Thinking and Emotions - Period 5 Social Sciences & Humanities Program Spring 2020 Semester - Amsterdam

The way we think and make decisions has a fundamental effect on virtually all facets of life. Understanding real-world problems starts with an understanding of human behaviour and its underlying cognitive processes. How do we think and make decisions? What role do emotions play in our decisions? In this course human thinking and decision-making will be addressed using a theoretical framework according to which decisions can made by either a fast automatic system, or a slow deliberate system. Several aspects of decision-making will be discussed on this basis, from heuristics and biases to overconfidence and risky choices. We will address several real world applications such as decisions in court, consumer choices, moral decisions, decisions in science, and happiness. The VU research profiles concerning human health and sustainability will further be discussed from a decision-making perspective. The course will follow the framework of the book ?Thinking Fast and Slow?, by Daniel Kahneman. The first five lectures will present this framework step by step and the remaining lectures will expand upon this with various practical and theoretical applications.

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (VU Amsterdam) awards credits based on the ECTS system. Contact hours listed under a course description may vary due to the combination of lecture-based and independent work required for each course therefore, CEA?s recommended credits are based on the ECTS credits assigned by VU Amsterdam. 1 ECTS equals 28 contact hours assigned by VU Amsterdam.

This is an Honors course.