Two contributions by Prof Dr Sebastian Oetzel
at the AMA Winter Academic Conference 2026

24 Feb 2026

The American Marketing Association's AMA Winter Academic Conference 2026 is one of the most prestigious international conferences in the field of marketing. This year, the conference took place for the first time in Europe - in Madrid.

Prof. Dr Sebastian Oetzel from the Department of Business at Fulda University of Applied Sciences was represented with two research papers, which were produced in cooperation with Prof. Dr Tobias Maiberger (Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences). Prof Dr Tobias Maiberger was responsible for the presentations at the conference.

The full contributions are published in the official conference proceedings: click here

1. How Price Sensitive is AI? Quantifying the Synthetic Bias in Willingness-to-Pay Estimation
The first contribution examines how reliable AI models are in estimating willingnessto pay. Two experimental university studies show a systematic "synthetic bias": AI-based estimates overestimate real willingness to pay and can thus manage to produce biased price and profit forecasts.

2. When Reassurance Backfires: The Paradox of Inflation Messaging in Retail
The second contribution analyses the effect of inflation-related price guarantees in retail. The results show that explicit inflation messages ("inflation stop") can increase the perceived threat and manage smaller shopping baskets.

We are delighted about the successful cooperation with Darmstadt Business School and the international exchange at the AMA Winter Academic Conference 2026.
 

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