Behavioral Economics and the Atheoretical Style

Ran Spiegler ()

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, 2019, vol. 11, issue 2, 173-94

Abstract: Behavioral economics is widely perceived to be part of the profession's shift away from a culture that places abstract theory at its center. I present a critical discussion of the atheoretical style with which "behavioral" themes are often disseminated: a purely anecdotal style in popular expositions, simplistic cost-benefit modeling in pieces that target a wide audience of academic economists, and the practice of capturing psychological forces by distorting familiar functional forms. I argue that the subject of "psychology and economics" is intrinsically foundational, and that a heavier dose of abstract theorizing is essential for it to realize its transformative potential.

JEL-codes: B40 D90 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
Note: DOI: 10.1257/mic.20170007
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.aeaweb.org/doi/10.1257/mic.20170007 (application/pdf)
https://www.aeaweb.org/articles/attachments?retrie ... 391XvplZ_UCNJg0PKsmW (application/zip)
Access to full text is restricted to AEA members and institutional subscribers.

Related works:
Working Paper: Behavioral Economics and the Atheoretical Style (2017)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aea:aejmic:v:11:y:2019:i:2:p:173-94

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.aeaweb.org/journals/subscriptions

Access Statistics for this article

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics is currently edited by Johannes Hörner

More articles in American Economic Journal: Microeconomics from American Economic Association Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Michael P. Albert ().