No one could accuse the boy’s self-appointed trainers of lacking ambition or being sticklers for ethical research. Psychologist John Watson of Johns Hopkins University and his graduate student Rosalie Rayner first observed that a 9-month-old boy, identified as Albert B., sat placidly when the researchers placed a white rat in More
Daniel Kahneman is a psychologist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Daniel joins the Armchair Expert to discuss the complexity of human nature, studying judgment and decision-making, and his experiments involving loss aversion. Daniel explains that memories can play tricks on More
In 1906, the British statistician and polymath Francis Galton attended a country fair at which the attendees were invited to estimate the weight of an ox. Out of curiosity, Galton borrowed the cards on which the guesses were written, took them home, and ran the numbers. To his surprise, the More
Featuring articles on the sharing economy, health and happiness, and social connection. More
A sample of research exploring links between income inequality and psychological health and ethical free riding. More
THAT human beings often continue to pour money into bad projects because they have already invested in them and cannot bring themselves to lose that investment is well known. Indeed the sunk-cost fallacy, as this phenomenon is called, is frequently cited as an example of people failing to behave in More
