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Early Career Award winner from the Society for the Science of Motivation

College of Arts & Sciences Leadership Board Fellow

Fellow Society of Experimental and Social Psychology

SEC Travel Grant-Travel Award

Distinguished Faculty Research Award

Student Mentoring Award

American Psychological Association 

Association for Psychological Science

Society for Experimental and Social Psychology 

Society for Personality and Social Psychology 

Society for Psychophysiological Research 

Society for the Study of Motivation

European Association of Social Psychology

Society for Psychophysiological Research

International Congress of Psychophysiology

Using Wearable Passive Sensing to Predict Binge Eating in Response to Negative Affect Among Individuals With Transdiagnostic Binge Eating: Protocol for an Observational Study

Feedback Related Negativity Amplitude is Greatest Following Deceptive Feedback in Autistic Adolescents

Peers, play, and performance to build social salience in autistic youth: A multisite randomized clinical trial

Impact of trait impulsivity on frontal asymmetry during motivational conflict

New advancements in the neuroscience of personality and individual differences

The Oxford Handbook of EEG Frequency (Oxford Library of Psychology)

Philip Gable is a Professor of Psychology in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at The University of Delaware. Dr. Gable studies both psychological and neurological processes underlying motivation/emotion, personality, control, substance use, and cognitive scope. He uses a range of measures such as EEG frontal asymmetry, EEG beta suppression over the motor cortex, event-related potentials and Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation. His work is well-recognized in diverse disciplines, including social, cognitive, and clinical psychology, psychophysiology, and neuroscience. He received the Early Career Award from the Society for the Science of Motivation. He has edited the Oxford Handbook of EEG Frequency and has published widely on affective and motivational science with more than 85 articles and chapters to date. Support for his work has come from national agencies and private industry and has totaled over $4.7 million USD in funding.

From these investigations, he has developed the Motivational Dimensional Model of cognitive scope, proposing that motivational intensity influences cognitive and perceptual scope. He has applied his work to understand consumer behavior and product research and development for corporations such as Del Monte, Big Heart Pet Brands, and J.M. Smuckers. He has investigated the neural and cognitive components of motivation in alcohol and drug use for individuals in drug recovery. He has also examined emotion-based therapies for individuals with autism. His work on how emotion and motivation influences our sense of time has been widely recognized in the media, being featured on CBS Sunday Morning, NBC Global Hangouts, NPR - New York City, New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal.

Emotional Theory

Motivation

Neuroscience

Social Psychology

Autism

Neuromarketing and Research Design

Substance Use and Recovery

English

University of Delaware Expert Profile

University of Delaware Faculty Profile

The Conversation Author Page

Google Scholar Citations

ResearchGate Citations

Time Is Zooming By. Four Ways You Can Slow It Down

Our Sense of Time Is Way Off—Especially Time We Spend on the Internet

Day 6: Don’t Cancel Those Plans

You Are Not Your Moods

How To Be Proud of Yourself Without Feeling Like A Phony

Peaking Inside the Black Box: Neural Correlates of Consumer Motivation

Emotional engineering for product research and design

Consumer Motivation to Novel Products: Product Design and Marketing

The role of right hemisphere regulation in impulsivity and alcohol cue reactivity

Influence of Approach Motivation on Affect, Cognition, and Neurophysiology

A Randomized Controlled Trial of the Emotion Awareness and Skills Enhancement (EASE) Program for ASD

RAPID: Approach-Avoidance Tendencies to Pathogen-Salience as a Function of Uncertainty and Regional COVID-19 Infection Rates

new-years-resolutions-why-they-fail-and-how-we-can-stick-to-them

Professor, Psychological and Brain Sciences

 By now, most people have already made their New Year's resolutions and (hopefully) put them into practice. But most people — about 90% — give up on them within the first few weeks of the year. University of Delaware experts dig into the psychology behind why resolutions fail and offer a recipe for success.

The timing of New Year’s resolutions also isn’t always ideal. According to Philip Gable, professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, a lack of commitment is one reason why many people fail to achieve their goals.

“New Year's resolutions sometimes lack in commitment,” he said. “It's just this time of year when people feel like they should make a resolution, as opposed to other times in the year when it's less common but maybe more meaningful, like if you get a doctor's report and realize you need to change that aspect of your life.”

In order to be part of the 10% of people who keep their New Year’s resolutions, Gable said to break down big goals into small, achievable steps.

“I think a lot of times with goals, people will commit to a very big goal and not realize the smaller steps they need to take to achieve that goal,” Gable said. “If we have too big of a goal, we get emotionally distressed when we can't do it, or we fail because we set too big of a goal. Or maybe we couldn't think through all of the elements required to meet that really big goal. So starting small gives us something achievable, and then that gives you a platform to go to the next thing.”

Naomi Sadeh, associate professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of Delaware, said that part of the reason it’s so hard to make long-term changes is that humans are wired to prioritize instant gratification over delayed rewards. In other words, when posed with an option, we tend to pick the easy choice with an immediate outcome to satisfy a need today instead of delaying gratification for a bigger reward — we splurge on items we don’t really need instead of saving money, order takeout instead of cooking a healthy meal, or binge-watch a TV show instead of going to the gym.

“With impulsivity and with breaking New Year's resolutions, often it's when people tend to opt for that sooner, smaller reward over the longer, bigger reward,” Sadeh said. “The sooner reward is really tempting, even if it's not as satisfying in the long run as the longer goal or bigger goal that you had.”

When people set goals, they tend to feel very motivated for a few days and falsely assume they’re committed to their goal. But as soon as that motivation wears off, they give up.

“There's potentially a mismatch in the timing of your goals,” said Rob West, interim chair and professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences. “Your goals are immediate, they're conscious, they're volitional. You have those in the moment, and they can be developed and abandoned quickly. But habits take a considerable amount of time and repetition.”

To connect directly with Gable, visit  his profile and click on the connect button. Interviews with other researchers can be arranged by contacting UD's Media Relations department. 

New Year's Resolutions: Why they fail and how we can stick to them

holiday-shopping-season-set-to-begin-with-questions-about-black-friday-consumer-behavior

Assistant Professor, Marketing

Professor, Business Administration; Director, Institute for Financial Services Analytics

 Is Black Friday still a thing? Online sales have been outpacing brick-and-mortar sales for years, resulting in shorter lines and less of a frenzy at stores on the day after Thanksgiving. Many stores have also gone online with deals to compliment in-person shopping. University of Delaware experts can comment  on this and other topics related to the holiday shopping season and gift-buying behavior.

Andong Cheng: Can provide tips on what to prepare for during this unique holiday shopping season. Her research focuses on defining and identifying the picky consumer segment, and explores how pickiness impacts other judgments and decisions. She advises consumers to consider the phenomenon of double mental discounting, where shoppers experience a “mental accounting phenomenon” when offered promotional credit.




Jackie Silverman: Research examines several facets of judgment and decision making and consumer psychology. According to Silverman, there are many potential benefits of online shopping for consumers, including some unconventional approaches to gift giving this season.







Philip Gable: Can talk about the science behind the art of gift-giving that goes beyond the material exchange — emotional nuances that also can be applied to charitable work and philanthropy. He says that significance contributes to the happiness we experience in gift-giving.







Matthew McGranaghan: Studies the economics of consumer attention and the indirect effects of marketing interventions. He explains that there is a difference in how businesses are innovating and utilizing online retail methods to connect with consumers this holiday season.







Bintong Chen: Can discuss the systematic nature of supply chain issues. He recommends shoppers use major retailers like Amazon and Walmart, whose companies use their own shipping fleets to minimize disruptions.








Caroline Swift: Examines supply chain transparency and the interactions between regulation and business performance.







Holiday shopping season set to begin with questions about Black Friday, consumer behavior

when-it-comes-to-new-years-resolutions-think-small

 By now, those of us who made New Year's resolutions are either off and running or off the rails. According to Philip Gable, professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, a lack of commitment and setting the bar too high are among the reasons many people fail to stick with their resolutions and achieve their goals.

“It's just this time of year when people feel like they should make a resolution, as opposed to other times in the year when it's less common but maybe more meaningful, like if you get a doctor's report and realize you need to change that aspect of your life," he said.

When people set goals, they tend to feel very motivated for a few days and falsely assume they’re committed to their goal. But as soon as that motivation wears off, they give up.

In order to be part of the 10% of people who keep their New Year’s resolutions, Gable said to break down big goals into small, achievable steps.

“I think a lot of times with goals, people will commit to a very big goal and not realize the smaller steps they need to take to achieve that goal,” Gable said. “If we have too big of a goal, we get emotionally distressed when we can't do it, or we fail because we set too big of a goal. Or maybe we couldn't think through all of the elements required to meet that really big goal. So starting small gives us something achievable, and then that gives you a platform to go to the next thing.”

To set up an interview with Gable, visit his profile and click on the contact button.


When it comes to New Year's resolutions, think small

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