Aaron Ahuvia

Dr. Aaron Ahuvia is the most widely published and cited academic expert on non-interpersonal love.

A scientific study listed him as one of the top 20 most influential scientists studying consumer behavior, out of thousands US researchers working on related topics. He was the first recipient of the Stetik Group Brand Relationship Award, 2019, which is a lifetime achievement award for research impact on marketing practice. He is also a leading expert on the psychology of happiness and how our happiness is impacted by our income and by our consumer choices.

Dr. Ahuvia has been at the forefront of this research since he published the first major scientific study on this topic entitled "I Love It! Towards a Unifying Theory of Love Across Diverse Love Objects," over twenty years ago. Dr. Ahuvia has over 100 academic papers and conference presentations. His research has been quoted in Time, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Glamour, and major publications in Europe and Japan. Dr. Ahuvia has also appeared on public radio talk shows as well as popular Television shows such as the Oprah Winfrey Show.

Dr. Ahuvia received a BA in Philosophy from the University of Michigan (1985) and a PhD in marketing from Northwestern’s Kellogg Graduate School of Management (1993), where he assisted Professor Kotler in revising his well-known textbook. He joined the faculty at the University of Michigan Ann Arbor’s Ross School of Business in 1992 before moving to the Dearborn campus in 1999, where he has won awards for research and teaching. Dr. Ahuvia also holds an appointment at the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor’s Penny W. Stamps School of Art and Design as well as the Center for Middle Eastern and North African Studies. Dr. Ahuvia’s reputation as an engaging speaker has led to his presentations in China, Denmark, Oman, Finland, Poland, Morocco, France, Germany, India, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Portugal, Rwanda, Singapore, Slovakia, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Yemen, and of course around the US as well.

Dr. Ahuvia first became well known for a series of papers on dating services that he published with Professor Mara Adelman. This research on dating services looked at the intersection of love and commerce, and hence is the mirror image of research on brand love (i.e. non-interpersonal love for products and brands). In addition to his research on love, Dr. Ahuvia has published extensively on the relationship between income, materialism, and happiness. He was recognized by Project+ (an interdisciplinary research group funded by the French American Charitable Trust) as a leading expert on happiness in the disciplines of marketing and consumer research. He recently co-authored a United Nations report on the applicability of scientific happiness research to public policy.

Most recently, he is the author of a popular book explaining the psychology of brand love titled "The Things We Love: How Our Passions Connect Us and Make Us Who We Are," published by Little, Brown, which Amazon has named by Amazon as one of the best 20 business books for 2022.