Experimental Methods and Behavioural Economics

The first aim of the course is to present the types of experimental methods used in behavioural economic sciences supported by research examples. Students will gain experience of economic decision-making experiments as an analytical technique. A second aim is to to provide an overview of how behavioural principles have been applied to economic problems both in microeconomics and macroeconomics.

Students should be able to apply the new instruments and the new methodolology in individual decisons as well in strategic decisions. At the end of the course they are expected to be able to design an experiment.
Moreover, student should identify and evaluate evidence for systematic departures of economic behaviour from the predictions of the neoclassical model and explain how these models change the predictions for equilibrium behaviour and welfare analysis, and assess the implications for optimal policy.