I’m running a fun survey exploring relationships and money, specifically hypothetical scenarios involving billionaires.

https://forms.gle/rELZY258XyzBCRgs9

The survey takes just 3-5 minutes and will be part of a documentary series.

Your responses are completely anonymous, and I’m specifically looking for participants 18+ in the US.

Thanks so much for helping out—it means a lot!

I'm writing my master thesis on the topic of cancer warning labels on alcohol. I need as many participants as possible for my experimental study, so I would like to ask you all to take part in this survey. Fyi - you can win a $20.00 Amazon voucher!

The survey takes approximately 5-6 minutes.

Survey: https://ucpresearch.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_0iAawPTxgmIwenI

For those interested, I'll share the results in January.

Nice tutorial explaining how emotions like pride and regret influence trading behavior, leading to phenomena such as the disposition effect, revenge trading, and analysis paralysis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=996Bil8sdko

I started a side project to help myself use my phone less, building an app that simply asks "Why do you need your phone right now?" after each unlock. It worked surprisingly well for me.

Later, while doing my second masters in HCI, I learned about behavioral economics, choice architecture and nudges - and realized this is exactly what my app was doing! The prompt acts as a gentle nudge that makes you pause and reflect.

Would love to hear this community's thoughts on using such point-of-action nudges for changing digital behavior.

Also the app has a data export feature and it's quite interesting to analyze your nudges interaction

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.actureunlock

Hello guys!

Hope this is the right place to ask this.

I am a PhD candidate in environmental economics, and last summer with a colleague of mine we ran an experiment in behavioral economics. Taking inspiration from some papers in the literature, we tried to test two nudges to see if they reduced cigarette littering in beaches. We collected the cigarettes on the ground and in the bins/ashtrays and from that we computed the dependent variable we are interested in, i.e. the daily ratio between the cigarettes on the ground vs the total. We also gathered data on some other variables affecting cigarette littering.

We applied the two treatments (the two nudges) in this way: we gathered data for a week on all the beaches without any treatment (so week 1 = pre-treatment/control for all). In the second week, we applied the first treatment on 1/3 of our beaches, the second treatment to 1/3 of our beaches, and the remaining 1/3 was the control group. On the third week, we rotated the treatments and control among the beaches. The same happened on the fourth week. In this way, we had data for both treatments and the control on every beach.

Now, looking at other studies, we could just perform an OLS regression to see if the treatments had a significant effect on littering. I was wondering however if I could apply a DiD and test in this way as well if the treatments were significant.

What do you guys think about this? Is there any other kind of analysis that I should run?

Thanks in advance :D

I have spent several years studying the psychology of scarcity, and I recently gave a TEDx talk about how scarcity acts as a hidden driver in our everyday decisions. I thought this might interest my fellow behavioral economists. https://youtu.be/gHpIj4P0Btc?si=38vTGLkz066vqt70

I’m working on my MBA dissertation and planning to focus on Behavioral Economics because I find it fascinating, especially the intersection of psychology and marketing. My goal is to explore the factors that lead consumers to make irrational decisions, specifically through the lens of cognitive biases.

I’d like my research to be quantitative, but I’m struggling to craft two strong research questions, a conceptual framework with clear variables and some Hypothesis. Here’s what I came up with so far

What is the impact of cognitive biases on consumer decision-making?

What factors drive consumers to think irrationally?

If you have any suggestions for refining these questions, or if you think a qualitative approach would work better (I’m hesitant due to the complexity but open to ideas), I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Also do you have any ideas for interesting topics within Behavioral Economics(like a different goal or in common to mine)

Edit: im doing my MBA in china

Hey! I am a econ college student and I’m looking for a research topic at the intersection of economics and the environment. Ideally, something around climate policy, green energy, sustainable development, policy implications, or the economic impact of environmental issues. I’d love any ideas or recent trends worth exploring. Thanks!

Hello, I am a junior currently taking management and economics courses in the Interdisciplinary Program. For our senior paper, we were tasked to make a thesis paper (a research paper, an applied research, or creative output) regarding our courses.

I already have a few in mind but I need help relating economics (microeconomics to macroeconomics, theories, consumer behaviors) to management (marketing, accounting, finance, leadership, business) and finding a topic that is practical and relevant. So, if you have a few ideas about possible topics, it will help me a lot because I just need a little more creative idea on how to integrate the two. Thank you so much!

If there are any experiments or research papers that you would personally use to back up your argument regarding any of these biases I'd love to hear about them!

Hi

Previously in my life, I have been widely interested in social psychology (in the behavioural part) and nudges. I managed a small company which had a partnership with a scientific department of social psychology and we tried to implement this in the product we were selling.

Now I have moved from this to a more technical job but next year I'll be moving back to business again. I am very interested in those two aspects, nudges and social psychology experiments. I have seen some resources online but do you guys have some recommendations about a good courses (plus if there's a diploma) that would not be full time, and if possible that could be taken online. The goal is to be able to set up nudges designs and evaluate the effect by my self.

Do you have any reco ?

Have a lovely weekend

Hi all, I think I have seen this question pop up a few times already so apologies for asking it again, but I’m currently in an MA program for Psych. I love it because it’s really helping me solidify what I’m interested in, both as future topics of research and what I would like my job to explore. I’m interested in judgment and decision making. I’m intrigued by intersection between psych and economics: the difference between economic and non economic utility, how that drives decision making in consumers, etc. I think it also parallels my interests in social psychology, and I’d really love to explore how social nature at population levels influence economies. Practically thinking about post graduation though is where I start to feel lost. I do want to go back and get my PhD, but not right after. I feel academically burnt out currently, which is not the mindset I want to have entering a 5+ yr program. I want to work, I want stable income lol, and more importantly I want to actually apply what I’ve been learning in school. I’m also surrounded by people who are mostly going the clinical route, so I don’t have much guidance on how to enter this field, if I even can.

1. Is it possible for me to enter neuro economics/BE if I’m getting my masters in Psych. The program itself is tailored to prep you for the doctoral route, so it’s very research and quant heavy. I also have been observing a lot of similarities in the way psychology thinks about quant research, how much it is valued, and how much of it is a requirement to actively contribute to the field. So it is my understanding that I’m in a field and a program learning skills/research techniques that are very relevant and transferable to this other field, but I could be wrong. I’m afraid that companies won’t be willing to receive me because I have a higher level degree in a field thats not Econ or Stats, and I don’t have an Econ background.
2. I’m not even sure what jobs to look for, like what titles they go by and what positions I would apply to starting out. The most obvious correlation that I can see if consumer/market analytics, but are there other kinds of jobs that I’m unaware of? Could Data Scientist be something to look in to?
3. I also am unsure about the skills and experience that these jobs require as part of the econ/finance field. I know coding is very important. I’m already learning R in my Stats class and teaching myself Python. Are there any other languages, certifications, etc that would help me bridge the gap?

I’d really appreciate any advice you guys have. I’ve been doing some research but it’s felt quite discouraging so far, almost as if it’s stupid to think that there is a correlation between psychology and economics. Please call me out if I’m being delusional lol, I’d rather get a reality check now than later and further down the rabbit hole. Thank you!

I have my Master's in Applied Behavior Analysis from Northeastern University and Bachelor's in Psychology from University of Hawaii. My career for the past 6 years is in Behavioral Health than Behavioral Science. I came across BeSci and Behavioral Econ about a year and half ago and trying to break it into the industry with my current credentials but no luck. I even got published and did some free work, but that doesn't seem to be helping. Is it worth it to get a master's? For context purposes, I have my own consulting practice now and I know that it'll help my business BUT, I want to prepare myself for a corporate or consulting career outside of my own, JUST IN CASE, I decide I don't want to be a solo-preneur anymore.

Because of my lifestyle and career, I can't commit to going back to grad school in-person for 2-3 years. So alot of amazing programs at the creme de la creme universities, are out of the picture. Of course I'd love to the London School of Econ program which is flexible, but I would be an international student and it's really costly (somewhere around $60k). I wouldn't be able to have access to grants and loans like I would in my home country of USA.

This leaves me with The Chicago School program thats an MA in Behavioral Economics, fully online. But will this truly help me launch in to the prestigious world of BeSci?

The other option is doing a Finance Masters with Harvard Extension School or an Industrial and Organizational Psychology Master's.

Both programs allow for grants, loans and scholarships, and they are half the price of LSE.

What's a better route? Chicago School? or Harvard Extension? While the former gives me the Masters in Behavioral Econ, the latter gives me a network of Harvard Alumni, and a more quantitative degree option in Finance.

For context-- I want to be qualified for international jobs and for Consulting Firms that use BeSci for Public Health, Marketing, Business growth and such.

Please advise!

Today I was watching a colleague in his trading platform, and it hit me: they’re eerily similar to slot machines in a casino. Think about it—the flashing lights, the constant color changes, prices updating multiple times a second. All these design elements seem less about giving us useful information and more about keeping us glued to the screen.

When I trade, I’m bombarded with rapid changes in red and green, along with price updates that never seem to stop. It feels overwhelming, almost hypnotic, and I started to wonder if that’s intentional. It’s like the platforms are built to draw our attention constantly, nudging us to stay active. And the constant ding of a price change or a market movement feels a lot like the slot machine reel stopping just short of a win.

Here’s my theory: just like casinos, trading platforms might be using behavioral design tricks to keep us hooked. The information overload, fast updates, and constant rewards (or punishments) for each small gain or loss create a feedback loop. Even if we try to step back, it’s hard because the platform makes it feel like we’re going to miss something big if we blink.

Anyone else noticed this? Do you think these design choices are intentional to keep us trading longer?

[Edit] are there masters post experience? I've been in the Fintech industry for 10+ years. Any suggestions?

Hi, I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this question but I'll give it a try.

I'm looking at masters or further studies in behavioral economics and finance or sciences and was wondering if there is a list of programs with pros/cons out there. I've only been able to find a few programs in the US and a few in Europe.

I'm attracted to the master in behavioral economics from the Erasmus school of economics as it seems the most practical one but I'm looking for suggestions.

My current situation:

• running/further developing my own tech business that focuses on private markets investments
• bachelor in finance and stats
• bachelor in economics
• master in international business

I'm open to any European, Asian or American programs, and to any suggestions from previous or current students.

Thank you in advance.

So,I wanted to make a model that predicts inflation. I want to use retail data and was wondering what items should I look for to correlate with inflation. If people are rational agents and they receive advice that inflation is coming will they start preping by extensive shopping . If so will they shop everyday items, will they cut out big purchases (cars,expensive clothes) or will they buy big purchases (luxury items) because they would know they wont do so soon. So. how do I prepare my dataset and what data to include on a pure economical logic.

Hello all,

I recently completed my DBA (January 2024) and my dissertation was about the effects of AI-generated reviews on consumer choice behavior, and this has inspired me to look further into BE. I'm still hungry for knowledge and want to follow a BE path. I noticed that UChicago Booth has a course in Behavioral Economics, and I'm intrigued (way cheaper than the one offered by HBS, I might add).

Has anyone taken this course, and what are your thoughts? I spoke with someone from the admissions team that reached out to me almost instantaneously after I requested a brochure. She said there really isn't any quant analysis (I love quant and statistics), which kind of disappointed me. I love to do statistical modeling and kind of want to learn some applied BE. The general overview that I was able to glean from her that you are evaluated on written reflective assignments without a general grading rubric. As a note, online courses at HBS are graded in this way, although they have quizzes and also evaluate your engagement with peers.

Your thoughts? Any suggestions of other courses that are delivered online which embody quant and qualitative analysis for behavioral economics? I've done courses on Coursera in the past, and this was integral to my MBA at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, but I'd like to do something directly with a school on an online basis.

Thanks

I am currently taking a course about Behavioural Economics at University and I am stuck at this questions and wondering how to mathematically calculate it. The question is which of the three games Person 2 would choose if they had a generous distributional preference. In my opion its option C as it maximises the payoff for the other participants while keeping Player 2s payoff constant. My classmate argues that Generosity is based on Maxmin preference so he argues it is A since there Person 3 has the highest payoff. Could anybody please help me out. Here is the table:

Thank you for your help

Hi everyone! I'm an IB student in year 11 currently who's chosen to do an economics EE on the topic, 'the effect of nudge theory on promoting healthier eating habits'. I haven't fully decided on a research question yet, but right now it's something along the lines of 'to what extent do nudges affect the consumption of processed, packaged foods high in sugar (and sodium?) in *my location*.

Essentially, I'd like to conduct an experiment where I get people to log their consumption of packaged foods for one week, and then compare that to their consumption after I introduce the nudges. My EE supervisor actually suggested an app called 'yuka' which scans barcodes and provides a health score out of 100 along with other nutritional information. My plan right now is for that to be one nudge, and for another group to look at nutrition labels after the first week of initial recording.

However, I'm a little stuck for ideas right now since I'm not sure if I should just focus on one aspect of the nutrition label or look at it from a wholistic point of view. I discussed this with my supervisor who pointed out that if I only focused on one aspect e.g. sugar then what would the point of the app be since yuka gives an overall score. He though maybe I could compare the results between the nutrition label and app group and see whether the app brings anything new to the table in terms of altering consumer behaviour, since nutrition labels have been around for quite som time now and there is still market failure when it comes to processed foods due to irrational behaviour.

Thanks to anyone who takes the time to read this and any help would be greatly appreciated!

Hi everyone!

I’m currently working on drafting a 10-week syllabus for an Introduction to Behavioral Economics course, and I’d love to hear the community’s thoughts on how to structure it effectively. If you were tasked with designing this course, how would you break it down?

For context, the course will be for upper-level undergraduate students with a basic econometric background: diff-diff, IV, etc. I’d love to hear how you would structure the course, which topics you think are essential, and any recommended readings, experiments, or interactive elements you’ve found effective.

I am especially having trouble choosing econometrics papers and deciding the order of the topics. I’m eager to hear your thoughts and suggestions. Feel free to share any past experiences you’ve had designing or taking similar courses.

Thanks so much in advance!!!

I'm particularly interested in how LLMs might replicate or diverge from human biases and heuristics identified in behavioral economics (e.g., loss aversion, overconfidence). Are there any studies or research exploring whether LLMs can accurately simulate these behaviors, or perhaps where they diverge or fall short compared to human decision-making? I'd love to hear any insights or recommendations on this topic. For context, I'm currently building my own Python framework (see GitHub) to use LLMs for simulating human behavior.

The Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics spoke with Dr. George Loewenstein about what he’s been working on recently and his thoughts on being the face of behavioral economics on Reddit. See the story here.

Hey guys! I am currently a Bachelors student doing my Major in Psychology. I have a very strong interest in BE for my masters later on, and then subsequently starting a career in Behavioral Economics.

I know that this is going to be a very very tough ride but I am willing to do the hard work and achieve my goal.

Right now I need some help from someone who is either a student of BE or a professional to help me sort out the courses I would need. My department has little understanding of this matter and so I believe someone more knowledgeable would be able to help me out better.

I’ll share the options with you, and you can let me know that these courses will be good and they will provide you with the foundational knowledge I will need later in my life. Also, a few suggestions of certain skills I would need for BE would be a huge huge help. Thank you so much.