My research explores consumer behavior in the online world using insights and methods from psychology, marketing, and computational social science. I have two main lines of research. The first seeks to better understand how consumers grapple with information online. My second line of research aims to empower consumers to navigate online environments and guard themselves against manipulation. I draw on a range of empirical methods, including surveys, online experiments, field studies, and combinations thereof.
Research on Understanding Consumer Behavior Online
- Geers, M., Fischer, H., Lewandowsky, S., & Herzog, S.M. (in press) The political (a)symmetry of metacognitive insight into detecting misinformation. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.
- Geers, M., Swire-Thompson, B., Lorenz-Spreen, P., Herzog, S.M., Kozyreva, A., & Hertwig, R. (2024). The Online Misinformation Engagement Framework. Current Opinion in Psychology, 55, 101739.
- Roozenbeek, J., Maertens, R., Herzog, S.M., Geers, M., Kurvers, R.H.J.M., Sultan, M., & van der Linden, S. (2022). Susceptibility to misinformation is consistent across question framings and response modes and better explained by myside bias and partisanship than analytical thinking. Judgment and Decision Making, 17(3), 547–573.
- Sultan, M., Tump, A.N., Geers, M., Lorenz-Spreen, P., Herzog, S.M., & Kurvers, R.H.J.M. (2022). Time pressure reduces misinformation discrimination ability but does not alter response bias. Scientific Reports, 12(1), 1-12.
Research on Boosting Consumers’ Competences Online
- Kozyreva, A., Lorenz-Spreen, P., Herzog, S.M., Ecker, U.K.H., Lewandowsky, S., Hertwig, R., Ayesha, A., Bak-Coleman, J., Barzilai, S., Basol M., Berinsky, A.J., Betsch, C., Cook, J., Fazio, L.K., Geers, M., Guess, A.M., Huang, H., Larreguy, H., Maertens, R., Panizza, F., Pennycook, G., Rand, D., Rathje, S., Reifler, J., Schmid, P., Smith, M., Swire-Thomson, B., Szewach, P., van der Linden, S., & Wineburg, S. (in press). Toolbox of interventions against online misinformation. Nature Human Behaviour.
- Lorenz-Spreen, P., Geers, M., Pachur, T., Hertwig, R., Lewandowsky, S., & Herzog, S.M. (2021). Boosting people’s ability to detect microtargeted advertising. Scientific Reports, 11(1), 1-9.