Time: 10:00, 14 May 2025
Speaker: Jia Gai is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Marketing at Peking University Guanghua School of Management. Her research focuses on consumer behavior, including digital consumption, moral behavior, and self-control. Her work has appeared in Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, and other journals. Before joining Guanghua, she received a bachelor's degree in psychology from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, a master's degree in social sciences from the University of Chicago, and a PhD in marketing from Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University.
Abstract:
Companies and platforms frequently request consumers to indicate their preferences to generate personalized content, assuming that users will reveal their full range of interests. However, a series of experiments, including several conducted on custom-built platforms, reveals that consumers often omit interests that they would otherwise select or consider when sharing their preferences with algorithms. This tendency arises because 1) consumers believe that sharing narrow preferences reduces the risk of being misclassified by algorithms, and 2) they do not adequately consider all predefined categories of interest. Two separate research projects document these distinct processes. Crucially, the preferences shared by consumers create a feedback loop: those who select narrow preferences receive less diverse recommendations, which further narrows their choices and subsequent recommendations. Our findings thus delineate the conditions under which filter bubbles are generated and dismantled, suggesting that simple yet effective design features can significantly alter the content that individuals are exposed to and engage with.
