Miguel

I think that, for me, Antonio Damasio’s book, Descartes’ Error, is interesting on this point, using cases of brain damage to show that, in fact, purely ‘rational’ individuals — those with certain emotion centres damaged — actually have a very hard time making decisions. That is, the evidence from neuropathology undermines the model of calculating subject that most microeconomics depends upon so heavily. This is not to say that economic models still don’t help to generate all sorts of really fascinating questions — and I’m going to keep on teaching economic anthropology — but it does suggest that all theoretical modeling needs, as you point out, empirical testing. A great example would be work by anthropology Jean Lave on how people actually use mathematics in markets and making purchases, or Caitlin Zaloom’s investigations of how commodities traders make decisions in trading pits or in front of computer screens (or work by Knorr-Cetina, which I really like). (We’ve got one of Zaloom’s chapters in the volume I did with Melissa Fisher, Frontiers of Capital.)

All of these actual studies of market behavior show that, in spite of economic models, even behaviour at idealized settings such as virtual auctions, commodities trading pits, and international commerce, actually depend upon all sorts of social relations, information limitations, and emotional behaviour that undermine the models of perfectly rational markets. The fact that books like Freakonomics sell millions of copies, or economists like Gary Becker earn Nobel Prizes for arguing that non-economic behaviour is actually ‘rational’ or ‘calculating’ does not make it so. The explanations may be clever, but it’s easy to make up stories about how things are rational in retrospect — if you can’t make predictions based upon the model, then it’s obvious that there are other causal factors (even circular or unpredictable causation) in play.

Thanks for posting all three of these articles though, Daniel. I’ve got to redo my economic anthro course for next semester and am looking for good examples to work with when I lecture.

This article has come to me this morning through Google Alerts. The basic idea is that scientists are surprised that people do not always act rationally and are severely influenced by their emotions.

The subject of emotions is extremely complex to study. There is not a single answer, at least not yet. Therefore there cannot be a simple answer to the question why people buy things when emotionally sad.

I would like to suggest one possible solution here. The core of my notion is that the solution lies in hierarchy of human society. There are symbols, signs of hierarchy; some of them are well-known as status symbols, cars, houses, expensive fur coats etc. The more you can buy the higher you are in the human society. There is a strong drive in many people to get as high as possible in this human hierarchy. But more general the findings show that it is normally not so important for people to get really extremely high in the hierarchy, but it is really important for them not to be the last on in the hierarchy.

The position of the last one in the hierarchy cannot be exactly determined; therefore people try to get higher as they do not know if they are not still the last ones. If some one feels sad he/she feels down and in order to contradict this feeling they buy things as they believe these things as status symbols will bring them up again, and it is usually the case.

Many observations have been mad as far as buying habits are concerned. In the times of personal success people usually buy dark furniture, if they are in the need of buying some furniture at that time. In the times of personal depression people usually buy white or light furniture if they are in the situation of buying some furniture at that time. Obviously, color of furniture is indirectly related to the personal economic and emotional situation.