Claudia Townsend is an associate professor of marketing. She performs research on consumer behavior and decision making. Specifically, she examines how people make choices with a focus on how aesthetics and the visual presentation of information influences judgment and choice. Her research has been published in the top academic marketing journals and covered by the popular press, including The Wall Street Journal, the Harvard Business Review, and NPR’s Marketplace.

She is an associate editor for the Journal of Marketing and is on the editorial review board for the Journal of Consumer Research and the Journal of Marketing Research. Townsend has industry experience in market research and economic consulting and has consulted for Fortune 500 companies as well as start-up businesses. She received her Ph.D. from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management and her B.A. from Brown University, graduating magna cum laude with honors.