McIntire Robert Hill Carter Professor of Commerce David Mick is one of two recipients of the 2020 Fellow in Consumer Behavior Award. The fellowship is the highest honor that the Association for Consumer Research grants in recognition of an individual’s contribution to scholarly work in consumer behavior over an extended period of time. Since the award was instituted almost 40 years ago, only 37 individuals have been bestowed this honor.
ACR Fellows receive lifetime membership to the ACR and are invited to make a presentation at the ACR conference.
“These scholars have made an indelible scholarly impact on our discipline and are being recognized for being legends in the field,” says Rajiv Vaidyanathan, ACR Executive Director and board member. “The ACR Board bestows this honor sparingly and expects Fellows to have had a significant and sustained influence on the field of consumer behavior. These are individuals who have advanced scholarship in a variety of ways.”
“David Glen Mick, Robert Hill Carter Professor of Commerce and Professor of Marketing, University of Virginia, McIntire School of Commerce, has conducted path-breaking work in semiotics, was an outstanding editor of the Journal of Consumer Research, and demonstrated remarkable leadership in the founding and nurturing of the transformative consumer research movement,” says Nomination Committee Chair Richard Lutz. “His continued scholarly contributions extend beyond academe to consumers themselves.”
Mick received his Ph.D. at Indiana University in 1987. Before joining the McIntire faculty in 2000, he held positions at the University of Florida and the University of Wisconsin, as well as extended visiting appointments at the Copenhagen Business School, Dublin City University, and the University of Sydney.
He is the author of over 75 articles, conference papers, and chapters on marketing and consumer behavior, and the editor of four related books. Mick’s work has been cited over 14,000 times, and he has won several national awards, including Best Article at Journal of Consumer Research, the Maynard Award at Journal of Marketing, and the Kinnear Award at Journal of Public Policy & Marketing. Mick has also been invited to conduct seminars at universities worldwide, including at Oxford, Erasmus (Netherlands), Trinity (Ireland), the Stockholm School of Economics, Harvard, Columbia, Duke, and Stanford, among others. He is the former associate editor and chief editor of Journal of Consumer Research (1997-2003) and past president of the ACR (2005). In this latter role, he spearheaded the transformative consumer research movement, which encourages and facilitates scholarly inquiry to improve quality of life for all beings influenced by worldwide consumption activities and trends. He is co-editor of the 2012 book Transformative Consumer Research for Personal and Collective Well-Being (Routledge Publishing). In June 2021, Mick will co-chair the seventh biennial Transformative Consumer Research Conference, which will be hosted at the McIntire School.
“David is exceedingly deserving of this high honor,” says Rick Netemeyer, McIntire Marketing Professor, Marketing Area Coordinator, and former Senior Associate Dean, who noted Mick’s selfless and influential service to the ACR. “In his roles as ACR president and JCR editor, he pushed consumer researchers to think about the potential influence we could have in advancing societal causes that promote consumer well-being.”
Netemeyer adds that Mick’s own prolific, impactful, and highly cited research has advanced consumer welfare and the social good. “As the ‘founding father’ of transformative consumer research,” he says, “David has been a forceful voice reminding consumer researchers that they are in a position to conduct research that helps those who are less fortunate than we.”
The award announcement was made during the 2019 ACR annual conference, which took place last month in Atlanta and was attended by more than 1,200 international consumer researchers. Mick will deliver his award speech next fall at the 2020 ACR conference in Paris, France.
