Jonah Berger’s Invisible Influence is in the tradition of informative marketing books based upon behavioral research, think Dan Ariely, Sheena Iyengar, or Chip Heath. He concentrates on optimal distinctiveness and social influence. Some of the details people may know from elsewhere but all of which are interesting. Optimal Distinctiveness And Social Influence One of the…
Category: Management Theory
Behavioral Economics Sports Bingo
A bit of an unusual post today. It being summer, therefore, here is a behavioral economics sports bingo card. Behavioural Economics Sports Bingo Game I’m looking for some help in assessing my new Behavioral Economics Sports Bingo game. The idea is that when you are watching sports you lookout for interesting comments from commentators, players,…
Tackling Big Problems With Behavioral Science
Jason Furman (former chair of the U.S. Council of Economic Advisers) discusses tackling big problems with behavioral science. He says behavioral studies can help address four major issues in the economy. Tackling Big Problems With Behavioral Science He isn’t joking when he says they are major. They really are. The four he choose are: 1)…
The Failure Of Markets
I very much enjoyed John Cassidy’s How Markets Fail. It is an ambitious piece in which he tries to describe how economic thought has impacted real-world markets. He has a special focus on the collapse of the financial markets in 2007/8 and the economic thought behind the failure to regulate the markets properly. What does he say about the failure…
The Trump Fallacy
Dixit and Nalebuff have great skill in popularizing game theory. Today I will detail a problem that I will call The Trump Fallacy. Theory And Understanding The World Their work is full of interesting examples and useful ways of looking at sometimes tricky concepts. They are strong believers in having theory to back up ideas…
Behaviourally Informed Government Policy
In a companion piece to the article published on the BEAR (Behavioural Economics In Action at Rotman) website Dilip Soman, Katie Chen, and myself have an article in the Spring issue of the Rotman Management magazine. This is an issue completely dedicated to behavioral insights. It has some major academic names in the field — Richard Thaler, George…
Why Not Test?
People love appearing to have knowledge. Often they are less careful about working out whether what they are saying makes sense. A concern I have is that we often claim to know much more than we actually know. We have some hunches or ideas and these gain the status of facts in our minds. Clearly this influences…
Reference Group Neglect: Don’t Gamble With Gamblers
The problem of why entrepreneurs start up companies is an interesting one. Many fail but it doesn’t seem to put new ones off. Colin Camerer and Dan Lovallo examined a possible reason for this. (They examine it in a lab so can’t give definitive answers but it is still interesting.) The authors use a small game…
Accounting For Brands
In a 2003 piece Tony McAuley discussed the history of accounting for intangible values. He interviewed Michael Schurch, CFO of RHM (Rank Hovis McDougall). They discussed the company’s decision to add the value of brands to the balance sheet back in 1988. This created a bit of a stir at the time, and has influenced accounting for…
Food Lessons From An Economist
Tyler Cowen’s “An Economist Gets Lunch” is pretty self-indulgent. In this book we get food lessons from an economist. Self-Indulgence Firstly, Cowen really loves his food and is happy to share his enthusiasm for high-quality meals. The second sense of self-indulgence is of an academic doing what he loves. I don’t mean to imply this negatively. When people do…
