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The research programme of economics and the relevance of psychology
Author(s) -
Meyer Willi
Publication year - 1982
Publication title -
british journal of social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.855
H-Index - 98
eISSN - 2044-8309
pISSN - 0144-6665
DOI - 10.1111/j.2044-8309.1982.tb00518.x
Subject(s) - illusion , relevance (law) , positive economics , order (exchange) , epistemology , behavioral economics , psychology , power (physics) , behavioural economics , social psychology , social science , sociology , economics , cognitive psychology , philosophy , political science , law , physics , finance , quantum mechanics
While biologists may learn from physics and from chemistry, economists seem to have no need to look at psychology in order to develop their theories. The paper addresses itself to this fact and attempts an explanation in terms of the following proposals: (1) Economics is not primarily a science of human behaviour. (2) Adam Smith has left a view of human nature and of human actions to economists which works quite satisfactorily for the purposes of political economy. (3) Modern economists hold their sophisticated approach to human behaviour to be superior to the (social) psychologists' one. This view is partially correct and partially an illusion. (4) Without any use of motivational hypotheses economics has no explanatory power at all. The implicitly applied motivation theory of economics can be better founded and can be enriched by looking at modern psychology.