Author: Lloyd Morgan
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Anatomy of a Price War
With the recent AmazonâWalmart price war on books and the 1992 airline industry price war as the backdrop, James Surowiecki takes a look at how price wars start, how they can be avoided, and how to (possibly) win at them. The best way to win a price war, then, is not to play in the…
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Grammar Precisionists, Rejoice!
Jason points to a 10-question grammar challenge given to the students of a non-fiction workshop held by David Foster Wallace. It’s not a particularly easy challenge, made worse by the fact that my non-native English speaking girlfriend just beat my score comprehensively (this wasn’t a difficult feat, however). The answers are provided, and I particularly…
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Environmental Effects of the Shipping Industry
I don’t usually give much credence to Daily Mail articlesâgiven the paper’s editorial stance and propensity for junk food newsâbut I made an exception for one penned by Fred Pearce, New Scientist‘s environmental consultant. Still not completely free from sensationalism, Pearce looks at the pollution emitted by the shipping industry, particularly some of the world’s largest…
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Cultural Differences in Career Change Perceptions
We all have career transitions throughout our livesâsome by choice, some not. By interviewing workers from Austria, Serbia, Spain, China and the U.S., researchers have determined some cultural differences in how people perceive career transitions, and why they occur. Workers in the United States didn’t ever attribute a career transition to an external cause, such as…
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Bertram Forer Experiments: Your Personalised Generic Profile
Here is the ‘personalised’ personality profile as used in a 1948 experiment by Bertram Forer: You have a great need for other people to like and admire you. You have a tendency to be critical of yourself. You have a great deal of unused capacity which you have not turned to your advantage. While you have…
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Applying Knowledge and Not Understanding Ourselves
One of my favourite reads–the British Psychological Society’s (BPS) Research Digest–has recently published its 150th issue. To observe this occasion, Digest has asked what twenty-three psychologists still don’t understand about themselves. I’ve mentioned a number of the featured psychologists here before,  including Robert Cialdini, Alison Gopnik and Richard Wiseman. As Vaughan notes, many of those contributing to…
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Seven Psychological Principles Con Artists Exploit
Inherent human vulnerabilities need to be taken into account when designing security systems/processes, suggests a study that looks at a dozen confidence tricks from the UK TV show The Real Hustle to determine recurring behavioural patterns con artists use to exploit victims. The study was a collaboration between Frank Stajano of the University of Cambridge…
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(Preventing) Manipulation Through Irrationality
Through the theories discussed in Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational (and largely based on the excerpts in Chris Yeh’s outline of the book), two articles have emerged on different sides of one topic: our irrational decision-making in terms of products and purchases. One on how to take advantage of our irrationality when marketing products, and another…
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Sugar Ray Robinson and Self-Reliance
In Intelligent Life‘s review of Sweet Thunder, a Sugar Ray Robinson biography, they discuss Sugar Ray’s entrepreneurial spirit and tenacity in keeping control over his own business and brand. Robinson was savvy. He was the first black athlete to own most of the rights to his fights and to negotiate broadcasting deals on radio and…
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Influencing Behaviour Online
Ignoring, for a moment, the rather unsound and outmoded neuroscience propounded in the introduction, these tips for extending influence online and persuading your visitors are worth a few minutes: Show ratings and reviews by other users (for action through social validation). Provide instant gratification and a quick fix. Put the most important action to be…