Dr Heather Kappes

This course is compulsory on the MSc in Marketing. This course is not available as an outside option to students on other programmes.

Mutually exclusive courses:

This course cannot be taken with MG4M4 at any time on the same degree programme.

For many companies, non-profit organisations, and political figures, success relies on understanding the “consumers.” What is it that they really want, and why? What information will they attend to, and what will they ignore? How do they make decisions, why do they sometimes make bad ones, and how can we help them make better ones? It can be tempting to answer these questions intuitively, based on your own experiences as a consumer. However, intuitions about human psychology are often wrong. This course builds a rigorous, evidence-based understanding of consumer psychology, drawing on contemporary research and examining how behavioural insights are applied in practice—from traditional marketing contexts to digital platforms, AI-driven personalisation, and algorithmic decision-making systems.

• Chronic and temporary sources of customer needs, desires, and motivations
• How customers search for information, acquire, and process information
• How customers allocate attention and how to attract it
• Customer decision-making processes, and the heuristics and biases that play a role
• The formation of attitudes and intentions, and processes for persuasively changing them
• Social influences on intentions and behaviour, including unconscious determinants
• How digital environments and AI-powered systems interact with human decision-making processes
• Why intentions are or are not translated into behaviour, and strategies to narrow the intention-behaviour gap in both offline and digital contexts.

Course content is refreshed continually to incorporate current research, emerging technologies, and evolving business practices.

30 hours of seminars in the Autumn Term.

This course has a reading week in Week 6 of Autumn 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.

Regular multiple-choice quizzes to assess understanding and application of course concepts. 

• Consumer Behavior, 6th edition. Hoyer, MacInnis, & Pieters. South-Western Cengage Learning, 2010;
• Consumer Behavior: Science and Practice. Kardes, Cronley & Cline. South-Western Cengage Learning.
• Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. Cialdini, Robert. Collins Business, 2006.

Further references, especially for journal articles and HBS case studies, will be provided at the commencement of the course.

Essay (70%).

Discussion post (30%).

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.