• The New Science of Pitching and Hitting With Travis Sawchik, Knowledge @ Wharton - 06/25/2025
• How AI Is Reshaping Customer Experience and Expectations, Knowledge @ Wharton - 06/25/2025