Summary Consumer and Economic psychology week 1+2 literature and lectures

Contents
Week 1 – lecture notes + summary readings...............................................................................................2
Introduction..............................................................................................................................................2
Economic psychology – reading 1.............................................................................................................3
Consumer psychology – reading 2............................................................................................................4
Segmentation – reading 3.........................................................................................................................4
Week 2.........................................................................................................................................................6
Explanations of the endowment effect: an integrative review – Reading 1.............................................6
Lecture (example included)..................................................................................................................6
Article...................................................................................................................................................8
Judgmental shortcuts – reading 2...........................................................................................................12
Lecture (examples included)...............................................................................................................12
Article.................................................................................................................................................15
Theories of economic decision-making: value, risk and affect – reading 3.............................................18
Lecture (examples included)...............................................................................................................18
Article.................................................................................................................................................19




1

,Week 1 – lecture notes + summary readings.

Introduction
Applied social psychology > consumer and economic psychology >
Goods and services <> people <> economy




This course: focus on people > emotions, values, preferences, cognition.




2

, Economic psychology – reading 1

Economic psychology
= Interaction between the economy and people.
= The science of economic mental life and behavior.
Economic psychology promotes and discusses research, as well as policy making, on the interface of
psychology and economics.

Focus on:
o People’s cognitions about money and the economy: (ir)rational, impact on actions
o How this makes people feel: wellbeing
o How this affects the economy



History

The theory of moral sentiments (Adam Smith) > About the concept of self-love and the
importance of being able to take others’ roles.

Homo economicus = a rational individual who makes rational decisions that maximize
utility, is self-interested, capable of learning from experience and with stable and
consistent preferences.

Introspection > necessary to examine needs and attributions of value.

La psychologie économique > birth of economic psychology.

Association of economic psychology > led by psychologists and businessmen
interested n using psychology for practical purpose.


Often quantitative research methods are being used in economic psychology.

Psychology in behavioral economics: the way people use money depends on how they mentally
categorize it > economic mental representation.




3