Behavioural Economics

Psychology, Neuroscience, and the Human Side of Economics

By: David Orrell

Narrated by: Al Kessel

For centuries, economics was dominated by the idea that we are rational individuals who optimize our own “utility”. Then, in the 1970s, psychologists demonstrated that the reality is a lot messier. We don’t really know what our utility is, and we care about people other than ourselves. We are susceptible to external nudges. And far from being perfectly rational, we are prone to “cognitive biases” with complex effects on decision-making, such as forgetting to prepare for retirement. In this book, David Orrell explores the findings from psychology and neuroscience that are shaking up economics - and that are being exploited by policy-makers and marketers alike to shape everything from how we shop for food to how we tackle societal happiness or climate change. Finally, he asks whether behavioral economics is a scientific revolution or just a scientific form of marketing.

©2021 David Orrell (P)2021 Dreamscape Media, LLC

Narrator is hard to listen to

I am fascinated by the subject matter, it seems well written, and I really think it will be a great book! However, the narrator emphasizes seemingly random words and has a strange “sing song” inflection to which I found impossible to listen. I’ll be purchasing the physical book instead.