Lancaster University brought together some of the world’s leading economists, including two Nobel Laureates, at a special online event to discuss behavioural insights into the Covid-19 crisis.

Nobel Prize-winning economists Professor Vernon Smith and Professor Robert Aumann joined more than 350 people from around the world for the Lancaster University 2020 Behavioural and Experimental Conference.

They were among economists from the UK, Israel and the USA to make presentations to an online audience including guests from India, China, Columbia, France and South Korea around the subject of ‘Behavioural Insights on the Corona Crisis’.

Professor Eyal Winter, P.W.S. Andrews and Elizabeth Brunner Chair in Industrial Economics in Lancaster University Management School’s Department of Economics, hosted the event via Zoom, and was among those to make a presentation.

He said: “The Covid-19 crisis is unlike anything that any of us have experienced in our lifetimes, and the Lancaster University conference was an opportunity for some of the leading lights in behavioural and experimental economics to come together to discuss the crisis in the contexts of our fields. To have two Nobel Laureates playing such active roles demonstrates the high level of input and how important the subject is, and I thank both Vernon and Bob for taking part.

“It was wonderful to see so many economists from around the world joining us, sharing their expertise and listening to a series of fascinating and insightful talks and presentations. Being able to do so online and to engage with such a wide audience during the crisis was valuable and heartening, and I am sure all who attended will have gained much from the event.”

Professor Smith, of Chapman University, had been due to deliver the second Andrews and Brunner Lecture at Lancaster University in April, an event postponed because of the Covid-19 crisis. He is the founder of Experimental Economics, a field that has revolutionised not only economics but other Social Science disciplines, making them more scientific, and is the 2002 Nobel Laureate in Economics.

Professor Aumann, of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, won the 2005 Nobel Prize for his work on conflict and cooperation through game theory analysis.

Professor Smith presented a lecture entitled ‘A Rehabilitation of Classical Economics: Lessons from Experiments’ to open the conference, and Professor Aumann discussed ‘A synthesis of behavioural and mainstream economics’. Other presentations came from Professor Gary Charness, of the University of California at Santa Barbara, Professor Winter and Professor Robert Sugden, of the University of East Anglia.

The talks focused primarily on the discrepancy between models of rational behaviour as presented by economic theory and game theory on the one hand, and real-life behaviour as revealed by experimental and empirical findings on the other hand, as shown through reactions to the Covid-19 crisis.

Concepts such as Ecological Rationality (Professor Smith) and Rule Rationality (Professor Aumann) have been discussed as means to bridge the discrepancy and suggest that rationality should not be examined on specific instances but rather on a large set of decisions taken in different environments and circumstances.

The presentations were followed by a panel discussion on the Covid-19 crisis, with questions and comments from the audience. The importance of transparency and clear guidelines from authorities during the crisis was one of the issues discussed.

A full recording of the Lancaster University 2020 Behavioural and Experimental Conference is available online here: https://us02web.zoom.us/rec/play/7MIscuisqW83EtOdswSDBfIoW428KK-shyUW_aZYmk-1VnUCYwfyZuRDYuAVKooMewojXD6lAB0k_SXe?continueMode=true&_x_zm_rtaid=Q297m2YkTR-a1fZSgrXgig.1588320654584.32f49262dfc1693d174df79bc6bf771d&_x_zm_rhtaid=570