My favorite behavioral economist title. ( )

This was a revealing and fun look at how people are influenced by surprising factors when making a decision. Having a product be 'Free' or thinking of a random number, like the last 2 digits of your social security number, can influence how much you're willing to pay for things. I definitely saw myself in many of the examples and it gave me food for thought on why some decisions are so difficult for me.

Very informative and entertaining. This would be a fun book to read and discuss with others. ( )

Humans are complex animals. To help us understand why we do what we do, Ariely describes the new field of Behavioral Economics as encompassing psychology and economics. The economics side focuses on rational thoughts, while the psychological side interprets our personal and manipulated thoughts, together contributing to our mostly irrational behavior.

Each chapter breaks down the how and why of our actions based on the following methods of making decisions: Relativity, Herding, Anchor Pricing, Market Norms and Social Norms. Ariely and his colleagues used experiments to test various theories giving his book solid footing.

I did like that Ariely provided a number of solutions to assist us in how to start thinking more rationally so we can act more rationally but they were very broad and more of a starting point for people to consider.

I learned much from this book but felt it provided too generally broad explanations for our irrational behavior. I thought many of the experiments seemed too simple and didn’t go far enough. Was it only college students who were tested or different age groups? I felt that people’s individual preferences and idiosyncrasies weren’t addressed as another piece of the puzzle. In other words, it didn’t include enough PERSONAL psychology.

Perhaps my issue with Predictably Irrational is that I don’t like thinking about how vulnerable we are to external influences i.e. culture, events, businesses’ marketing practices, etc. Or that we rely on others to control our decision-making. ( )

A highly accessible collection and explanation of the author's work in various studies demonstrating that whereas humans are often irrational in their behavior, they prove predictably irrational: they follow patterns which can be perceived.

The author does well at demolishing one of the fundamental assumptions of the standard theory of economics: that man, in general, is a rational animal, and always calculates rationally when considering buying and selling. Instead, the author demonstrates through all sorts of studies that humans frequently overvalue certain things and undervalue others, treat "free" things very differently than things for which there is an expense, have expectations based on price points, tend to make decisions in ways that either follow the crowd or give the perception of standing on one's own, the difference between doing something for service vs. for pay, and many other examples.

The book is an embarrassing read because it forces a person to confront his or her own irrationality; whether we wish to admit it or not, we would most likely behave as the people in the various studies did.

But the book is valuable in helping to point out exactly how we tend to be irrational. This can help us in our interactions with others, a check on our own behavior, and a warning lest we put too much confidence in any philosophy which demands pure rationality from humanity. ( )

I hadn't expected this book to be so entertaining. It's basically a collection of psychological experiments to test biases and illogical behavior that we all share. I was particularly impressed by the three options tests, where you have option A, option B, and a third option that's basically option B but a little bit worse, in which case most of the time people will choose option A - far more often than if they only have to choose between A and B. A lot of good food for thought in this one, particularly for people (like me) who think of themselves as generally rational. Recommended. ( )