Forbes contributors publish independent expert analyses and insights. I am a physician and behavioral scientist at Duke University. I teach a course on consumer irrationality and market failure at the ...

Consumer behavior—or how people buy and use goods and services—is a rich field of psychological research, particularly for companies trying to sell products to as many potential customers as possible.

The term consumer behavior gets tossed around a lot. Let’s take a moment to properly answer the question: What is consumer behavior? At its core, consumer behavior is an act of studying a specific ...

Organizations of all sizes acknowledge the importance of consumer research. Multinational companies use advanced analytics and conduct large-scale studies to better understand their target market.

In business, a key part of effective marketing is knowing the customers needs, wants and desires. Much of this can be predicted by the behaviors in the market and knowing the ideal customer for your ...

Who, exactly, is a consumer? Before we understand the psychological factors driving consumers' buying behavior, it is important that we understand who consumers are. Consumers can be a single consumer ...