I see where you're coming from. Hopefully I can defend some some of the researchers in that field :)

Although most applications of that research are often applied to business and marketing, the underlying research has broader implications. For example, some of those studies progressed our understanding of cognition in general (the researchers merely used numbers in their study - which was then adapted for pricing applications). But we now understand more about our brain's processes than we did before.

And ,with a better understanding of cognition, we can help pave the way toward other, more benevolent applications (e.g., curing psychological ailments).

So even though that research may not produce benevolent results directly, I would argue that it helps indirectly (among many other benefits too).

So that's my two cents.