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897 reviews for:
A Taste of Irrationality: Sample chapters from Predictably Irrational and Upside of Irrationality
Dan Ariely
3.97 AVERAGE
897 reviews for:
A Taste of Irrationality: Sample chapters from Predictably Irrational and Upside of Irrationality
Dan Ariely
3.97 AVERAGE
Interesting explanation for our irrational buying decisions. The author explains in layman's terms why the allure of FREE! is so strong, why we should never put ourselves in a position to envy what we cannot afford, and why imprinting is not just a term that Stephenie Meyer came up with the tie up loose ends with werewolves and vampires.
Notes:
Most people don't know what they want unless they see it in context. So no matter the item, we usually take the one that is middle-of-the-road. If there are no similar items, we tend to not buy it.
We avoid comparing things that can not be easily compared. So if we are given the choice between two similar things and one not-so-similar thing, we will often choose the better of the two similar things.
We should always be sure to separate market norms from social norms. (i.e. Don't offer to pay your grandmother for Thanksgiving dinner.)
Notes:
Most people don't know what they want unless they see it in context. So no matter the item, we usually take the one that is middle-of-the-road. If there are no similar items, we tend to not buy it.
We avoid comparing things that can not be easily compared. So if we are given the choice between two similar things and one not-so-similar thing, we will often choose the better of the two similar things.
We should always be sure to separate market norms from social norms. (i.e. Don't offer to pay your grandmother for Thanksgiving dinner.)
informative
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
informative
reflective
fast-paced
I enjoyed reading a little refresher on some of the ways and whys of human behavior. However, I was disturbed when the author related his experience trying to get permission to research on human subjects from a psychology department at one of his universities. They didn't approve his experiment. He expressed he didn't understand why the psychology research board didn't agree to his methods. Instead of fixing his research methods to protect the subjects of the test, he shopped his psychological research to the media department - which does research? and can approve psychological research on human subjects? And he didn't have any ethical problem with this? He then opined that the psychology board was off its rocker not to approve his research. To me, it seems he gave no thought to proper research methods when dealing with human test subjects. In the experiment he described, the one rejected by the psychology board, he didn't adequately protect the human test subjects, but he also didn't control for enough variables to draw any useful conclusions. In fact, most of the experiments mentioned in the book are poorly described or poorly designed. I hope they are well designed and in rendering them into English for the non-scientist, the science parts of the experiment get lost in translation. I would have much preferred the author didn't do any of his own experimenting (it isn't research, and 'experimenting' is being a little too generous) and instead did a survey of the findings of other scientists, who work within the recommendations of research boards, and who design better experiments, and who have bigger samples. Further, I don't understand how he can rationally take a small sample then draw huge conclusions, some of which have no relation to the sample or experiment. He talked to a handful of people, offered them pennies, and then determined that everyone should read the bible on a regular basis and that will solve the problem of corporate fraud in America?
Yet even if his methods were extremely clunky, and his conclusions overly broad, jumped to, or poorly disguised moralizing, the book did serve as a nice reminder of some interesting human behaviors.
Yet even if his methods were extremely clunky, and his conclusions overly broad, jumped to, or poorly disguised moralizing, the book did serve as a nice reminder of some interesting human behaviors.
I listened to this while walking to and from campus. Definitely made my 30-45 minute commute more thoughtful.
Ariely writes wonderfully. I'm currently taking a Behavioral Econometrics course as well as an Experimental Economics course, so this book is apropos. Ariely does gloss over some of the technical details here and there (which makes me want to read his original papers), but that's okay because the big message is clear. People act "irrationally" frequently. We are all influenced by these small and large cues and events we hardly ever pay attention to. The amount of "surprising" results he's able to find and publish is really quite impressive. He's dug up quite the gold mine.
Overall, Ariely deftly illustrates a layer of the world we hardly notice but that is just beneath the surface of our daily decisions and behavior. I find it difficult to not question my anchors and motives every time I finish one of his chapters. Fun stuff. I'd recommend it.
Ariely writes wonderfully. I'm currently taking a Behavioral Econometrics course as well as an Experimental Economics course, so this book is apropos. Ariely does gloss over some of the technical details here and there (which makes me want to read his original papers), but that's okay because the big message is clear. People act "irrationally" frequently. We are all influenced by these small and large cues and events we hardly ever pay attention to. The amount of "surprising" results he's able to find and publish is really quite impressive. He's dug up quite the gold mine.
Overall, Ariely deftly illustrates a layer of the world we hardly notice but that is just beneath the surface of our daily decisions and behavior. I find it difficult to not question my anchors and motives every time I finish one of his chapters. Fun stuff. I'd recommend it.
informative
reflective
medium-paced
I found this book very interesting. The writing in parts was a little simplistic and with some lame attempts at humor, and I would have like to see a bit more in depth about some of the claims made. But, that said, I hope I will remember what I learned from this book and perhaps change the way I make decisions.
My Blogpost
Bring up example
Talk about how it’s related to your hypothesis
Talk about how you experimented on your hypothesis
What we can learn from it all
Starts off decent, but as the writer uses the exact same format for each chapter it gets old quick. The format itself is:
Bring up example
Certainly, a solid application of the scientific method (mostly), but it gets dry for the layman reader. I can’t personally confirm whether most—or even any—of the lessons outlined are valid, but they seem reasonable to me.
But what I do know is that, as the chapters go on, Dan tries to explain the same problems of the human condition that many other materialists have tried to. No offense, but this is certainly taking on a task that is somewhat above him, or at least above the topic of behavioral economics. I’ve stopped my notes past Chapter 9 for this reason.
An interesting book. I would have preferred less filler (why he knows his fellow researchers) and more on the theories, experiments and results , but overall the book aged well. One amusing moment was a piece that was so old he had to explain PayPal and Skype. Definitely saw some of myself in this, especially time v money value (waiting in 10m line for $1 refund).
informative
reflective
fast-paced