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The Best TED Talks on Behavioural Economics

Why do human beings behave the way that they do? What might persuade them to act, choose and feel differently? How can we influence the consistently irrational decisions that people seem to make? How could we sway their choices in our favour? For marketers there are few more pressing questions than these, which helps to explain why our industry is so fascinated by behavioural economics, the study of the psychological and emotional drivers behind decisions. It’s a hugely exciting area that throws up insights that are intriguing, provocative and insightful in equal measure. Here are some of the best that have been shared on the stages of TED:

You’d expect the knowledge that human beings are persistently unrealistic and irrational, and largely incapable of learning from experience, to be bad news. As Tali Sharot explains in her talk on The Optimism Bias, that’s far from being the case. Sharot explains how our firmly fixed rose-tinted spectacles can be crucial to our wellbeing, and why appealing to humans’ hard-wired sense that they can always beat the odds is far more effective than appealing to their sense of realism. It’s essential viewing for any marketer targeting any type of decision-maker.

As marketers, we’re trained to believe that choice is a good thing: that people want more of it, and that they respond positively to it. A fascinating TED talk explores why this assumption is often wrong – and how it can frequently be counter-productive. In The Paradox of Choice, psychologist Barry Schwartz explains how providing too many choices increases the chance of your target audience choosing nothing at all – and sticking with what they have. 

In a provocative talk, psychologist Paul Bloom asks Can prejudice ever be a good thing?, with insights as to why our prejudices exert such a powerful influence on our behaviour. Bloom has some startling insights on just how pervasive and potentially dangerous prejudice can be – but also on how the power of empathy through storytelling has the capacity to overcome them.

No round-up of the best Behavioural Economics TED talks could be complete without an appearance by Daniel Kahneman, regarded by many as one of the founders of the discipline. Kahneman’s talk on The Riddle of Experience versus Memory asks why human beings have such problems with the concept of happiness. The answer is hugely important for anyone involved in planning consumer journeys and customer experiences. As he explains, there is a huge distinction between our ‘experiencing self’ and our ‘remembering self’. Our actual experiences have almost no influence on our future choices. In this regard, it’s only what we remember of them that counts.

Picking the best TED talks on behavioural economics is a challenge – because there is just so much good insight out there. If you enjoy the talks on this list, then there are plenty of others worth exploring as well. Shlomo Benartzi’s talk on persuading people to save for retirement is a great example of applied behavioural economics. Colin Camerer explores why human beings are often so poor at judging the motivations of others. Dan Gilbert focuses on how humans struggle to project their image of themselves into the future. And there’s plenty of other fascinating thinking on human choices on the TED platform.