How Neurobiology Elucidates the Role of Emotions in Financial Decision-Making

Abstract

Over the last 15 years, a revolution has been taking place in neuroscience, whereby models and methods of economics have led to deeper insights into the neurobiological foundations of human decision-making. These have revealed a number of widespread mis-conceptions, among others, about the role of emotions. Furthermore, the findings suggest that a purely behavior-based approach to studying decisions may miss crucial features of human choice long appreciated in biology, such as Pavlovian approach. The findings could help economists formalize elusive concepts such as intuition, as I show here for financial “trading intuition.”