ANNUAL MEETING OF THE BRUNSWIK SOCIETY, LONG BEACH, CA, NOV 15-16, 2007
The 23rd Annual International Meeting of the Brunswik Society will be held on Thursday and Friday, November 15-16, 2007 in Long Beach, California, at the Hyatt Regency Hotel. The program begins at 12:00 noon on Thursday afternoon, and ends at 6:00 Friday afternoon.
We invite papers and/or panel discussion proposals on any theoretical or empirical/applied topic directly related to Egon Brunswik’s theoretical lens model framework and method of representative design, including approaches based on Brunswikian principles. Please send a brief abstract (75-100 words), and indicate whether the paper/discussion is theoretical or empirical, to Jim Holzworth by Friday, July 13th. Kindly respect this submission due date. Due to an increase in number of submissions, we cannot guarantee a presenting slot to those who do not meet the submission deadline. Our time is limited, so we apologize in advance if some papers cannot be scheduled this year. Meeting organizers are Jim Holzworth (jim.holzworth at uconn.edu) and Mandeep Dhami (mkd25 at cam.ac.uk). The meeting is held concurrently with the Psychonomic Society Annual Meeting and just before the Judgment and Decision Society meeting. More details about the 2007 meeting, including registration instructions, will be posted on the Brunswik Society website, at http://brunswik.org.
ACR PRE-CONFERENCE: CONSUMERS ONLINE. DEADLINE JUNE 1, 2007.
The Internet in general, and Amazon.com in particular, is still Chapter One. You’re asking me about my story, and it’s still the very beginning. –Jeff Bezos
Association for Consumer Research Pre-Conference on Consumers Online: Ten Years Later. Thursday, October 25, 2007. The Peabody Memphis. Memphis, TN
It has been about 10 years since the first research about consumer behavior in online environments was originally published. What have we learned in that time? What frameworks, theories and facts have emerged? What new questions need to be explored?
The Center for Excellence in E-Business at Columbia Business School and the Sloan
Center for Internet Retailing at the University of California, Riverside are jointly sponsoring a pre-conference, in conjunction with the 2007 Association for Consumer Research Annual North American Conference, to address these questions. The goals of this pre-conference are to (1) summarize existing knowledge (2) present state-of-the-art results, methods and concepts and (3) hopefully set exciting directions for future research. Examples of topics that presentations might address include, but are certainly not limited to:
• How does the web influence consumer behavior offline? What is the relationship between information search on and off-line and purchasing?
• What meaning do consumers ascribe to the Internet in their daily lives?
• What consumer research can be done uniquely on the web? Are there new methods that are made possible by the web?
• What is the nature of community on the web? Do virtual communities and social networking present a fundamentally novel form of word-of-mouth and social networking?
• How has data on the web changed the idea of consumer search? Have we seen, as predicted, a decrease in price dispersion? Have markets become more efficient? Have more niche markets emerged?
• What elements of online customer experience are most important in influencing consumer decision making and online purchase behavior?
• What is the latest thinking on predicting and modeling consumer search and purchasing?
Program Committee:
Randy Bucklin (UCLA), John Deighton (Harvard), Kristin Diehl (USC), Andrew Gershoff (Michigan), Dan Goldstein (LBS), Gerald Haubl (Alberta), John Lynch (Duke), Wendy Moe (Maryland), Jaideep Sengupta (HKUST), Venky Shankar (Texas A&M)
Submission Details: Deadline is June 1, 2007 to submit an abstract.
Consumer behavior researchers should submit a 500- word abstract for consideration by the program committee, plus a 100-word abstract which will be listed on the program in the event of acceptance, at www.cebiz.org/acr. Both abstracts should be submitted in the same file. All submissions must be submitted electronically through www.cebiz.org/acr and must be received by June 1, 2007 to be considered. Participants will be notified by June 30.
Registration Details: Deadline is October 1, 2007 to register for the conference. The registration fee is $150.00 and includes breakfast, lunch, all breaks and attendance at the pre-conference. Attendees must register through http://webpay.ucr.edu/. Conference attendance will be limited to 100 attendees, so please be sure to register well in advance of the October 1, 2007 deadline!
Hotel Details: The Peabody Memphis. A limited number of hotel rooms have been set aside at the ACR rate of $174.00 plus tax for the pre-conference. Please contact the hotel directly to book your room. The Peabody Memphis www.peabodymemphis.com 149 Union Avenue, Memphis, TN 901-529-4000; 1-800-732-2639. Conference Code: 286824.
Conference Co-Organizers:
• Donna Hoffman, Chancellor’s Chair & Co-Director, Sloan Center for Internet Retailing, UC Riverside, donna.hoffman at ucr.edu
• Eric J. Johnson, Norman Eig Professor of Business & Director CEBiz, Columbia University, ejj3 at columbia.edu
IMPACTFUL, IMPROBABLE EVENTS CAPTURE THE IMAGINATION
Decision Science News is noticing how attention is turning towards the unlikely events that can change the world.
Institutions are undergoing epidemic preparations. Harvard Business Review has an feature on pandemics with two sections written by noted decision science researcher Baruch Fischhoff. A podcast is available here.
A book on high-impact black swans debuted at number five on the NY Times best seller list.
Popular television shows 24 depict again and again how a few individuals, without special titles or power, can topple governments and kill millions.
Decision researchers are investigating how people infer the likelihood of low-probability events from experience and description.
Is it a pandemic pandemic?
SOCIETY FOR CONSUMER PSYCHOLOGY ANNUAL CONFERENCE FEB 21-23, 2008
The Society for Consumer Psychology (SCP) will be holding its Annual Winter Conference on February 21-23 at the Omni Royal Orleans Hotel, New Orleans, LA. The SCP conference provides a relatively intimate forum, providing opportunities for a high level of interaction among participants interested in the integration of psychology and consumer research. This year’s conference will be held in the heart of the historic French Quarter in New Orleans, and the city is back and livelier than ever so the conference promises to be a memorable one.
We are seeking proposals for original competitive papers, special topic sessions, and working papers for presentation at the conference. In order to encourage a diverse set of ideas and approaches to consumer psychology, the topic areas are not limited by a particular theme or application. We also welcome diverse methodologies, including experimental research, survey research, conceptual and/or theoretical developments, ethnography, or other methods relevant to the study of consumer psychology.
SUBMISSION INFORMATION:
All submissions, reviewing, and notification regarding SCP 2008 will be conducted electronically through the conference website. (Note: the URL for the conference is currently under construction but will be posted soon on the SCP home website: http://fisher.osu.edu/marketing/scp/). The conference website will provide an interface for reviewers and submitters, eliminating the need for e-mail submissions, as well as additional information about the conference.
SUBMISSION DEADLINE:
All submissions for competitive papers, special topic sessions and working papers are due by August 3, 2007. Notification of acceptances will be sent in early October. The conference website will be available for submissions between Friday, June 15, 2007, and midnight PST of the new deadline, Thursday August 9, 2007.
HOTEL INFORMATION:
Omni Royal Orleans Hotel, 621 Saint Louis St., New Orleans, LA 70140; Phone: (504) 529-5333; Fax (504) 529-7089. Nestled in the heart of the French Quarter, this AAA Four-Diamond luxury hotel is just moments from the excitement of Bourbon Street and Jackson Square and features an artful mélange of 19th century artifacts and the essence of Creole charm. http://www.omnihotels.com/FindAHotel/NewOrleansRoyalOrleans.aspx
CONFERENCE CO-CHAIRS
Maria Cronley
Dhananjay (DJ) Nayakankuppam
If you have questions, please email the conference co-chairs at: SCP2008@gmail.com
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EXTREME AND HIGH IMPACT UNCERTAINTY
Nassim Taleb’s new book The Black Swan is out now. Early reviews are in:
The first chapter free online at the New York Times.
ANNUAL MEETING OF THE SOCIETY FOR JUDGMENT AND DECISION MAKING
The Society for Judgment and Decision Making (SJDM) invites abstracts for symposia, oral presentations, and posters on any interesting topic related to judgment and decision making. Completed manuscripts are not required.
LOCATION, DATES, AND PROGRAM
SJDM’s annual conference will be held at the Westin Hotel & Resort in Long Beach, CA during November 17-19, 2007. Early registration and welcome reception will take place the evening of Friday, November 16. Following the format established in the last few years, the schedule includes a full day on Saturday to make room for more presentations and for two keynote speakers.
SUBMISSIONS
The deadline for submissions is July 1, 2007. Submissions for symposia, oral presentations, and posters should be made through the SJDM website at http://sql.sjdm.org. Technical questions can be addressed to the webmaster, Alan Schwartz, at www at sjdm.org. All other questions can be addressed to George Wu, at wu at chicagogsb.edu.
ELIGIBILITY
At least one author of each presentation must be a member of SJDM. Joining at the time of submission will satisfy this requirement. A membership form may be downloaded from the SJDM website at http://www.sjdm.org. An individual may give only one talk (podium presentation) and present only one poster, but may be a co-author on multiple talks and/or posters.
AWARDS
· The Best Student Poster Award is given for the best poster presentation whose first author is a student member of SJDM.
· The Hillel Einhorn New Investigator Award is intended to encourage outstanding work by new researchers. Applications are due July 1, 2007. Further details are available at http://www.sjdm.org.
· The Jane Beattie Memorial Fund subsidizes travel to North America for a foreign scholar in pursuits related to judgment and decision research, including attendance at the annual SJDM meeting. Information and an application form can be found at http://gsbwww.uchicago.edu/fac/joshua.klayman/more/BeattieInfo06.htm. Applications are due by July 16, 2007.
PROGRAM COMMITTEE
George Wu (Chair), Melissa Finucane, Craig Mackenzie, Ellen Peters, Rebecca Ratner, Yuval Rottenstreich, Alan Schwartz, Gal Zauberman, Jon Baron (SJDM president)
Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/forgetmeknottphotography/360952335/
WHEN DOES DISEASE SCREENING HELP?
The judgment and decision making crowd is buzzing about the idea that screening for certain diseases (such as breast or lung cancer) can be ineffective or even harmful. Some of the readings dans le vent:
Peter B. Bach; James R. Jett; Ugo Pastorino; Melvyn S. Tockman; Stephen J. Swensen; Colin B. Begg. (2007) Computed Tomography Screening and Lung Cancer Outcomes. JAMA, 297 , 953 – 961.
Kolata, Gina (2007). Study Questions Exam to Detect Breast Cancer. New York Times.
http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=454157043&size=m
COMMON MISUNDERSTANDINGS OF A COMMON MEASURE
Dan Goldstein and Nassim Taleb have written a paper called “We don’t quite know what we are talking about when we talk about volatility” which looks at what finance professionals and students do when asked for estimates of standard deviation.In particular, they posed this question:
A stock (or a fund) has an average return of 0%. It moves on average 1% a day in absolute value; the average up move is 1% and the average down move is 1%. It does not mean that all up moves are 1%–some are .6%, others 1.45%, etc. Assume that we live in the Gaussian world in which the returns (or daily percentage moves) can be safely modeled using a Normal Distribution. Assume that a year has 256 business days. The following questions concern the standard deviation of returns (i.e., of the percentage moves), the “sigma” that is used for volatility in financial applications. What is the daily sigma? What is the yearly sigma?
Find out how many of 87 trained people got it correct.
REFERENCE:
Goldstein, D. G. & Taleb, N. N. (in press). We don’t quite know what we are talking about when we talk about volatility. Journal of Portfolio Management.
UPDATE (May 28, 2007): The aforementioned paper has hit #1 on the SSRN Recent Hits list.
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PAID INTERNSHIP AT FIDELITY INVESTMENTS
DSN is noticing a rise in the number of private-sector behavioral economics jobs over the past year. For those eager to get in at the ground floor, Fidelity is offering a paid internship in its Center for Applied Behavioral Economics in Boston.
The purpose of the Center is to apply behavioral economics to help investors do a good job and succeed, at a time when the burden of seeking financial security falls heavily on individuals.
As a central resource to all Fidelity business units, the Center offers the designers of financial products and customer experience a deeper quantitative and qualitative understanding of what motivates and hinders investors, through courses, publications, and consulting. It represents an excellent opportunity to do applied work involving important, real-world problems.
Candidates pursuing doctoral or post-doctoral studies in decision theory, cognitive psychology, and/or economics are encouraged to apply. The focus is on the research and writing of white papers addressing key topics that can help lead to better outcomes for Fidelity customers and investors in general. The focus of the internship will be adjusted to fit the strengths and interests of the successful candidate.
Candidates should have a solid academic and research background combined with the ability to write clearly and persuasively for a lay audience. Also important: intellectual curiosity and a desire to have a positive impact on the real world.
The Center is located in downtown Boston, and is part of the Fidelity Center for Applied Technology. The environment is lively and stimulating, with the express intent of fostering daily interaction among scientists in different disciplines together with technologists, designers, and business people. Fidelity is a privately held financial services company. This is a paid position.
Send applications, consisting of a cover letter summarizing your research interests, curriculum vitae or resume, examples of your research, and (optionally) other writing samples to Dr. Eric Gold, Fidelity Center for Applied Behavioral Economics, 82 Devonshire Street V3A, Boston, Massachusetts 02109, or e-mail eric.gold [at] fmr [dot] com.
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SUMMER INSTITUTE IN SURVEY RESEARCH TECHNIQUES
Now in its 60th year, the Summer Institute in Survey Research Techniques provides rigorous and high quality graduate training in all phases of survey research. The program teaches state-of-the-art practice and theory in the design, implementation, and analysis of surveys. Classes start June 4 and meet through July 27. Courses are offered in one to eight week time frames. The Summer Institute in Survey Research techniques draws on a renowned group of instructors from within SRC and the University community, and on other experts from outside the University of Michigan. For more details about course descriptions, and other relevant information visit the website, http://www.isr.umich.edu/src/si/
