The Construction Of Preference

One of the main themes that has emerged from behavioral decision research during the past three decades is the view that people's preferences are often constructed in the process of elicitation. This idea is derived from studies demonstrating that normatively equivalent methods of elicitation (e.g., choice and pricing) give rise to systematically different responses. These preference reversals violate the principle of procedure invariance that is fundamental to all theories of rational choice. If different elicitation procedures produce different orderings of options, how can preferences be defined and in what sense do they exist? This book shows not only the historical roots of preference construction but also the blossoming of the concept within psychology, law, marketing, philosophy, environmental policy, and economics. Decision making is now understood to be a highly contingent form of information processing, sensitive to task complexity, time pressure, response mode, framing, reference points, and other contextual factors.

Psychologists have been observing and interpreting economic behaviour for at least fifty years, and the last decade, in particular, has seen an escalated interest in the interface between psychology and economics. The Cambridge Handbook of Psychology and Economic Behaviour is a valuable reference resource dedicated to improving our understanding of the economic mind and economic behaviour. Employing empirical methods – including laboratory experiments, field experiments, observations, questionnaires and interviews – the Handbook covers aspects of theory and method, financial and consumer behaviour, the environment and biological perspectives. With contributions from distinguished scholars from a variety of countries and backgrounds, the Handbook is an important step forward in the improvement of communications between the disciplines of psychology and economics. It will appeal to academic researchers and graduates in economic psychology and behavioural economics.

Local Forest Managementis built around careful and illuminating case studies of the effects of devolution policies on the management of forests in several Asian countries. The studies demonstrate that devolution policies – contrary to the claims o

The theory of revealed preference has a long, distinguished tradition in economics but lacked a systematic presentation of the theory until now. This book deals with basic questions in economic theory and studies situations in which empirical observations are consistent or inconsistent with some of the best known economic theories.

Shaping Entrepreneurship Research: Made, as Well as Found is a collection of readings designed to support entrepreneurship research. Focused on a worldview in which the future is open-ended and shapeable through human action - i.e. "made", this collection reframes entrepreneurship as a science of the artificial rather than as a natural or social science. It posits an open-ended universe for the making of human artifacts even if large swathes of nature and society are not within the control of the people making them. The book explores the notion of "made" through 25 foundational readings - classics from the history of ideas. Organized into five sections, each classic is individually introduced by the editors in one of five chapters written to explain its relevance and significance for a "made" view of entrepreneurship. Readers will benefit from exposure to these classic ideas and ongoing research in a variety of areas that fall somewhat outside the line-of-sight of traditional entrepreneurship research. Both individually and collectively, the readings suggest opportunities to ask new questions and develop new ways of framing entrepreneurship research that carry the discussion beyond worlds found to worlds made as well as found. The book is crafted to be valuable to three groups of scholars: young scholars with limited or no access to research infrastructure but with a desire to participate in deep conversations; young scholars with access to research infrastructure who also desire to listen-in on a different kind of conversation; and established entrepreneurship scholars who are contemplating an alternative set of foundational ideas to support their conversations in the discipline.

Originally published over two decades ago, this classic text within the philosophy of economics is a tour de force against revealed preference. It critically examines the research programme carried out by the Nobel Prize winner Paul Samuelson on the revealed preference approach to the theory of consumer behaviour. It also challenges two essential premises: * that the programme has been completed * that the various contributions of Samuelson are mutually consistent. This text contains a new preface by Wong, in which he provides a detailed insight into the origins of his pioneering text, and a new introduction from Philip Mirowski, analyzing the impact The Foundation of Paul Samuelson’s Revealed Preference Theory has had on the discipline of economics as well as explaining why it remains core reading for economists today. The defining statement of economic method, this book will be of interest to economists everywhere.

Amos Tversky (1937–1996), a towering figure in cognitive and mathematical psychology, devoted his professional life to the study of similarity, judgment, and decision making. He had a unique ability to master the technicalities of normative ideals and then to intuit and demonstrate experimentally their systematic violation due to the vagaries and consequences of human information processing. He created new areas of study and helped transform disciplines as varied as economics, law, medicine, political science, philosophy, and statistics. This book collects forty of Tversky's articles, selected by him in collaboration with the editor during the last months of Tversky's life. It is divided into three sections: Similarity, Judgment, and Preferences. The Preferences section is subdivided into Probabilistic Models of Choice, Choice under Risk and Uncertainty, and Contingent Preferences. Included are several articles written with his frequent collaborator, Nobel Prize-winning economist Daniel Kahneman.

This book describes how a confused decision maker, who wishes to make a reasonable and responsible choice among alternatives, can systematically probe their thoughts and feelings in order to make the critically important trade-offs between incommensurable objectives.