Behavior Theory

Does your job make a meaningful contribution to the world? In the spring of 2013, David Graeber asked this question in a playful, provocative essay titled “On the Phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs”. It went viral. After a million online views in 17 different languages, people all over the world are still debating the answer.

We like to think of ourselves as rational. This idea is the foundation for classical economic analysis of human behavior, including the awesome achievements of game theory. But as behavioral economics shows, most behavior doesn’t seem rational at all - which, unfortunately, casts doubt on game theory’s real-world credibility. In Hidden Games, Moshe Hoffman and Erez Yoeli find a surprising middle ground between the hyperrationality of classical economics and the hyper-irrationality of behavioral economics.

Inequality, social immobility, and political polarization are only a few crucial phenomena driven by the inevitability of social structures. Social structures determine who has power and influence, account for why people fail to assimilate basic facts, and enlarge our understanding of patterns of contagion - from the spread of disease to financial crises. Despite their primary role in shaping our lives, human networks are often overlooked when we try to account for our most important political and economic practices.

New edition, expanded and updated. With the release of Theory U almost 10 years ago, Otto Scharmer set in motion a revolution in thought. Scharmer explained that what we pay attention to and how we pay attention is key to what we create. What prevents us from attending to situations more effectively is that we aren't fully aware of and in touch with the inner place from which attention and intention originate.

Anxious, Avoidant, and Disorganized Attachment Recovery is a healthy relationship workbook that seeks to help you understand not only the roots of your attachment patterns, but also the tools to reshape them. You will gain powerful insights into your relationship dynamics that echo the imprints of childhood—shaped by who loved you, who let you down, and how those experiences live on in your heart.

Sigmund Freud remains one of the most influential and controversial figures in the history of psychology. His groundbreaking theories on the unconscious mind, psychoanalysis, dream interpretation, and human development transformed the way people understand behavior, personality, and mental health. Freud’s belief that much of human action is driven by unconscious desires challenged conventional wisdom and laid the foundation for modern psychotherapy. His ideas about repression, defense mechanisms, and the structural model of the mind—dividing it into the id, ego, and superego—became ...

ATTENTION COLLEGE STUDENTS: If you need to write a paper on emotionally intelligent leadership or the application of motivational theories to the real world, then this is the perfect reference. It's simple, easy to understand, and right to the point. Emotionally Intelligent Leadership in Organizations Emotional intelligence and listening go hand-in-hand in most aspects of life. This relationship has application in the business world because it helps create the best leaders possible for achieving organizational growth and prosperity. This book focuses on emotionally intelligent leadership in...

My beginner's book is your ticket to one of the coolest and most mysterious subjects out there. This isn't your average physics book. It's a portal to understanding the stuff that makes up... well, everything! Subatomic particles. Do not let their size fool you; they have a massive impact on the world around you—the fundamental part of how everything works and not as complex as you might fear.

This book offers a concise, accessible guide to the key concepts and applications in Otto Scharmer's classic Theory U. Scharmer argues that our capacity to pay attention coshapes the world. What prevents us from attending to situations more effectively is that we aren't fully aware of that interior condition from which our attention and actions originate. Scharmer calls this lack of awareness our blind spot. He illuminates the blind spot in leadership today and offers hands-on methods to help change makers overcome it through the process, principles, and practices of Theory U.

Now, from the AGI-Goldratt Institute and Jeff Cox, the same creative writer who co-authored The Goal, comes Velocity the book that reveals how to achieve outstanding bottom-line results by integrating the world's three most powerful continuous improvement disciplines: Lean, Six Sigma, and Goldratt's Theory of Constraints.

Erving Goffman effectively extends his argument in favor of a diagnosis of deviant behavior which takes account of the whole social situation.

Tremendous forces for change are radically reshaping the world of work. Disruptive innovations, radical thinking, new business models and resource scarcity are impacting every sector. Although the scale of expected change is not unprecedented, what is unique is the pervasive nature of the change and its accelerating pace which people in organizations have to cope with. Structures, systems, processes and strategies are relatively simple to understand and even fix.

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber, read by Christopher Ragland. Back in 1930, the economist John Maynard Keynes prophesied that by the century's end, technology would see us all working 15-hour weeks. But instead, something curious happened. Today, average working hours have not decreased but increased. And now, across the developed world, three-quarters of all jobs are in services or admin, jobs that don't seem to add anything to society: bullshit jobs.

The corporate world is a complex game that must be mastered in order to achieve great success and rise up the organizational ladder. There are many rewards for the winners in this game-playing environment, and as with many things in life, the corporate world can be quite brutal for the losers in this competitive ecosystem of complicated relationships and diverse behaviors that must be effectively navigated in the course of playing the strategic game. Ergo, learn to play the game of office politics or suffer the unkind consequences of being destroyed on the corporate battlefield.

Academia has produced many motivational theories. Most are well thought, and subsequent research has supported their usefulness and validity. One concern with theses theories, however, is the fact that they were mostly developed in academia using interviews, surveys, or controlled subject groups made up of students or paid participants. Often times, real world application is not part of this process. This eBook examines the gap between academia and the real world. It describes major seven motivational theories and applies them to situations in organizations. Using the examples provided, ...

Whether you believe it or not, the quantum world is real! Quantum physics discovers the behavior of energy and matter at the nuclear, atomic, molecular, and even smaller levels. This book will make such a complicated subject simple to comprehend. It avoids the complicated math and jumps right into all the implications, thought experiments, paradoxes, and concepts that make quantum physics so intriguing to people out there.

How do house flies help save millions of euros? Presented with the image of a fly in toilet bowls in airports, cafés and other public places, men—without realizing it—aim better and splash less, thereby reducing loads of cleaning costs. In The Housefly Effect behavioral scientist Eva van den Broek and advertising expert Tim den Heijer explain how to recognize The Housefly Effect (and many other effects) in our everyday lives and how we can use it to our advantage. Sometimes the smallest things can have a surprisingly large effect.

Too often, textbooks turn the noteworthy details of economics into tedious discourse that would put even Joseph Stiglitz to sleep. Economics 101 cuts out the boring explanations and instead provides a hands-on lesson that keeps you engaged as you explore how societies allocate their resources for maximum benefit. From quantitative easing to marginal utility, this primer is packed with hundreds of entertaining tidbits and concepts that you won't be able to get anywhere else.

When people are diagnosed with OCD, it doesn’t always come as a surprise. With others, it may be more of a shock. However, when we look at the symptoms and the influences that affect such people, it may not be any wonder that it is more prevalent than many have assumed it to be. OCD is a very real, common disorder that knows variations in severity and randomness. Some people are obsessed with cleaning, while others can’t stop double-checking locks, organizational spaces, or items.

In Hidden Games, MIT economists Moshe Hoffman and Erez Yoeli find a surprising middle ground between the hyperrationality of classical economics and the hyper-irrationality of behavioural economics. They call it hidden games. Reviving game theory, Hoffman and Yoeli use it to explain our most puzzling behaviour, from the mechanics of Stockholm syndrome and internalised misogyny to why we help strangers and have a sense of fairness.