by Roberta De Cicco Political debates, public interest issues, medical diagnosis, conspiracy theories, entrepreneurship: these are just a few of the areas affected by our tendency to preserve personal identity by confirming existing prior ideas that reflect our social group or personal beliefs (Brain Week, 2018). This phenomenon describes people’s tendency to favor information that validates preconceptions, assumptions, and personal beliefs, regardless of the veracity of such information. Confirmation bias was first acknowledged and named in the 1960s by Peter Wason, a cognitive psychologist ..read more

by Serena Iacobucci It is no exaggeration to say that some economists really seem to hate Christmas as they consider this a holiday that simply “destroys value.” George Loewenstein and Cass Sunstein – two researchers who pioneered behavioral economics and neuroeconomics, affirm that the destruction of wealth in Econoland (an imaginary world where everyone behaves rationally and there’s apparently no room for eggnog and carols) is indeed the greatest crime one can commit. In this article, we are going to destroy some of your Christmas spirit: we’ll talk about the “Scrooge” spirit of some econo ..read more

by Riccardo Palumbo A couple of years ago, around April 2018, I attended what has probably turned out to be the most interesting speeches of the last few years. (I could be a bit biased here, as, of course, it was the last conference I have physically attended – and not only joined via Zoom or WebEx or whatever). Plus, it was held in Naples, a unique city in which incredible history, culture and costumes seem to naturally encourage you to reflect on the relationship between nature and nurture. I was one of over 500 participants. We were talking about the future (little did we know…). Among th ..read more