Selin A. Malkoc

Selin A. Malkoc received her Ph.D. in marketing from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Prior to joining Fisher College of Business, she was a faculty member at the Carslon School of Business, University of Minnesota, as well as at the Olin School of Business, Washington University in St. Louis.

Dr. Malkoc’s research focuses on the area of consumer behavior, with an emphasis on intertemporal matters. Specifically, her research examines how consumers make decisions where the outcomes are spread over time, as well as how they perceive and consume their time. She has explored why consumers might show impatience despite their best intentions and proposed several mechanisms that can help consumers make better decisions for themselves. Dr. Malkoc also studies how consumers can best allocate their time between work and leisure to maximize their short and long term happiness. Her work has important implications to consumer well-being, as well as long term consumer satisfaction.  In recent years, Dr. Malkoc also started to examine why and how otherwise innocuous actions and decisions get politicized and influence the consumer and firm action.  

Dr. Malkoc’s research appeared the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, Psychological Science, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Making Processes, Journal of Consumer Psychology, Journal of the Association of Consumer Research, in addition to other prestigious psychology and decision making outlets.

Recently, Dr. Malkoc edited a special issue on "Pandemic Transformed Economy" for the Journal of the Association of Consumer Research. She is an associate editor for the Journal of Consumer Research and for the International Journal of Research in Marketing and serves in other editorial review boards. She has also co-chaired annual conference for both the Society of Consumer Psychology (2020) and the Association of Consumer Research (2025).

Dr. Malkoc is the recipient of the prestigious Paul E. Green Award (awarded to the best paper published at the Journal of Marketing Research), and the William F. O’Dell Award (awarded to the paper published at Journal of Marketing Research that has made the most significant long term contribution to marketing theory, methodology and/or practice). Her research has also won the Citation of Excellence Award.  

Dr. Malkoc’s research has appeared in numerous national and international media outlets, including Wall Street Journal, New York Times, BBC, Huffington Post, TIME Magazine, OZY, Medium, The Today Show, and Fox News.

Dr. Malkoc’s TedX Talk

Dr. Malkoc’s Google Scholar Page

Ph.D., University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 2006

B.S., Bilkent University, 2000

Malkoc, Selin A. (forthcoming, 2026), “From Decision Patience to Process Patience: Bridging Decision Impatience and Process Impatience,” Journal of Consumer Psychology. 

Tonietto, Gabriela, Selin A. Malkoc, Kun Wang, and Sam Maglio (forthcoming, 2026), "Gained Time is Expanded: Examining the Psychological and Behavioral Consequences of Gaining Time," Journal of the Association of Consumer Research. 

Orbadeyava, Nailya, Selin A. Malkoc, Christine Kim, Monika Lisjak, Elicia John, Grant Donnelly, Lisa A. Cavanaugh and Vikas Mittal, (in press, 2025), “Politics in the Middle: A Call to Study Nuanced Political Differences in a Binary World” International Jornal of Research in Marketing.                  

Jin, Jianna, Selin A. Malkoc, and Russell H. Fazio, (2023) “For Whom Do Boundaries Become Restrictions? The Role of Political Orientation” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 152(7), 2118-2124.

Deng, Xiaoyan, Xiaojing Yang, Yuwei Jiang and Selin A. Malkoc (2023) “Reflection, Resilience, Rebound: Consumer Coping with the Pandemic,” Journal of the Association of Consumer Research, 8(2), 121-235.

Costello, John and Selin A. Malkoc (2022) “Why Are Donors More Generous with Time than Money? Perceived Control Over Donations Increases Charitable Giving” Journal of Consumer Research, 49(4), 678-696.

Tonietto, Gabriela, Eric VanEpps, Selin A. Malkoc and Sam Maglio (2022) “Time Will Fly During Future Fun (But Drag Until Then)” Journal of Consumer Psychology, 32(3), 475-483. (select media: WSJ, BBC, Quartz, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution)  

Kim, Junha, Selin A. Malkoc and Joseph K. Goodman (2022) “The Upgrade Pricing Effect: Just-below Pricing Discourages Consumers to Upgrade,” Journal of Consumer Research, 48(6), 1096-1112. (select media: Science Daily)

Tonietto, Gabriella, Selin A. Malkoc, Rebecca Reczek and Mike Norton (2021) “Viewing Leisure as Wasteful Undermines Enjoyment,” Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 97, 104198. (select media: BBC, Vice, Chicago Sun Times, Fast Company)

Goodman, Joseph K.*, Selin A. Malkoc* and Mosi Rosenboim (2019) “The Material-Experiential Asymmetry in Discounting: When Experiential Purchases Lead to More Impatience,” Journal of Consumer Research, 46(4), 671-688.

Tonietto, Gabriela, Selin A. Malkoc and Steve Nowlis (2019) “When an Hour Feels Shorter: Future Boundary Tasks Contract the Perception and Consumption of Time,” Journal of Consumer Research, 45(5), 1085-1102. (select media: CNN, NBC News, The Atlantic, BBC, Inc., Medium, Huffington Post) 

Malkoc, Selin A., and Gal Zauberman (2019) “Psychological Analysis of Consumer Intertemporal Decisions,” Consumer Psychology Review, 2, 97-113.

Malkoc, Selin A. and Gabriela N. Tonietto (2019) “Activity versus Outcome Maximization in Time Management,” Current Opinion in Psychology, 26, 49-53..

Nelson, Noelle, Selin A. Malkoc and Baba Shiv (2018) “Emotional Brain Knows Best: Domain Specific Effects of Emotional versus Cognitive Regret,” Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 31(1), 40-51. (select media: Forbes, Fast Company, Medium)

Goodman, Joseph K.*, Selin A. Malkoc* and Brittney D. Stephenson (2016) “Celebrate or Commemorate? A Material Purchase Advantage When Honoring Special Life Events,” Journal of the Association of Consumer Research, 1(4), 497-508. (select media: Time, Market Watch)

Tonietto Gabriela and Selin A. Malkoc (2016) “Calendar Mindset: How Scheduling Takes the Fun and Puts the Work in,” Journal of Marketing Research, 53(6), 922-936. (select media: NYT, WSJ, Huffington Post, Washington Post, Time, Inc.) 

Malkoc, Selin A., William Hedgcock, and Steve Hoeffler (2013) “Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Failure of the Attraction Effect Among Unattractive Alternatives,” Journal of Consumer Psychology 23(3), 317-329.

Goodman, Joseph K.*, and Selin A. Malkoc* (2012) “Choosing for Here and Now vs. There and Later: The Moderating Role of Construal on Assortment Size Preferences.” Journal of Consumer Research, 39(4), 751-768.

Malkoc, Selin A., Gal Zauberman, and James R. Bettman (2010). “Unstuck from the Concrete! Carryover Effect of Abstract Mindsets in Intertemporal Preferences.” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 113(2), 112-126.

Zauberman, Gal, B. Kyu Kim, Selin A. Malkoc and James R. Bettman (2009). “Discounting Time and Time Discounting: Subjective Time Perception and Intertemporal Preferences.” Journal of Marketing Research, 46(4), 543-556.

Ratner, Rebecca K, Dilip Soman, Gal Zauberman, Dan Ariely, Ziv Carmon, Punam A. Keller, B. Kyu Kim, Fern Lin, Selin A. Malkoc, Deborah A. Small, and Klaus Wertenbroch (2008), “How Behavioral Decision Research can Enhance Consumer Welfare: From Freedom of Choice to Paternalistic Intervention,” Marketing Letters, 19, 383-397

Malkoc, Selin A. and Gal Zauberman (2006) “Deferring versus Expediting Consumption: The Effect of Outcome Concreteness on Sensitivity to Time Horizon.” Journal of Marketing Research, 43(4), 618-627.

Malkoc, Selin A., Gal Zauberman, and Canan Ulu (2005). “Consuming Now or Later? The Interactive Effect of Timing and Attribute Alignability.” Psychological Science, 16(5), 411-417.