Behavioral Economics
The joint Ph.D. program in Behavioral Economics is the first Ph.D. program of its kind for students looking to do cutting-edge research at the intersection of economics and psychology.
The field of Behavioral Economics was pioneered by our own Carnegie Mellon faculty Herbert Simon (a Nobel Prize winner in Economics) and George Loewenstein. While Behavioral Economics started as a small movement in the 1970s, it has made an enormous impact on academic research and research in Behavioral Economics papers regularly appears in the top economics journals. Behavioral Economics research has been used to help governments enact better public policy and operate more efficiently, to help businesses improve their profitability, and to help individuals make better decisions.
Joint Program Details
This program builds on the world-renowned Behavioral Economics faculty from the Department of Social and Decision Sciences and the outstanding Economics faculty from the Tepper School of Business. Students in this joint program will have access to world-renowned experts in decision science, organizational behavior, statistics, marketing and many other areas. Research facilities like the Center for Behavioral and Decision Research and the BEDR Policy Lab will also be key resources for students.
As a joint program, oversight will be handled by the Joint Program Oversight Committee (JPOC). This committee is comprised of the Director of Graduate Studies at SDS, the head of the Tepper School Ph.D. Committee, and one faculty liaison between these areas. Most decisions regarding Ph.D. students in this program will be handled by the JPOC. However, it is important to note that students are considered members of both the Tepper School and SDS. This means that decisions regarding Ph.D. education made by those schools separately also apply to students in this joint program. That is, the Graduate Education Committee (GEC) at SDS and the Ph.D. committee at the Tepper School may make changes to the general requirements for ALL graduate students in their respective areas. These changes also apply to joint program students.