The Eclectic Professor

Reflections on the psychology-marketing-economics nexus

by John Gaski, Ph.D.

An Unsung Underlying Cause of the Financial Mess

The real reasons for the U.S. financial crisis of '08-09 may surprise you. Read More

Anatomy of a Smear Campaign, Installment No. 2

After a yellow-journalism smear campaign executed by the Chicago Tribune and National Catholic Reporter against a renowned, venerable institution, the Washington Post joins in--with one reporter common to two of the outlets. Curious. Read More

Paradise Lost: A History of the Next 200 Years

Some future scholars will conclude that the American tragedy merely reflected a routine case of the evolution, decline, and fall of nations, i.e., how extreme affluence begets terminal weakness in the ending throes of a national life-cycle. Yet it truly appears that it need not have happened to America. The tragic flaw would seem to have been the decline of education. Read More

Anatomy of a Media Smear Campaign Against an Honorable University

On the Seeberg Tragedy, NCR, the Chicago Tribune, and Notre Dame: A Rebuttal Read More

The Miracle of Stock Market Efficiency

OK, you would like to know the most profitable stock market investment strategy. Naturally, a question of such magnitude has already been investigated. Numerous researchers have done scientific studies on that very issue over the last four decades. The results have been consistent, in fact overwhelming. The answer is known as well as anything can be known. Read More

American Public Finally Begins to Appreciate Marketing

After years of negative reactions to the way marketing is practiced, overall consumer sentiment toward marketing turned positive for the first time in 2011. Read More

A Needed Tutorial on Business and Capitalism

Recently the Indiana Policy Review reported some uninformed anti-business comments by university professor Gary Gutting (N.Y. Times, Oct. 12):

Corporations are a particular threat to truth. . .The corporate threat is most apparent in advertising, which explicitly aims at convincing us to prefer a product regardless of its actual merit. Read More

The Real Story on Gasoline Prices

Here is a test question for you: The next time you find yourself irritated by the price of gasoline, you need to remind yourself of how much—or little—of that $3-plus per gallon charge is the oil company's profit. What exactly is that amount of profit, anyway?

The Indiana Time Wars

A forthcoming issue of PT reports on a study Jeff Sagarin and I did on the cognitive effects of living in an area in which daylight-saving time is observed. (Journal of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Economics, No. 1, 2011; Jeff is the famous sports statistician who does those weekly rankings in USA Today.) Our findings surely qualify as a blockbuster. Read More

The Psychology of Thrift: Why Not Frugal Cool?

Why can't the American people learn how to save money? Why is our national saving rate so abysmally low? Because of the wrong public psychology, that's why. Read More

John Gaski, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Marketing at the University of Notre Dame whose research interests are power in distribution channels and the societal impact of marketing activity. more...