Homer or Spock? Find out which one you are!

Irrational

Hyperrational

   

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The book I chose to read for my Tradebook Blog was Dan Ariely’s (2010) The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home.  Ariely has earned a PhD in cognitive psychology and business administration.  With that being said, the premise of the book revolves around the idea that many times we let our intuitions lead us astray, resulting in irrational behavior (Ariely, 2010).  One analogy that Ariely uses to illustrate human thinking involves Spock and Homer Simpson (see above).  Specifically, Ariely believes that if people were placed on a spectrum with Homer at one end and Spock at the other, most people would be closer to Homer in most situations.  However, Ariely also highlights the ways in which our irrationalities contribute to our humanness.  That is, because of our irrationalities we are able to adapt to a variety of situations, learn to trust others, love the ones we are with, and enjoy effortful labor.  Throughout the book, Ariely (2010) provides empirical evidence to support the duality of irrationality. Specifically, we are able to learn how compensation impact performance, why we come to value what we create, and why our ideas are better than others’. We also gain a better understanding of adaption and learn the harsh truths of assortative matting (think of the number on the forehead game that Dr. G. had us play).  Furthermore, we are able to gain insight into why people feel compelled to help one person but not many.  Lastly, Ariely (2010) emphasizes the need for the experimental approach when individually making important decisions and in areas such as business and public policy because it is the best way to learn about what really works.

My decision to choose this book was partially based on the book reviews that I had read on Amazon.com.  A lot of the reviews I read were very specific when describing why they enjoyed Ariely’s book so much.  Therefore, I felt that I was able to get a good understanding of what the book was about.  Another reason I decided to choose this book was because I visited Ariely’s official website (it’s actually his personal blog).  By reading his posts, I was able to get a good sense of his ‘voice’.  Now that I have completed reading this book, I full heartedly believe that it was a great choice to make.  Through the experience of engaging with this book, I was truly able to critically think about some of my own behaviors and about the way that I have chosen to live my life.    
        

Now I would like to give you a bit more information about Dan Ariely.  Ariely (2010) is currently a Professor of Psychology and Behavioral Economics at Duke University, and you can find some of his work in the Wall Street Journal and Scientific American.  I am hesitant to call anyone an expert on any subject.  I will say though, that he seems well verse in the field of psychology and behavioral economic such that he has reviewed the literature and has conducted numerous studies using diverse populations.  What I find most compelling about Ariely is his personal story that got him interested in the field of behavioral psychology.  At the age of 18, a magnesium flare exploded next to him, causing third-degree burns on 70 percent of his body.  Then, after being admitted to the hospital, he contracted hepatitis from an infect blood transfusion.  He experienced a very emotional journey as he adapted to the new restraints placed on his body and tried to figure out where he fit into society (especially the dating scene) (Ariely, 2010).  It’s at this point that he began wondering about the social processes that drove us toward other people as well as away from other people, leading to a study years later on how aesthetically challenged people adapted to their looks when it came to the dating.  Overall, based on his educational background and his work in the field, I found this book to be very credible.  Moreover, I would say that this book could be seen as scholarly in the sense that he has provided a great deal of empirical evidence with citations at the back to support his claims.     

It is now time for me to decide who should and should not read this book.  In general, I think a person without a background in psychology would do just fine with this book.  Ariely’s layperson language makes for a very easy read.  Should my fellow social psychology peers wish to read this book as well, I would simply give them a word of caution.  That is, the content within this book does overlap with some themes from a social psychology course.  However, I personally did not find the overlap annoying, rather I was excited that I knew the official scientific terms such as affective forecasting :).  If I were to try to describe the best audience for this type of book, they would definitely need to be receptive to new ideas that may contradict their intuitions because a good chunk of this book contradicts long-held beliefs about human behavior.  For example, many people believe that if you give people more money, their performance will increase, but research shows that end-of-the-year bonuses actually lead to a decrease in performance (Ariely, 2010).  However, Ariely acknowledges that there are cases in which bonuses may work in increasing performance.  Therefore, it’s also important that the audience be able to take all the findings in the book for what they are; they are aggregates that depict how most people behave in most situations.  If you are one of those people who are constantly saying, “I know someone that did the opposite”, then this book is probably not for you.  Lastly, I believe that people who do not like behavioralists should not read this book, because it will probably make them even angrier that once again a behavioralist is sitting on their high-horse, telling them how to live their lives.  If you don’t believe me, here is an excerpt from an article titled We are not all Homer Simpsons by Daniel Ben-Ami:

“…behaviouralists…imagine they are capable of understanding the world but they believe the rest of us, with our apparently Homer Simpson like dumbness, cannot. Instead of trying to reshape the world for the better [their]… main project is to manipulate our behaviour…they have created an elitist justification for interfering in our lives.”  http://danielbenami.com/2012/10/01/we-are-not-all-homer-simpsons/

I believe the reason I enjoyed this book so much was because there were a lot of theories and findings that I could relate to my own life and decisions.  I have chosen a few examples from my life to help illustrate some of the topics/theories that Ariely focuses on in his book.  Ariely (2010) begins his book by introducing the concept of procrastination, stating that it is probably one of the most frequent, illogical behaviors that we exhibit.  Logic states that we should engage in behaviors that have immediate negative effects for the sake of long-term positive effects; therefore procrastination is illogical because we are avoiding behaviors that have immediate negative effects even though they will lead to long-term positive effects (Ariely, 2010).  According to Ariely, one way to rectify procrastination is by setting up an incentive such that once you have completed the negative task, you can enjoy an activity associated with immediate pleasure as well as reap the long-term benefits when they came around.  For example, when I had to complete study hours at the library for my sorority, I made a deal with myself.  On Fridays, if I studied diligently from 9:45am to 1:45pm with a small break in the middle, I allowed myself to spend the rest of the day watching TV shows on Hulu.  Therefore, by adding an immediate incentive to an undesirable behavior (i.e., studying), I engaged in the undesirable behavior, which helped me in the long-term (i.e., passing my classes), and I got to watch a lot of shows without feeling guilty.    

 

This was me in HS. I've gotten better now.

Another theory that I enjoyed reading about was the IKEA effect (think effort justification) (Ariely, 2010).  The IKEA effect states that people come to love the things they create to the point that they overvalue their creations (e.g., the build-it-yourself furniture from IKEA).  My personal IKEA effect involves my authentic dream catcher versus the one my mom bought me from a store.  During my freshman year, I made my very own dream catcher. I was very proud of my creation, and I thought it was the most awesome thing I had ever seen.  Over the summer, my mom bought me another dream catcher that was accented with purple string and beads.  Unfortunately, I felt nothing toward this new dream catcher.  In fact, I remember thinking that it looked tacky with its purple string.  Now, had I not already had a dream catcher that I made myself, I think I would have loved the one my mom bought me.  Unfortunately though, I feel prey to the IKEA effect and came to value my own creation so much that I could not really appreciate another version of my piece. Below are pictures of both dream catchers. Objectively speaking, I can see how the purple-one is pretty to look at, but it’s too perfect (I’m just saying).    

This is mine :)

This is the store-bought

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After a somewhat awful experience with printing a poster for SWPA at the ITS printing center, I knew that I had to touch upon the topic of revenge.  Ariely (2010) argues that revenge and trust are two sides of the same coin.  That is, when we feel that someone has broken our trust (e.g., treated us unfairly) we seek revenge, which can be rewarding and pleasurable.  Although me and my research partner did not seek revenge against ITS, we came close.  We had paid $50 to print our poster, so we were thoroughly displeased to discover a blemish on the paper that caused the ink to not catch in two places.  When we brought the blemishes to the attention of the student workers, they were not that helpful.  The guy suggested that we get a maker and just color the spots in.  The girl kept saying things like “that’s unfortunate”, but after some probing from my awesome research partner, the girl went to talk to the woman in charge and we were able to print a new poster without any extra charges.  After we left, we joked that had they not let us reprint the poster for free, we would have made a poster saying “ITS printing sucks”.  Then, printed it at ITS and put it up for everyone to see.  Although we were simply joking, our immediate reaction to make this poster illustrates how easy it is to feel it’s necessary to seek revenge when someone breaks your trust.  That is, we paid ITS a good sum of money in expectation of receiving a good product; however, they did not provide us with that product.  Furthermore, if they had charged us again, we would have felt even more peeved.  Ultimately, because ITS would have broken their side of our ‘deal’, we would have felt justified in seeking revenge.  Luckily, we did not have to release our vengeful sides…this time. 

I wonder what this person did? 

This must have been a shocker to the owner

The last idea I want to touch upon is the fact that people are less willing to help the statistical victim (Ariely, 2010).  In other words, people tend to care more about the individuals than the masses.  In turn, they are more likely to help individuals than they are to help a collective group suffering from illnesses or social disparities.  We tend to be more inclined to help individuals because of the identifiable victim effect.  That is, once people are able to connect a face to a tragedy, their sympathies and money will follow (Ariely, 2010).  By contrast, reading a bunch of statistics about poverty and illiteracy rates does not garner much action form people who are not in the immediate vicinity.  Ariely proposes some methods to combat the statistical victim problem.  On method deals with diminishing the ‘Drop-in-the-bucket effect’, or becoming discouraged because you don’t believe that you can single-handedly help the victims of a tragedy.  To counteract this effect, he suggests changing your perspective about the magnitude of the tragedy (Ariely, 2010).  On way that I have already used this suggestion is during my volunteer work with the San Antonio Youth Literacy Council.  While in high school, I volunteered to help second-graders develop their reading and compression skills.  I knew that illiteracy was a problem in our country, but most of the time I felt helpless in aiding the cause. However, this volunteer opportunity narrowed the problem to a small subset of people that I could help.  Specifically, my reading group consisted of the same five students throughout the year.  Therefore, by participating in this program I was able to help the cause and optimize the impact I made.                        

Based on the amount of details and praise I have given about this book, I think it’s clear that I am a bit biased.  Despite my biasness, I do believe that this book has a couple of weaknesses.  First, the book can be a bit wordy at times when Ariely is describing the design of a studying.  Although, I think I found such descriptions wordy because I am used to reading things such as “a 2 x 2 within-subject design”.  Another potential weakness is the lack of using scientific terms to label some of the theories.  Ariely does a great job and relaying the definitions in ‘terms that grandma would understand’, but I think the audience losses out if they aren’t told at least the proper name for certain psychological effects.  Lastly, the thing that annoyed me the most about this book was the use of the pronoun ‘you’.  I think Ariely successfully draws the reader in by having them image themselves into a certain situation.  However, I found it a bit tedious because if felt like I was being told to imagine a situation every other page. 

Despite my criticisms, I believe this book has many strengths.  The most important strength would have to be the fact that Ariely uses personal examples to illustrate almost every theory he discusses.  By using personal examples, this book really does read like a blog, which makes the text easier to engage with.  Furthermore, Ariely is able to create a bond between him and his readers because he shows that he is willing to be honest and frank.  Another strength is that he doesn’t include any statistics when presenting research results, which I think makes the text really accessible to people who get put-off when they see a bunch of numbers. What I particularly enjoyed about this book was him stating numerous times that he is not perfect; he makes the same irrational mistakes that we make, which I think humanizes him even more.  Moreover, I found his suggestions on how to combat the negative effects of our irrationalities to be very useful, because without them, some of these chapters would paint a very depressing picture of human behavior.  Lastly, I do feel that other people may benefit from Ariely’s attempts at getting the readers to put themselves in a position where they can visualize a study or why a particular outcome occurred in a certain situation.         

Taking into account everything I have learned in this book and the way Dan Ariely seems to feel about the positive and negative effects of human irrationalities, I would conclude that the ‘take home’ message is to view our behavior in terms of a cost-benefit equation (Ariely, 2010).  That is, we should actively look for ways to maximize the positive effect of irrationality while finding ways to minimize the negative effects.  Untimely, if we are able to find the optimal balance between positive and negative, our behaviors would be more effective, which would lead to a more effective society.  However, it’s difficult to convince people such politicians, bankers, CEOs to change the behaviors that benefit them but not other people.  Therefore, this change should start at the personal level.  Then hopefully, there will come a time when people in power will be willing to listen to empirical evidence.

n = 2,702 

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Ariely, D. (2010). The upside of irrationality: the unexpected benefits of defying logic at work and at home. Harper.