Module overview
This module gives an overview of the concepts, models, and findings in behavioural economics. Behavioural economics is a field of economics that imports relevant insights from neighbouring disciplines, like psychology and anthropology, to inform economic theory and policy. Many of these insights have been generated through lab and field experiments about the drivers of economic behaviour, and they have revealed systematic patterns of individual and group behaviour. These systematic patterns are relevant for economic behaviour in several domains (e.g. consumption, savings, risk behaviour), and this module studies them in depth. It also exposes students to modifications of economic theory that capture these patterns, and to various behavioural phenomena such as self-control problems and cognitive bias, both in theory and in practice. It equips students with the theoretical toolset to analyse and understand economic choices in the presence of behavioural biases, as well as the analytical tools to make normative and policy analysis in the presence of behavioural phenomena. The module also emphasises the consequences of departures from classical microeconomic theory for prediction of economic choices and market outcomes and policy implications.
Linked modules
Prerequisite: ECON2044 or ECON2033 or (ECON1018 and ECON2039)