Professor Patti Williams' research examines ways consumers' emotional responses influence consumption and persuasion. Her current research projects focus on how emotions influence consumer decisions and processes of persuasion; consumer responses to emotional and attitudinal ambivalence; emotion regulation; and the emotions associated with social identities.

Williams' research has been published in top-tier academic journals, including the Journal of Consumer Research, the Journal of Marketing Research, and the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied. She serves on the Editorial Review Boards for the Journal of Consumer Research, the Journal of Consumer Psychology, the Journal of Marketing Research, and the Journal of Marketing.

Williams earned her PhD and MBA from the University of California, Los Angeles and her BA from Stanford University.