050: Dan Ariely on Irrational Behavior and the Importance of Our Environment When Making Decisions

Dan Ariely is Professor of Psychology & Behavioral Economics at Duke University in North Carolina. Dan’s interests span a wide range of behaviors, and his sometimes unusual experiments are consistently interesting, amusing and informative, demonstrating profound ideas that fly in the face of common wisdom. Dan is the author of the New York Times bestsellers Predictably Irrational, The Upside of Irrationality, and The Honest Truth About Dishonesty and his latest book Irrationally Yours is now available. Dan received a B.A in Psychology from Tel Aviv University, an M.A and PhD in Cognitive Psychology from University of North Carolina and another PhD in Business Administration from Duke University. In this episode you will learn: about Dan Ariely’s traumatic experience resulting in severe burns. how Dan found his love for psychology and behavioral economics. why Dan will not be teaching his Irrational Behavior course on Coursera. the problems with MOOCs like Coursera and why it is making the wrong choice regarding its open platform system. why Dan was turned down for his first book - a cookbook and what advice he was given by a publisher. why we as humans make very costly mistakes and what we can do about it. how people eat more than they realise and how experiments in economics have shown this. why we are bad at doing things that makes us happy. the most common mistake companies make when making decisions or processing information. if anger is a good or bad emotion. the most surprising finding from Dan Ariely’s research. the most surprising question put to Dan in his Ask Ariely column. how your environment matters when making decisions. and much more. Check out the shownotes and the links to resources and books mentioned in this podcast at www.economicrockstar.com/danariely Subscribe on iTunes and never miss an episode.