Third party publications
New Economics Foundation
Behavioural Economics: Seven Principles for Policy Makers
A useful attempt at applying Behavioural Economics in the public policy sphere but with plenty of general learning applicable more widely
Mindspace
Influencing Behaviour through Public Policy
Well researched publication from the Cabinet Office and The Institute for Government. Comes in two flavours — full report or ‘Practical Guide’.
“ Behavioural Economics & The Future of Behavioural Analysis”
by Dr Steven R Hursh.
A 2003 deck from a leading academic. Heavy and hard to digest it nonetheless has some good technical graphs and examples.
“Behavioural Economics: Reunifying Psychology and Economics”
by Colin Camerer
Paper that discussed the background of economics’ use of psychology.
A Marketer’s Guide To Behavioural Econonics
The official endorsement from McKinsey’s that marketing can ‘do’ Behavioural Economics. Download requires free registration.
Financial Capability: A Behavioural Economics Perspective
by David de Meza, Bernd Irlenbusch & Diane Reyneirs
Published in 2008 this report was commissioned from the LSE by the Financial Servcies Authority to see what Behavioural Economics could add to making people more financially capable (i.e. better with money)
Academic papers
How online brand communities work
by Mike Hall, Partner, Development, VERVE
With Paddy Barwise, Emeritus Professor of Management and Marketing at London Business School and Emma Morioka, Partner, Proposition Development, VERVE (2010)
Tool Kit: 'Nudge Your Customers Toward Better Choices'
by Daniel G. Goldsteine, Eric J. Johnson, Andreas Herrmann and Mark Heitmann, Harvard Business Review (2008), pp. 99-105
The standard version of your product or service can boost satisfaction and profits - or fuel defections and lawsuits. Here's how to design defaults so that everyone wins.
'The Science of Liberty'
by Paul J Zak (2008)
‘ A Behavioral Model of Rational Choice’
by Herbert A. Simon Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 69, No. 1 (Feb. 1955), pp. 99-118
Simon was amongst the first Economists to start discussing the weaknesses inherent in assuming economic behaviour was always rational. This 1955 paper is regarded as an early classic.
‘ A Psychological Perspective on Economics’
by Daniel Kahneman, American Economic Review, Vol. 93 No.2 (2003), pp. 162-168
Kahneman’s contributing is unequalled and his literature voluminous. This paper is a useful survey of the extent and ambitions of Behavioural Economics.
‘ Behavioral Economics: Past, Present, Future’
by Colin Camerer and George Loewenstein, Advances in Behavioral Economics, Chap. 1 (2004), pp. 3-51
This introductory chapter to a collection of 25 eminent papers is itself one of the most useful surveys of the subject matter covered by Behavioural Economics.
‘The Framing of Decisions and the Psychology of Choice’
by Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, Science 211 (1981) pp. 453-458
‘ Rational Choice and the Framing of Decisions’
by Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman, Journal of Business Vol. 59 No. 4 (Oct. 1986), pp. S251-S278
Two classics from the Tversky and Kahneman stable. Both demonstrate how the simple reframing of a proposition can change people’s response to it even though neither content nor outcomes change. As framing is arguably the very business of advertising (to present a proposition in its most favourable light) these papers are essential reading.
‘A Tale of Two Pizzas: Building Up from a Basic Product Versus Scaling Down from a Fully-Loaded Product’
by Irwin P. Levin, Judy Schreiber, Marco Lauriola and Gary J. Gaeth, Marketing Letters, Vol. 13, No. 4 (Nov. 2002), pp. 335-344.
When given the choice between building up from a simple pizza or scaling down from a fully-loaded product people end up in very different places. A clear example of framing, loss aversion and the endowment effect working together.
‘ When Choice Is Demotivating: Can One Desire Too Much of a Good Thing?’
by S. S. Iyengar and M. R. Lepper, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Vol. 79, (2000) pp. 995-1006
The original paper to discuss choice amongst jams and apparent negative effects of increasing choice.
‘ Placebo Effects of Marketing Actions: Consumers May Get What They Pay For’
by Baba Shiv, Ziv Carmon, and Dan Ariely, Journal of Marketing Research 383 Vol. XLII (November 2005), 383—393
One of Ariely and his teams most ingenious experiments to show that when drinking a soft-drink meant to increase mental sharpness, increasing the price of the drink actually seems to make people smarter.
‘ Mental Accounting Matters’
by Richard H. Thaler Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 12 (1999), pp. 183-206
The idea of earmarking money for one thing and not another is familiar to us all. Thaler analyses how this behaviour effects how we handle money bringing an economist’s precision to an everyday phenomenon.