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Money, values, & behavior

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The Unselfish Gene. Artwork: Geoffrey Cottenceau and Romain Rousset, Flamme, 2009 In 1976, evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins wrote in The Selfish Gene, “If you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, you can expect little help from biological nature.

The Unselfish Gene

Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish.” By 2006, the tide had started to turn. Harvard University mathematical biologist Martin Nowak could declare, in an overview of the evolution of cooperation in Science magazine, “Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of evolution is its ability to generate cooperation in a competitive world. Thus, we might add ‘natural cooperation’ as a third fundamental principle of evolution beside mutation and natural selection.” The 15-Word Fix for Tragically Misguided Logic (Needism) The sharing economy is bullsh!t. Here’s how we can take it back. The sharing economy is bullshit.


Airbnb is a rental broker. Uber and Lyft are unregulated cab services. Taskrabbit and similar “servant economy” enterprises let well-off people pay less well-off people to do their chores — without providing anyone the benefits and security of traditional employment. Class differences. University of California, Irvine, professor Paul Piff, PhD, starts his courses on class differences by asking students about their consumer habits: Do they shop at J.C.

Class differences

Penney or Neiman Marcus? What kind of car do they drive, if they drive at all? What is their preferred breakfast, a fruit smoothie from Starbucks or a Dunkin' Donut? "As people reconstruct their days, it's clear that in every single decision they make, class is an essential feature," says Piff. The implications are larger than breakfast choice, he adds. Behavioral Economics 101. This page was adapted from A Glimpse of Behavioral Economics by ideas42 and Applying Behavioral Research to Asset-Building Initiatives by CFED innovator-in-residence Mindy Hernandez.

Behavioral Economics 101

Behavioral economics is the study of how people make choices – not in a simplified economic model, but in the textured and rich reality of daily life – and draws on insights from both psychology and economics. Standard theorizing from traditional economic models assumes that people are highly rational and pursue their goals consistently, without mistakes or need for help. Applying a behavioral economics lens provides us with a fresh perspective. Bounded rationality is a foundational notion of behavioral economics. Bounded rationality proposes that we are not the perfectly rational men and women presented in the standard economic model, but neither are we arbitrary beings whose choices and preferences are completely unpredictable. The Danger of Financial Jargon. The most important mystery of ancient Egypt concerned the annual inundation of the Nile floodplain.

The Danger of Financial Jargon

The calendar was divided into three seasons linked to the river and the agricultural cycle it determined: akhet, or the inundation; peret, the growing season; and shemu, the harvest. The size of the harvest depended on the size of the flood: too little water, and there would be famine; too much, and there would be catastrophe; just the right amount, and the whole country would bloom and prosper. 6 studies of money and the mind. Paul Piff shares some of his research on the science of greed at TEDxMarin.

6 studies of money and the mind

How does being rich affect the way we behave? In today’s talk, social psychologist Paul Piff provides a convincing case for the answer: not well. The Military Family Research Institute at Purdue University. Terrance Odean. Paul Piff. Paul Piff studies how social hierarchy, inequality and emotion shape relations between individuals and groups.

Paul Piff

Why you should listen Paul Piff is a post-doctoral researcher in the psychology department at the University of California, Berkeley.​ In particular, he studies how wealth (having it or not having it) can affect interpersonal relationships. His surprising studies include running rigged games of Monopoly, tracking how those who drive expensive cars behave versus those driving less expensive vehicles and even determining that rich people are literally more likely to take candy from children than the less well-off. The results often don't paint a pretty picture about the motivating forces of wealth.

What others say. Want To Retire Wealthier? Start by Scanning Your Photo - WSJ. How Money Makes People Act Less Human. In a windowless room on the University of California, Berkeley, campus, two undergrads are playing a Monopoly game that one of them has no chance of winning.

How Money Makes People Act Less Human

A team of psychologists has rigged it so that skill, brains, savvy, and luck—those ingredients that ineffably combine to create success in games as in life—have been made immaterial. Here, the only thing that matters is money. You Make Better Decisions If You “See” Your Senior Self. The finding: Many people feel disconnected from the individuals they’ll be in the future and, as a result, discount rewards that would later benefit them.

You Make Better Decisions If You “See” Your Senior Self

But brief exposure to aged images of the self can change that behavior. The research: Hal Hershfield ran fMRI scans on subjects and found that the neural patterns seen when they described themselves 10 years in the future were markedly different from those seen when they described their current selves (but similar to those seen when they talked about actors). In a later asset allocation task, people whose brain activity changed the most when they began discussing their future selves were the least likely to favor large long-term gains over small immediate ones. However, in follow-up experiments, when subjects were shown aged images of themselves, that tendency disappeared.

Bitcoin is Gamification. Sick of this market-driven world? You should be. To be at peace with a troubled world: this is not a reasonable aim.

Sick of this market-driven world? You should be

It can be achieved only through a disavowal of what surrounds you. To be at peace with yourself within a troubled world: that, by contrast, is an honourable aspiration. Pocket: Log In. Followership. Followership refers to a role held by certain individuals in an organization, team, or group. Specifically, it is the capacity of an individual to actively follow a leader.[1] Followership is the reciprocal social process of leadership.[2] The study of followership (part of the emerging study of Leadership psychology) is integral to a better understanding of leadership, as the success and failure of groups, organizations, and teams is not only dependent on how well a leader can lead, but also on how well the followers can follow.[3] Specifically, followers play an active role in organization, group, and team successes and failures.[4] Effective followers are individuals who are considered to be enthusiastic, intelligent, ambitious, and self-reliant.[1] The emergence of the field of followership has been attributed to the scholar Robert Kelley.[4] Kelley[3] described four main qualities of effective followers, which include: Followership Patterns (Types)[edit] References[edit]

FREE Download on Why You Should Bribe Your Kids: A New Freakonomics Radio Podcast. [MUSIC: Pearl Django, “La Rive Gauche” (from Under Paris Skies)] Stephen J. DUBNER: Hello, John List? John LIST: Stephen Dubner, how are you doing, man? Why Everybody Who Doesn’t Hate Bitcoin Loves It: Full Transcript. This is a transcript of the Freakonomics Radio podcast “Why Everybody Who Doesn’t Hate Bitcoin Loves It.” [MUSIC: Greg Ruby Quartet, “Swing for Dudley” (from Look Both Ways)] Stephen J. One Reason Cross-Cultural Small Talk Is So Tricky - Erin Meyer. By Erin Meyer | 8:00 AM May 30, 2014 It was my first dinner party in France and I was chatting with a Parisian couple. All was well until I asked what I thought was a perfectly innocent question: “How did the two of you meet?” Michael Sandel: Why we shouldn't trust markets with our civic life. Collared or Untied: Reflections on Work in American Culture. The evils of meritocracy. © Geert Vanden Wijngaert/AP/Press Association Images.

Money Can't Buy Trustworthiness - David DeSteno. Why Americans Are the Weirdest People in the World. IN THE SUMMER of 1995, a young graduate student in anthropology at UCLA named Joe Henrich traveled to Peru to carry out some fieldwork among the Machiguenga, an indigenous people who live north of Machu Picchu in the Amazon basin. Why No Sustained Protests (Yet)? How economic news keeps us dumb and stops us changing the world. Unpaid Labor, On Purpose: Why We Volunteer.

At the San Francisco literacy center where I work, I see more than 40 volunteers every week. Brigid Schulte’s Overwhelmed and our epidemic of busyness. Photo by Thinkstock. ‘Slomo’ ‘Slomo’ Last Word On Mozilla. I wrote about the Mozilla CEO termination thing (I, II, III). Millennials Don't Care About Owning Cars, And Car Makers Can't Figure Out Why.

The Cheapest Generation - Derek Thompson and Jordan Weissmann. 48 Psychological Facts About Yourself. What Makes People Happy. How computer games can help us overthrow capitalism. Science Of Persuasion. Culture and Resources : Personal Finance : Family. Behavioral economics show that women tend to make better investments than men. A Friendly Chat With a Rich Person (Household Income: $360,000) The Mental Burden of a Lower-Class Background. The transparent avatar in your brain: Thomas Metzinger at TEDxBarcelona. 6 Ways Money Really Can Buy Happiness. Companies Need To Pay People More. Onora O'Neill: What we don't understand about trust. How to "Just Say No" to Peer Pressured Spending. Dan Gilbert - PopTech 2007. Three Big Money Mistakes You Could Be Making Right Now.

List of cognitive biases. Bounded rationality. Cognitive bias. Companies Need To Pay People More. How to Think About the Federal "Nudge Squad" Why We Keep Playing the Lottery - Issue 4: The Unlikely. Learned Helplessness. Money on the Mind. What Isn’t for Sale? - Michael J. Sandel. The Homeless Person with a Cell Phone. A Homeless Man and His BlackBerry. The Real Normal. Bondsy and the Modern Myth of Barter. Machines Can't Flow: The Difference Between Mechanical and Human Productivity - Linda Stone.

Dan Ariely - The Upside of Irrationality. Watch Episodes - Justice with Michael Sandel. Michael Sandel: This much I know. Exploitation. The Inequality Crisis. Positive psychology. How Numbers Affect Your Happiness. 6 Being by Doing Invoking the Self. How to Spot Con Men Before They Spot You. Lectures: Bloom. Robert Sapolsky: Are Humans Just Another Primate? Stanford's Sapolsky On Depression in U.S. (Full Lecture) Unequal or Unfair: Which Is Worse? - The Darwin Economy. The Persuaders. Mind Over Money. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF CONSUMERISM. Secret Fears of the Super-Rich - Graeme Wood. Dan Pink - Drive. Making the Choice Between Money and Meaning - Umair Haque. Alain de Botton: Imagining Advertisements for Things We Really Need. What Are You Worth? Getting Past Status Anxiety.

The Emerging Mind: How relationships and the embodied brain shape who we are. Frans de Waal: Moral behavior in animals. Amy Cuddy: Your body language shapes who you are.