George Wu

Biography

George Wu studies the psychology of decision making; goal-setting and motivation; and cognitive biases in bargaining and negotiation. Wu's research has been published widely in a number of journals in economics, management science, and psychology, including Cognitive Psychology, the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, the Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Management Science, Psychological Science, and the Quarterly Journal of Economics. Prof. Wu was also the inaugural faculty director of the Harry L. Davis Center for Leadership.

Prior to joining the Chicago Booth faculty in 1997, Wu was on the faculty of Harvard Business School as an assistant and associate professor in the managerial economics area and then in the negotiation and decision making group. He also has worked as a lecturer at Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to graduate school, Wu worked as a decision analyst at Procter Gamble.

Wu is a Department Editor of Management Science and is on numerous other editorial boards, including Decision Analysis, Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, and Theory and Decision. He earned a bachelor's degree cum laude in applied mathematics with a concentration in decision and control in 1985, a master's degree in applied mathematics in 1987, and a PhD in decision sciences in 1991, all from Harvard.

Wu was honored as the 2020 recipient of the Chicago Urban League’s Humanitarian Award. You may read more about the award and the program here. He also received the Class of 2020 Emory Williams Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Research Interests

Decision making under risk and uncertainty; behavioral decision making; negotiation; goal setting and motivation.

Academic Areas

• Behavioral Science