Gita Johar has served as Senior Vice Dean and is currently the Meyer Feldberg Professor of Business at

Columbia Business School Columbia Business School (CBS) is the business school of Columbia University, a Private university, private research university in New York City. Established in 1916, Columbia Business School is one of six Ivy League business schools and is one ...

, Columbia University. She is known for her research in the field of

Consumer behavior Consumer behavior is the study of individuals, groups, or organizations and all the activities associated with the purchase, use and disposal of goods and services. Consumer behaviour consists of how the consumer's emotions, attitudes, and pr ...

, particularly in the area of consumer inference making in advertising and communication. In 2006, she was appointed the Meyer Feldberg Professor of Business at Columbia Business School. Johar has been the Senior Vice Dean, the Vice Dean for Research and the Vice Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Columbia Business School, and received the Service to the Doctoral Program Award at Columbia Business School in 2023.

Academic career

Johar is a graduate of

IIM Calcutta Indian Institute of Management Calcutta (IIM Calcutta or IIM-C) is a public business school located in Joka, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. It was the first Indian Institute of Management to be established, and has been recognized as an Institu ...

and she received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the institute in 2019. In her doctoral thesis at the

Stern School of Business The New York University Leonard N. Stern School of Business (commonly referred to as NYU Stern, The Stern School of Business, or simply Stern) is the business school of New York University, a private research university based in New York City. I ...

, New York University, Johar focused on the role of consumer involvement in drawing false inferences from advertisements ( deceptive advertising). She joined Columbia University in 1992, received tenure in 2000, became a full professor in 2002 and was appointed the Meyer Feldberg Professor of Marketing (a named chair) in 2006. Johar served as the President of the

Society for Consumer Psychology The ''Journal of Consumer Psychology'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal covering psychology as it relates to consumer behavior. It was established in 1992 and is published by John Wiley & Sons on behalf of the Society for Consumer Psyc ...

from 2022-2023 and organized the SCP Climate Change Challenge boutique conference in 2023. She has served as co-editor of the Journal of Consumer Research and as editor of a Journal of Marketing special issue on Better Marketing for a Better World (BMBW), and co-founded the BMBW initiative.

Research

Much of Johar's research deals with the way people interpret messages and on how attributes of the source and characteristics of the message can affect the way a recipient interprets the message. In one series of studies, she shows that people with baby-faces (rounder facial characteristics) are considered to be more honest while people with mature faces are considered to be more competent. This research has implications in a variety of situations, from companies in crisis to the messages of presidential candidates. She also applies a psychological lens to understand when and why misinformation impacts consumer beliefs and the effectiveness of proposed remedies. This research suggests that misinformation is hard to combat. For example, she shows that people are less likely to fact-check information when they are on social media and feel they are in the presence of others.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Johar, Gita Columbia Business School faculty Living people Indian Institute of Management Calcutta alumni New York University Stern School of Business alumni Year of birth missing (living people)