There Is More to Behavioral Economics Than Biases and Fallacies - Behavioral Scientist

Behavioral economics emerged as a subfield of economics focusing on the fact people did not quite act and react like the consistently rational, self-interested, utility-maximizing agents in the classical models. We are bamboozled by biases, fooled by fallacies, entrapped by errors, hoodwinked by heuristics, deluded by illusions.

The deviations from the standard model had to be captured somehow, and psychology provided a basis for doing so.

A widespread misconception is that biases explain or even produce behavior. They don’t—they describe behavior.

Biases are not natural laws. They are broad tendencies, which are not uniformly shared by everyone. We are not picking a course of action because of the sunk cost bias, for example. The sunk cost bias is a label not a cause. Personal tendencies & the context play a major role in influenceing our behavior.

Biases are oversimplifications hidding the truth & human behavior is fluid and fuzzy. The use of discrete, distinct labels implies a rigor that is simply not there.