Behavioral Economics

Economics, like behavioral psychology, is a science of behavior, albeit highly organized human behavior. The value of economic concepts for behavioral psychology rests on their empirical validity when tested in the laboratory with individual subjects and their uniqueness when compared to established behavioral concepts. “Behavioral Economics” as studied and applied within behavior analysis is based on 4 decades of research and scholarship and has both important theoretical and applied implications. This work has its genesis in Herrnstein’s matching law, and from that, postulates such as delay-reduction, hyperbolic discounting, group matching and intersections with foraging theory have been explored. Indeed, the matching law and its predictions of hyperbolic discounting curves are currently well cited in journals across many disciplines, however this area of research goes far beyond delay discounting. Although it started with a couple of pigeons pecking keys on simple schedules of reinforcement, Behavioral Economics stands as a well-developed, quantitatively sophisticated and theoretically rich part of behavior analysis and brings a fresh understanding to complex human behavioral issues such as decision making, consumer choice, gambling, drug use, and therapy, and is now poised to provide innovative answers to vexing applied questions.