Uma R. Karmarkar

Uma R. Karmarkar is an Assistant Professor in the Marketing Unit at the Harvard Business School. She holds dual PhDs in Neuroscience (University of California, Los Angeles) and in Consumer Behavior (Stanford Graduate School of Business). Prior to entering the field of consumer behavior, she held an NIH-supported postdoctoral fellowship in Neuroscience at the University of California, Berkeley.

Dr. Karmarkar’s research on this falls into two major streams. The first investigates how individuals use the limited information available in uncertain contexts to make choices. The second examines how the timing and context-dependent framing of information influences perceptions of value and decisions. In pursuing this work, she combines methods from consumer psychology and behavioral economics together with neuroimaging, allowing her to study both conscious and unconscious processes.