Clayton R. Critcher 
Associate Professor | Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley
Berkeley, CA, UNITED STATES
Identifying and explaining skills and shortcomings in people's social, economic, moral, and political judgments
Areas of Expertise (4)
Self and Social Judgment
Moral Psychology
Consumer Experience
Judgment and Decision Making
About
Clayton Critcher is an Associate Professor of marketing, cognitive science, and psychology at Berkeley Haas. A social psychologist, Critcher researches how people come to understand themselves and other people and to make judgments and decisions in economic, morally relevant, and social situations.
Education (2)
Cornell University: PhD, Psychology
Yale University: AB, Psychology
Links (3)
Honors & Awards (8)
Barbara and Gerson Bakar Faculty
Fellow
Sage Young Scholar Award
2015
Hellman Fellow
Fellowship
Carol D. Soc Distinguished Graduate Student Mentoring Award
2014
Science: Editors’ Choice
Award
National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship
Fellowship
Yale University Angier Prize
Award
Society of Experimental Social Psychology
Fellow
Selected External Service & Affiliations (9)
- Journal of Personality and Social Psychology: Associate Editor
- Social Psychological and Personality Science : Editorial Board
- Self & Identity : Editorial Board
- Association for Psychological Science
- Association for Consumer Research
- Society for Consumer Psychology
- Society for Personality and Social Psychology
- Society for Judgment and Decision Making
- Society of Experimental Social Psychology
Positions Held (1)
At Haas since 2010
2020 - present: Director, Haas Behavioral Lab
2020 - present, PhD Field Advisor, Marketing
2017 – present, Institute for Personality and Social Research
2016 – present, Associate Professor of Marketing, Haas School of Business
2013 – present, Department of Psychology (affiliate)
2011 – present, Cognitive Science Faculty
2010 – 2016, Assistant Professor of Marketing, Haas School of Business
Media Appearances (5)
Political campaign ads may have ironic side effects
American Marketing Association podcast radio
2018-11-05
Assoc. Prof. Clayton Critcher was interviewed about his research that found mandatory candidate endorsements may incentivize nastiness.
'I Approve This Message' Has an Unwelcome Subtext
Pacific Standard Magazine online
2018-03-02
Many participants in a study saw that notification as an indication that "the ad had been touched by regulation," said Clayton Critcher of the University of California–Berkeley, who co-authored the study with Minah Jung of New York University. "That gave a legitimizing halo to the message as a whole. We hope that by bringing this to light, policymakers might realize this provision is not serving the public, and find a better way"...
That “I Approve” Tagline on Political Ads May Have Precisely the Opposite Effect of What Congress Intended
Mother Jones online
2018-02-16
“For a couple of reasons, when that tagline is added to political ads, then people believe the content of the ads more,” says study co-author Clayton Critcher, an associate professor at the University of California-Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. “That’s particularly true for ads that people start out with the most skepticism about, which are precisely those ads that [Congress was] trying to discourage: negative ads. So adding the tagline, far from disincentivizing negativity in advertising, has actually made it surprisingly effective by increasing how true those messages seem.”
Frisbees, Hula Hoops and Hacky Sacks. Southern California's Wham-O looks to reinvent its toys for the digital age
Los Angeles Times online
2017-08-09
“The downside of [Wham-O’s] business model—in which products themselves attain greater brand equity than their parent brands—is it means Wham-O has a more difficult time with launching new products,” said Clayton Critcher, a retail expert and professor at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business.
“When each product is essentially its own brand, it raises the marketing challenges in pushing new products. It requires Wham-O to launch a new brand with each product.”
How to Tell If Someone Will Succeed
Time Magazine online
2016-10-27
Study authors Melissa J. Ferguson, Professor of Psychology, Cornell University and Clayton R. Critcher, Associate Professor of Marketing, Cognitive Science, & Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, contributed this article illustrating how their research could be applied to predict how successful college students will be.
Selected Research Grants (1)
"The Spreading of Perceived Exclusion"
National Science Foundation Grant
Social Psychology
Selected Papers & Publications (6)
Critcher, C. R., Inbar, Y, & Pizarro, D. A.
2013
Moon, A., Gan, M., & Critcher, C. R.
2020
Reit, E., & Critcher, C. R.
2020
Risen, J. L., & Critcher, C. R.
2011
Critcher, C. R., & Dunning, D.
2009
Critcher, C. R., & Gilovich, T.
2008
Teaching (1)
Marketing
MBA 206 (Core)
Social