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Leonard Lee

Leonard Lee

Director, PhD (Management, Marketing), MIT Sloan

leonard.lee@nus.edu.sg
Risk Perception Decision Making Behaviour Change

Leonard Lee is Director and Lloyd’s Register Foundation Professor of Lloyd’s Register Foundation Institute for the Public Understanding of Risk (IPUR), and Professor of Marketing at NUS Business School, National University of Singapore (NUS). Before joining NUS in 2014, he was an Associate Professor of Marketing at Columbia Business School where he spent the first eight years of his academic career. He received a BSc in Computer and Information Sciences from NUS, a MS in Computer Science from Stanford University, and a PhD in Management (Marketing) from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Leonard’s research investigates how emotional and cognitive factors influence consumer judgments and decision making, with applications in public policy domains such as healthcare and sustainable transportation. Additionally, he is interested in understanding shopping motivations and behavior in real-world environments.

His research has been published in major academic journals such as the Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing Research, Journal of Consumer Psychology, Journal of Marketing, and Psychological Science, and featured in media such as The New York Times, Financial Times, and The Wall Street Journal. He has received honors such as the Paul Green Award (Finalist) from the Journal of Marketing Research, the Franco Nicosia Best Competitive Paper Award from the Association for Consumer Research, and the Robert Ferber Award (Honorable Mention) from the Journal of Consumer Research. He was also selected as a member of the inaugural class of MSI Scholars in 2018.

Leonard is an Associate Editor of the Journal of Consumer Psychology and the Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, and a previous Associate Editor of Journal of Consumer Research (2015-22) and the International Journal of Research in Marketing (2014-15). He is also serving on the Editorial Review Boards of Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Marketing Letters, and Foundations and Trends in Marketing. He co-chaired the 50th Edition of the annual ACR conference in 2019 in Atlanta, USA, as well as a SCP Advertising and Consumer Psychology (ACP) conference on “The Asian Consumer” in 2012 in Singapore.

published papers

  1. Mende, M. et al. (2024) ‘People, peace, prosperity, and the planet: A journey toward sustainable development in consumer research’, Journal of Consumer Research, 51(1), pp. 91–103. doi:10.1093/jcr/ucad068.
  2. Baskentli, Sara, Rhonda Hadi, and Leonard Lee (2023), “How Culture Shapes Consumer Responses to Anthropomorphic Products,” International Journal of Research in Marketing, forthcoming.
  3. Chung, Jaeyeon, Leonard Lee, Donald R. Lehmann, and Claire I. Tsai (2023), “Spending Windfall (‘Found’) Time on Hedonic versus Utilitarian Activities,” Journal of Consumer Research, 49(6), 1118-39.
  4. Huang, Szu-chi and Leonard Lee (2023), “The 5’s of Consumer Health: A Framework and Curation of JCR Articles on Health and Medical Decision Making,” Journal of Consumer Research, 49(5), 926- 39.
  5. Faraji-Rad, Ali and Leonard Lee (2022), “BankingHappiness,”Journal of Consumer Research, 49(2), 336-58.
  6. Lee, Angela Y., Jiaqian Wang, Ulf Böckenholt, Leonard Lee, Rafal Ohme, Dorota Reykowska, and Catherine Yeung (2022), “The Enthusiasts and the Reluctants of COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake: A Cluster Analysis,” Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, 7(2), 222-234.
  7. Huang, S., & Lee, L. (2022). The 5s’s of consumer health: A framework and curation of jcr articles on health and medical decision-making. Journal of Consumer Research, 49(5), 926–939. https://doi.org/10.1093/jcr/ucac051
  8. Shultz, Clifford, Janet Hoek, Leonard Lee, Wai Yan Leong, Raj Srinivasan, Madhu Viswanathan, and Klaus Wertenbroch (2022), “JPPM’s Global Perspective and Impact: An Agenda for Research on Marketing and Public Policy,” Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 41(1), 34-50.
  9. Koh. Chan Ghee, Leonard Lee, Carolyn Lo, Catherine Mei Ling Wong, and Janson Yap (2020) “A Socio-Psychological Perspective” in World Economic Forum Insight Report: Challenges and Opportunities in the Post-COVID-19 World (pp. 44-48). Geneva: World Economic Forum.
  10. Tomaino, Geoff, Jasper Teow, Ziv Carmon, Leonard Lee, Moshe Ben- Akiva, Charlene Chen, Wai Yan Leong, Shanjun Li, Nan Yang, and Jinhua Zhao (2020), “Mobility as a Service (MaaS): The Importance of Transportation Psychology,” Marketing Letters, 31, 419-28

ongoing projects

  1. “Providing Mobility as a Service: Public Acceptance and Behavioural Responses” Singapore has to date implemented effective, general measures such as institutionalising the Certificate of Entitlement and reducing the number of parking spaces in housing estates. However, the effectiveness of such one-size-fits-all measures may vary considerably across drivers, and, arguably, resources used to implement these measures could be more effectively and efficiently utilised. By gaining a thorough understanding of the underlying motivations of different types of drivers, our study promotes greater efficacy in persuading certain drivers to either reduce or give up driving through designing appropriate targeted behavioural interventions.
  2. “Research on Risk Perception Fundamentals” Since the seminal work by Paul Slovic and his colleagues more than 30 years ago (Slovic 1987; Slovic et al. 1981, 1985), how people perceive risk and what they consider as risk objects may have changed substantially, given the evolving socio-political, economic, cultural, and environmental landscape in Asia. In this research project, the project aim to acquire a revised understanding of the factors and dimensions that have become essential to how people—both the public and experts—perceive risk in Asia today.
  3. “Visualisation in Risk Perception and Communication of Major Infectious Diseases” This project potentially identifies new factors influencing risk perception and new ways of communicating risk in a more effective and accurate manner. In particular, the project hypothesises that risk perception and communication are affected by visualisation. It further hypothesises that risk perception through visual imageries likely operates through the emotional, instead of the cognitive, route. The findings have the potential to enhance risk communication and inform policy concerns which can lead to better preparation for risks in the future.
  4. “The impact of risk perception on precautionary behaviours towards COVID-19 among health care workers and general population in Singapore & globally” Understanding individuals' precautionary behaviour and its relation to their perceived risk is important to achieve an accurate risk assessment and an effective control of an infectious disease threat. The trajectory of an infectious disease outbreak is affected by the behaviour of individuals, and the behavior is often related to individuals' knowledge, risk perception and information seeking activities. Hence it is important for health authorities to understand the influence of psychosocial constructs on precautionary behavior, so as to conduct targeted and informed risk communication. Moreover, there is a need to understand how social media interacts with information processing of individuals, and how authorities can leverage on these information technologies while minimizing the negative effects.
  5. “Culture and Innovation in Consumer Behaviour” The project seeks to understand how socio-cultural factors affect consumers’ perception of various forms of product innovation, and to understand the effects of culture on factors affecting innovation adoption, such as risk perception.
  6. "Mind Over Diabetes" Partnership with Diabetes Singapore to enhance public awareness and understanding of diabetes care and management. “Mind Over Diabetes” aims to engage healthcare providers, policymakers, individuals with diabetes and the wider community in dialogue on improving diabetes management by exposing fixed mindsets and fostering growth mindsets. The collaboration was driven by a study, “Mindsets and self-efficacy beliefs among individuals with type 2 diabetes” which presents a new understanding to how patients’ beliefs may influence motivation and behaviour to profoundly improve diabetes care and health outcomes.
  7. "Risk Barometer" The IPUR Singapore Risk Barometer Report is a flagship initiative to gain deeper insight into the risks that Singaporeans feel are the greatest concerns in their daily lives. It spotlights the needs, expectations and demands of society and serves as an annual scorecard on the management of these risks. The report aims to provide valuable information to government, companies and the media regarding the public’s perceptions of these issues and their expectations about whether sufficient action is being taken to address them.
  8. "[IPUR Seed Grant] Gamifying and carbon scoring urban mobility for a greener Singapore: A randomized control By conducting a Randomized Control Trial with 300 students, this project is the first step to test the hypothesis that a mix of pro-environmental messaging, carbon scoring, and gamification-based rewards encourages public transit. 
  9. "World Risk Poll and Mental Health Services" Quality mental health services are pivotal in addressing mental health issues worldwide. Despite this importance, many countries face challenges in providing accessible, high-quality mental health care. This project aims to analyse the Lloyd's Register Foundation World Risk Poll 2021, and data sourced from databases such as WHO and OECD to understand the relationship between mental health services and the public's worry about mental health issues.

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