Why People Agree to Work Boring Jobs
NPR recently covered my research with David Comerford on effort aversion. Our research gives some insight into how people wind up in boring jobs. You can listen to the NPR Morning Edition segment here.
David Brooks is a pretty solidly moderate conservative, and one who is a big fan of behavioral science. But that doesn’t mean he can see beyond his own biases, especially when describing the differences between conservatives and liberals. He was particularly offensive on May 7, in an article titled “Beyond the Fence,” in which he discusses…
Heuristics is jargon used by decision psychologists and behavioral economists to refer to cognitive shortcuts we humans take to make judgments and decisions. One of the first heuristics identified as such by Danny Kahneman and Amos Tversky was the anchoring heuristic. I would define it for you, but it is wonderfully captured in this cartoon:
In an article from the Atlantic last January, Joshua Lang wrote a wonderful article about the challenge of deciding whether surgical anesthesia actually makes people unconscious, or whether people remember parts of their surgery and are traumatized by them later. In the article, he quotes George Wilson, a Scottish chemist who had his foot amputated…
McDonald’s has announced that it would no longer market junk food to kids and it’s going to include more fruits and vegetables in on its adult menu. The move came after another fast food joint, Burger King, rolled out the lower-calorie French fries it has dubbed “Satisfries.” Apparently, they are 20% healthier but “taste the…
According to many traditional economic theories of human nature, higher income should make people happier. That’s because with every additional dollar we make, we can purchase goods that increase our “utility.” Or we can save more money, and reduce anxiety about our financial future. But of course, once people have enough money to meet the…
One of the more useful phenomena employed in psychological research is what’s known as “priming.” This idea is simple: get a thought into people’s heads, and it lingers, thereby affecting future thoughts. Hold a cup of hot tea while riding an elevator, and the next person you meet might seem to have a warmer personality!…