Author: Dan Ariely
Pages: 384
Genre: Non-fiction
Grade: A-
Synopsis: This book investigates how we make decisions and how we think that we are in control of our lives, yet in many situations it is easy to predict how we are going to act. Dan Ariely is a behavioral economist from MIT who has designed and implemented a ton of different experiments to try and figure out the process of decision making. As noted on the book jacket, "We consistently overpay, underestimate, and procrastinate. We fail to understand the profound effects of our emotions on what we want, and we overvalue what we already own. Yet these misguided behaviors are neither random nor senseless. They're systematic and predictable — making us predictably irrational."
My Review: I found this book very fascinating. There were plenty of times when I thought to myself, there is no way that I would act like that (or do that), but the experimental proof is nearly inarguable. The fact of the matter is, is that we as humans are a bunch of suckers. Hopefully, though, we can start to realize when we are being taken advantage of so that we can start to take control of our lives and decisions.
Just a couple of weeks after finishing this book I came across an interesting article in Wired by Dan Ariely "How Online Companies Get You to Share More and Spend More." Give it a read!
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