Introduction to Behavioral Economics

Every day, billions of people make trillions of decisions, at work, at home and everywhere else. Behavioral economics (BE) is the study of the decisions and actions we make as human beings. This course will introduce you to BE, which includes behavioral biases and ways to apply behavioral design to family planning and reproductive health (FP/RH). BE teaches us that the interplay between context and psychological features of humans can have a surprisingly powerful effect on our behavior. Insights from behavioral analysis allow us to anticipate and account for these inconsistencies in human behavior when designing products, programs, and policies in public and reproductive health and beyond. The sessions in this course consist of instructional videos and engaging tasks that you can complete to deepen your understanding of the application of behavioral economics. We look forward to working with you and hope you enjoy the process.