Articles
Cognitive Overload in the EU
The idea of non-rational decision-making in an environment of overwhelming information is not new but it is becoming more common. We look at how participants skilled in negotiations (lawyers, politicians, civil servants) often engineer deliberate overload in order to...
Chinese Social Credit – Business Implications
The implications of China's Social Credit Score system will reach into every business that operates in China. Foreign corporates will not be spared. The opacity in the calculation methodologies will likely encourage self-censorship and a high level of attentiveness to...
Loss Aversion and Markets
The cognitive bias of Loss Aversion is based around an ancient sense of keeping hold of current possessions - i.e. that what we already own is more valuable than something we could exchange it for but do not yet possess. This tendency can lead to delays when entering...
Understanding Motivation
We are increasingly dismayed by the tendency of international media to indulge in emotional framing around all newsflow developments. Such an approach lends itself towards behavioural biases and provides an increasingly skewed view of the world. Fundamental...
Cash, Contactless and Cryptos
The use of electronic money (be it contactless credit/debit cards or fully-fledged crypto currencies) has disrupted the previously dominant mental processes surrounding spending money. Technology is being implemented that tries to reconnect a direct psychological link...
The Tyranny of Numbers
Why do markets, investors and economists continue to obsess over inaccurate and misleading national income accounting statistics? There are many biases at work but the empirical evidence is incontrovertible - almost no-one in the economics profession predicted the...