Faculty directory

Aparna Labroo

Marketing

Professor of Marketing

Portrait of Aparna Labroo, Faculty at the Kellogg School of Management

Dr. Labroo is a Consumer Psychologist and Professor of Marketing. Her expertise is in judgment and decision-making, including the role emotions play in consumer choices, health-regulation, self-control, pro-social action, and creativity. Her research designs psychological interventions to nudge consumers into taking actions beneficial to them and to society in the long run and has featured in New York Times, Time, MSN, Forbes, Financial Times, Business Week, Scientific American, and other leading media outlets and she has presented this research a several leading business schools and psychology departments worldwide.

She is recipient of the Society for Consumer Psychology Early Career Award (2011), a Marketing Science Insoitiute Young Scholar (2007), is currently co-Editor at the Journal of Consumer Psychology and previously Editor-in-Chief of Marketing Letters (2020-2023). She also is on the Policy Advisoy Boards of the Journal of Consumer Psychology Data Policy Board (2021), Psychology & Marketing, and Consumer Psychology Review. She previously served as Associate Editor at Perspectives on Psychological Science (PPS), for Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Consumer Psychology, and she serves on several Editorial Review Boards. 

Dr. Labroo teaches Marketing Strategy courses in Kellogg’s EMBA, Exec Ed. And MBA programs and has worked through her career with more than 4000 executives. She serves on Advisory Boards of start-ups and non-profits and has consulted in the pharmaceutical and non-profit space. An exceptional educator, she was voted by her EMBA class as winner of the J. Keith Murnighan Outstanding Professor Award in a Core (2020) and the Chair’s Core Course Teaching Award (2021).

Before joining Kellogg, Dr. Labroo served as the Patricia C. Ellison Professor of Marketing at University of Toronto's Rotman School of Management, and as Assistant and then Associate Professor of Marketing at Chicago Booth, where she taught MBA and Executive Courses on Marketing Strategy and on Strategic Brand Communications. She previously worked in advertising, on Unilever and SmithKline Beecham Brands. She has an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management (Ahmedabad) and her PhD is from Cornell.

About Aparna
Research interests
  • I am an expert on consumer judgment and decision making and branding and the role emotions play in these contexts. I research factors that influence brand preferences and consumer choices
  • especially choices that engage self-control and involve trade-offs between immediate pleasure and long-term benefits
  • such as healthy choices
  • financial decisions
  • and pro-social actions including charitable giving. My focus is on how feelings can be leveraged to play a functional role in helping people accomplish their goals.
  • PhD, 2004, Marketing, Cornell University
    MBA, Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad
    BA, Economics, St. Stephen's College, India, Honors
  • Professor of Marketing, Northwestern University, 2013-present
    Patricia C. Ellison Professor of Marketing, University of Toronto, 2011-2013
    Visiting Scholar, Northwestern University, 2011-2012
    Visiting Professor of Marketing, University of Chicago, Fall 2011, 2011
    Associate Professor of Marketing, University of Chicago, 2007-2011
    Assistant Professor of Marketing, University of Chicago, 2003-2007
  • The J. Keith Murnighan Outstanding Professor Award (EMBA), Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management
    Chair Core Course Teaching Award (MBA), Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
    OpEd Project Public Voices Fellow, Northwestern University
    Conference Co-chair, Association for Consumer Research Annual Conference
  • Co-Editor, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2024-2027
    Associate Editor, Perspectives on Psychological Science, 2022
    Co-Editor, Marketing Letters, 2021-2023
    Co-Editor, Journal of Association for Consumer Research (Special Issue), 2018-2020
    Co-Editor, Special Issue of the Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2018-2021
    Associate Editor, Journal of Consumer Research, 2014-2018
    Associate Editor, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2012-2015
    Editorial Board, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 2015-2024
    Editorial Board, Journal of Marketing Research, 2006-2018

Developing Impactful Consumer Behavior Research (MKTG-531-3)

Taking a problem-solving approach, we examine how psychological insights inform and solve real-world consumption problems, and how real-world problems provide new psychological insights. Taking an empirical deep-dive, we also discuss published data, what we can/cannot infer, how to make objective conclusions, and to enhance their substantive impact (e.g., employing observational data, field studies, choice data, and/or programmatic experimental designs).

Theory Building in Consumer Behavior Research (MKTG-531-1)

The purpose of this course is to acquaint you with the principles of theory building in social science research, to help you distinguish between theory-building research and research with other aims, and to provide you with an opportunity to develop your ability to conceptualize and develop research that builds theory.

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