I am the James B. Duke Professor of Psychology & Behavioral Economics at Duke University. I also hold appointments at the Fuqua School of Business, the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, the Department of Economics, and the School of Medicine at Duke University and am Director of the Center for Advanced Hindsight. I also serve as Chief Behavioral Economist at Qapital.
Ethical Systems Interview (April 2015)
My Approach to Ethical Systems:
My research explores the influences that shape our daily decisions and the implications that these decisions have on our personal lives, professional lives, as well as public policy. Some of my recent research looks at dishonest behavior and attempts to identify what causes ethical people to make unethical decisions and the role that physical, mental, and social environments play in these behaviors. One of the major implications of this work has to do with the troubling role of conflicts of interest and how they infect much of our lives in places we don’t expect them to.
My Ethical Systems Research Page: Cheating & Honesty
My Major Relevant Publications:
Books
- Irrationally Yours: On Missing Socks, Pickup Lines, and Other Existential Puzzles (2015). This book is an expanded, illustrated collection of Ariely’s immensely popular Wall Street Journal advice column, “Ask Ariely”. [Homepage, public library]
- The Honest Truth About Dishonesty (2012). This book is about the contradictory forces that motivate the sometimes irrational – but entirely human – tendencies to cheat and be honest. [Homepage, public library]
- The Upside of Irrationality (2010). This book is about how irrationality is not all bad and sometimes has positive effects on our lives. [Homepage, public library]
- Predictably Irrational (revised and expanded, 2010). This book is about decision making and the tricks that our minds play on us when we think we’re making rational choices. [Homepage, public library]
Videos
- How Equal Do We Want the World to Be? (2015)
- What Makes Us Feel Good About Our Work? (2013)
- Beware of Conflicts of Interest (2011)
- Our Buggy Moral Code (2009)
Academic Articles
- “Moral Masochism: On the connection between guilt and self-punishment,” article in Emotion (2013).
- “The Pot Calling the Kettle Black: Distancing Response to Ethical Dissonance,” article in Journal of Experimental Psychology (2012).
- “Signing at the beginning Makes Ethics Salient and Decreases Dishonest Self-Reports in Comparison to Signing at the End,” article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (2012).
- “The Dark Side of Creativity: Original Thinkers Can Be More Dishonest,” article in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (2011).