MG4J7      Half Unit
Consumer Neuroscience

This information is for the 2025/26 session.

Course Convenor

Availability

Our understanding of how consumers make evaluations and decisions has been greatly advanced by the many new theoretical and technological developments in the study of consumer behaviour in the last decade. This course covers the insights gained from this new field often referred to as Consumer Neuroscience or Neuroeconomics, which sits at the intersections of consumer behaviour, psychology, behavioural economics, and neuroscience. We will cover the key findings of this highly productive new field and will introduce the neuroscience and cutting-edge techniques behind these developments including eye tracking, skin conductance, and mouse tracking, and neuroscience methods like fMRI and EEG.

Topics covered include how knowledge and measurement of the visual system inform ad design, how the brain represents the preferences and values that guide decisions and how this leads to biases, how the limbic system helps to encode emotions and how its measurement can predict marketing outcomes, and functional localization of brand preferences and marketing actions and their link to learning and memory systems. The influence of neural changes across the consumer lifespan, from adolescence through to older age, on marketing and management practices will be covered. We will discuss the use of insights gained from this research to nudge human behaviour, and future directions and ethical ramifications will be examined. Finally, the brain’s ability to predict not only the individual’s future choice but also aggregate market-level behaviours will be discussed.

Students will receive practical hands-on experience with one of these advanced techniques. By the end of the course, students will also be able to sort junk science from good science, making them informed consumers of research in this cutting-edge field. This is a good option for students who enjoyed Consumer Behaviour: Behavioural Fundamentals I (MG404) and would like to extend their knowledge on that topic.

30 hours of seminars in the Winter Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Winter Term.

In its Ethics Code, LSE upholds a commitment to intellectual freedom. This means we will protect the freedom of expression of our students and staff and the right to engage in healthy debate in the classroom.

Prior to the summative quizzes, participants will be given a formative quiz. Formative work will also be submitted in relation to the students’ group projects (Project Outlines, Elevator pitches).

1. Ding, Y. et al. The past, present, and future of measurement and methods in marketing analysis (2020). Marketing Letters. 31, 175–186
2. Galvan, A. Adolescent development of the reward system. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, (2010).
3. Glimcher, P. Introduction to Neuroscience. Chapter 5, Neuroeconomics: Decision Making and the Brain, 2nd edition. Glimcher and Fehr, Eds. Academic Press.
4. Johnson, E. et al. Beyond Nudges: Tools of a Choice Architecture. Marketing Letters (2012) 23: 487–504.
5. Kable, J. The Cognitive Neuroscience Toolkit for the Neuroeconomist: A Functional Overview. (2011) Journal of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Economics.
6. Plassmann, H. and Weber, E. Individual Differences in Marketing Placebo Effects: Evidence from Brain Imaging and Behavioral Experiments. Journal of Marketing Research, 52(4):493-510, 2015.
7. Ramsøy, T. Learning & Memory. Chapter 7 of Introduction to Neuromarketing & Consumer Neuroscience. Neurons Inc.
8. Samanez-Larkin, G. & Knutson, B. Decision Making in the Ageing Brain: Changes in Affective and Motivational Circuits. Nature Reviews Neuroscience. 2015.
9. Schulte-Mecklenbeck, M., Johnson, J. G., Böckenholt, U., Goldstein, D. G., Russo, J. E., Sullivan, N. J., & Willemsen, M. C. (2017). Process-tracing methods in decision making: On growing up in the 70s. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 26, 442–450.
10. Shimojo, S. et al. (2003), Gaze bias both reflects and influences preferences. Nature Neuroscience.

Course participation (15%)

Quiz (30%)

Project (55%)

This component of assessment includes an element of group work.

For detailed assessment information, including all deadlines and timings, please see the relevant course Moodle page. Assessment timings will be available at the start of each term.