Joseph Simmons

Who they are

Simmons works on two fronts. One is how people make judgements and choices, including about prices. The other is how psychological research should be designed and reported so that its findings can be trusted, which made him one of the better-known voices in the field's discussion of replication.

That second interest is visible in the 2025 paper. Rather than proposing a new explanation alongside the old ones, it was built so that the old explanations could fail a direct test.

Key papers

Gaertig, C., & Simmons, J. P. (2025). "Why (and when) are uncertain price promotions more effective than equivalent sure discounts?" Journal of Consumer Research, 52(5), 1022-1042. Second author.

Key ideas

An uncertain promotion's advantage depends on how small the sure alternative looks. See Probabilistic Promotions.

How a discount is presented changes what people do with it, independently of the amount. See Price Framing.

Our notes record no other publication of his that this site relies on, and this page lists none.

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