I was just wondering about a new discipline called "behavioral economics." I read a very interesting article about in the April edition of Scientific American. The author discussed his research concerning capuchin monkeys and their cooperative behavior. This lends support to the main tenet of behavioral economics - "it views the way human conduct business as an evolved heritage of our species," (SciAm, April 2005 p.74). Also, the author pointed out that basic cooperational and emotional mechanics in humans readily appear in animals (most prevalent and similar in primates). I thought this was really intriguing. Does anyone know anything about this? I read in the article that Daniel Kahneman and Vernon Smith founded this discipline, and even won the Nobel Prize in '02 for doing so - However, does anyone know of specific literature or published research I can check out about this subject? I searched on the internet, but there is a lot of material. I dont' know where to begin. I welcome any guidance and insight into this emerging social science field.
