Essays on Economic Psychology


Book Description

Economic behavior is explored from a psychological perspective by both, prominent economic psychologists with a long tradition in studying economic problems as well as economists who are open and interested in the psychological aspects of economic behavior. The contributions discuss the prospects and difficulties of this dialogue between psychology and economics and survey some important areas of research where such an interdisciplinary approach has proved to be successful. The text can also be used to introduce psychology to economists in order to give them an idea how to analyze economic problems from a psychological perspective. It also indicates many urgent and exciting research topics awaiting eager scholars to carry on the dialogue.




Social Psychology and Economics


Book Description

This book combines chapters written by leading social psychologists and economists, illuminating the developing trends in explaining and understanding economic behavior in a social world. It provides insights from both fields, communicated by eloquent scholars, and demonstrates through recent research and theory how economic behaviors may be more effectively examined using a combination of both fields. Social Psychology and Economics comes at a particularly fitting time, as a psychological approach to economics has begun to flourish in recent years, and papers exploring the intersection of these two disciplines have appeared in peer-reviewed journals, opening a dynamic dialogue between previously separated fields. This volume, the first in the Society for Judgment and Decision Making Series since acquired by Psychology Press, includes chapters by economists and psychologists. It addresses a variety of economic phenomena within a social context, such as scarcity and materialism, emphasizing the importance of integrating social psychology and economics. Social Psychology and Economics is arranged in seven parts that discuss: an introduction to the topic; preferences, utility, and choice; emotions; reciprocity, cooperation, and fairness; social distance; challenges to social psychology and economics; and collaborative reflections and projections. The market for this book is students, researchers, and professionals in the disciplines of economics, psychology, business, and behavioral decision making. Graduate students and upper-level undergraduate students will consider it a useful supplemental text.




Renaissance in Behavioral Economics


Book Description

Economists working on behavioral economics have been awarded the Nobel Prize four times in recent years. This book explores this innovative area and in particular focuses on the work of Harvey Leibenstein, one of the pioneers of the discipline. The topics covered in the book include agency theory; dynamic efficiency; evolutionary economics; X-efficiency; the effect of emotions, specifically affect on decision-making; market pricing; experimental economics; human resource management; the Carnegie School, and intra-industry efficiency in less developed countries.




Essays in Socio-Economics


Book Description

These essays deal with various aspects of a new, rising field, socio economics. The field is seeking to combine the variables studied by neoclassical economists with those typically studied by other social sciences. The combination is expected to provide a better understanding of economic behavior and the economy as well as society; make more reliable predictions; and be more in line with normative values we seek to uphold. The new field, though, may be less elegant mathematically and possibly less parsimonious than neoclassical economics. Some of my ideas on this subject are included in a previously published book, The Moral Dimension: TowardA New Economics (New York: The Free Press, 1988). They also led to a formation of an international society of several thousand scholars who are interested in the field, the Society for the Advancement of Socio-Economics. The essays at hand are in effect grouped. The first two, previously published respectively in the Journal of Economic Psychology and Business Ethics Quarterly, reflect my most recent thinking. They both have a utopian streak that may stand out especially in these days when unfeathered capitalism is the rage. The first points to people, who far from making consuming ever more their life's project, seek a less affiuent way oflife. It examines the psychological foundations and the social consequences of such an approach.




Essays on Psychology


Book Description




The Psychology of Saving


Book Description

Some people save and others with similar incomes and wealth do not. Why? Whilst psychology has devoted little attention to the forward looking dimension of human behavior, it contributes theories and techniques for studying the cognitive, motivational, and social factors that affect saving. The book examines the assumption that man is forward looking and desires to provide for the future. It summarizes theories and behavioral research in the area of saving and explores the psychological insights and findings of economists and interprets them in terms of modern psychology. The Psychology of Saving will be welcomed as a major contribution to economic psychology which brings together research and analysis, developing our understanding about rationality, expectations, and consumer behavior.




The Future of Law and Economics


Book Description

In a concise, compelling argument, one of the founders and most influential advocates of the law and economics movement divides the subject into two separate areas, which he identifies with Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. The first, Benthamite, strain, “economic analysis of law,” examines the legal system in the light of economic theory and shows how economics might render law more effective. The second strain, law and economics, gives equal status to law, and explores how the more realistic, less theoretical discipline of law can lead to improvements in economic theory. It is the latter approach that Judge Calabresi advocates, in a series of eloquent, thoughtful essays that will appeal to students and scholars alike.







The Economic Approach to Human Behavior


Book Description

Since his pioneering application of economic analysis to racial discrimination, Gary S. Becker has shown that an economic approach can provide a unified framework for understanding all human behavior. In a highly readable selection of essays Becker applies this approach to various aspects of human activity, including social interactions; crime and punishment; marriage, fertility, and the family; and "irrational" behavior. "Becker's highly regarded work in economics is most notable in the imaginative application of 'the economic approach' to a surprising breadth of human activity. Becker's essays over the years have inevitably inspired a surge of research activity in testimony to the richness of his insights into human activities lying 'outside' the traditionally conceived economic markets. Perhaps no economist in our time has contributed more to expanding the area of interest to economists than Becker, and a number of these thought-provoking essays are collected in this book."—Choice Gary Becker was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economic Science in 1992.




Computable, Constructive and Behavioural Economic Dynamics


Book Description

The book contains thirty original articles dealing with important aspects of theoretical as well as applied economic theory. While the principal focus is on: the computational and algorithmic nature of economic dynamics; individual as well as collective decision process and rational behavior, some contributions emphasize also the importance of classical recursion theory and constructive mathematics for dynamical systems, business cycles theories, growth theories, and others are in the area of history of thought, methodology and behavioural economics. The contributors range from Nobel Laureates to the promising new generation of innovative thinkers. This volume is also a Festschrift in honour of Professor Kumaraswamy Vela Velupillai, the founder of Computable Economics, a growing field of research where important results stemming from classical recursion theory and constructive mathematics are applied to economic theory. The aim and hope is to provide new tools for economic modelling. This book will be of particular appeal to postgraduate students and scholars in one or more of the following fields: computable economics, business cycles, macroeconomics, growth theories, methodology, behavioural economics, financial economics, experimental and agent based economics. It might be also of importance to those interested on the general theme of algorithmic foundations for social sciences.