Category: Recent Seminars

Date: 07 January 2026, Wednesday Time:10.30 – 11.30 Place: MA-330 “Inclusive Exclusion: When Market Expansion Reinforces Exclusion” by Utku Ay University of Arizona Abstract  Firms often seek growth through inclusion, extending their brands to new consumer groups. Yet these initiatives frequently reproduce exclusionary structures rather than dismantle them. This study introduces inclusive exclusion, an empirically derived and theoretically grounded construct that explains how inclusionary marketing strategies can perform inclusion while sustaining exclusionary order. Drawing on an ethnographic investigation of football in Turkey, we identify three mechanisms of market participation that structure consumer inclusion and exclusion: consumer role assignment, consumption pathways, and infrastructural support. Inclusion emerges under conditions of role alignment, coherent pathways, and strong infrastructural support, which foster legitimate market participation. Conversely, when firms invite new consumers, but these mechanisms…

Date: 24 December 2025, Wednesday Time: 10.30 – 11.30 Place: MA-330 “Victimhood as a Currency: Observing Abusive Consumption Mobilizes Support for Misused Objects and Brands" by Evrim de Groot Glion Institute Abstract  Consumers typically buy bulk for their cost-saving benefits. Drawing on costly signaling theory, we argue that such commitments, however, serve as subtle unintentional signals of status. Although consumers buy bulk for cost saving purposes, observers consistently perceive bulk purchasers (long-term subscribers, clubhouse shoppers, loyalty card holders) as higher in status not only because they appear to possess greater financial resources, but also because they are seen as respected customers. Consequently, such customers are afforded a way of costly signaling where the risk of being labeled a show-off is minimized due to the low-cost disguise. Hence, bulk purchases essentially come…

Date: 23 December 2025, Tuesday Time: 13.30 – 14.30 Place: MA-330 "Time-Left Versus Future-Age: How Framing Life and Healthy Life Expectancy Shapes Perceived Time and Health Decisions" by David Faro London Business School Abstract  Statistics and predictions about life expectancy and healthy life expectancy feature on across a wide range of consumer-facing platforms, from retirement planning tools to health-tracking apps, wellness products, and insurance calculators. These are typically presented in future-age frame (e.g., ‘As a 50-year-old, you are expected to live until the age of 84’) or in time-left frame (e.g., ‘As a 50-year-old, you are expected to live for another 34 years’). Across seven online studies (N = 4103) and one field experiment (N = 14,422), we show that the time-left frame makes total life expectancy and healthy life…

Date: 17 December 2025, Wednesday Time: 10.30 – 11.30 Place: MA-330 "Modeling and Analysis of On-demand Service Systems " by Ke Sun McGill University Abstract  On-demand services, ranging from ride-hailing to mobile ordering, rely on real-time matching between customers and service providers. These systems increasingly allow customers to engage remotely before arriving at the service facility, creating new operational challenges around congestion, information, and incentives.In this talk, we focus on the order-ahead setting in quick-service restaurants, where remote customers place orders before traveling and their orders begin advancing in the preparation queue. Although order-ahead is widely believed to reduce delay and increase throughput, we show that adopting the order-ahead technology can sometimes make the system unintentionally yield lower throughput than an onsite-only system, even when the provider optimally chooses whether to share queue-length…

Date: 12 December 2025, Friday Time: 13.30 – 14.30 Place: MA-330 "Contracting Telemedicine: A game-theoretic consideration for NHS Advice & Guidance" by Feryal Erhun Cambridge Judge Business School Abstract  The UK's National Health Service (NHS) relies on general practitioners (GPs) as the first point of contact for patients for initial assessment and treatment. However, this gatekeeping in the referral process may be susceptible to diagnostic and referral errors, causing both over- and under-referrals. These inefficiencies, compounded by long outpatient waiting lists, strain traditional care models. To address such inefficiencies, the NHS introduced Advice & Guidance (A&G), a telemedicine service allowing GPs to consult hospital specialists electronically before making referral decisions. This optional pre-referral step aims to improve referral appropriateness and reduce unnecessary hospital visits. We investigate optimal incentive mechanisms to…

Date: 5 December 2025, Friday Time: 13.30 – 14.30 Place: MA-330 " Distrust Spillovers: Exploring the Role of the Socio-Cultural Context" by S. Arzu Wasti Sabancı University Abstract  Despite its importance, trust violation has remained relatively understudied in organizational research (Ferrin & Gillespie, 2010; Lewicki & Brinsfield, 2017; Schilke et al., 2023). This presentation focuses on trust violation in the context of coworker relationships. Specifically, it explores whether trust violations lead to distrust spillovers in the form of higher generalized distrust and whether this is moderated by relational mobility, a socio-ecological construct defined as the opportunity to form new relationships and the freedom to leave undesired relationships or groups in a given social context (Yuki, 2007). In Study 1, critical incidents of trust violation collected from working adults in two…

Date: 03 December 2025, Wednesday Time: 10.30 – 11.30 Place: MA-330 " Switching Gradient: Learning to Compete with Price Match Guarantee " by Sichen Guo Shanghai University Abstract  Price Match Guarantee (PMG) has become a widespread strategy among retailers to attract and retain customers by promising to match lower prices. However, how sellers should dynamically set prices under PMG, especially without full knowledge of price competition remains unclear. We model an online price competition in a duopoly market with asymmetric PMG adoption. Customers request a refund when the price difference exceeds their hassle threshold, thereby distorting both sellers' revenue functions. Each seller observes only their own realized demand and must learn to optimize on the fly without knowing the demand model or the other's information. The setting poses unique challenges,…