Who I am
Good morning. Let me introduce myself , I'm Luigia Barzaghi.
In 2017 I graduated in Psychoeconomics at the e-Campus University of Novedrate with the thesis: "Financial markets: investors and mental traps".
In the old system there was the course: “Cognitive and emotional bases of the decision”.
It was thanks to this exam, which combined economics studies with those of psychology, that I became passionate about the issues of decision-making and behavioral economics .
In 2020 I attended the "Decision, Persuasion and Change Management" master at the IULM University of Milan which allowed me to deepen some aspects of the subject.
Now I'm Choice Architect in Behavioral Economics.
This term, which was coined by Thaler and Sunstein, it refers to the practice of influencing choice "by organizing the context in which people make decisions".
"The architects of public and private choices actively seek to push individuals in a direction that can improve their living conditions by nudging them." - Thaler R., Cass R., Sunstein C., Nudge, 2008 -
Thaler argues that individuals need to be prodded when faced with difficult and unusual decisions, when immediate feedback is not available, when choices have deferred effects: costs today, benefits tomorrow.
And in fact, Thaler's most famous intervention concerns the US social security sector, implemented in the early years of the new century.
In the United States, before the intervention, only 49% of employees had a pension plan.
Question has been raised: how can we nudge workers to get them to join a pension plan? The answer was: changing the “default rule”; that's replacing non-adhesion with automatic adhesion. As soon as the employee starts working and therefore acquires the right to join the pension fund, he receives a letter informing him that he will be automatically enrolled in the company pension plan, unless he decides to fill in a form stating that he doesn't want to join.
This intervention leverages cognitive distortions and wins inertia, procrastination and a lack of self-control.
After the coming into force of automatic membership, the number of members has increased from 49% to 86%.
Other times the solution to a decision problem can be obtained thanks to Boosting.
Gigerenzer tells us about "risk literacy" and states: "Risk literacy, starting from elementary school, is needed to make paternalism a ghost of the past". - Gigerenzer G., Learning to take risks, 2015 -
With the term paternalism (libertarian) he refers to the Nudge, towards which he is rather critical.
I share Gigerenzer's thinking and I am convinced that to achieve change it is necessary to understand the basics, the dynamics of the decision-making process in order to avoid some mental traps and come to a better decision.
This applies to us, but also to help our friends, our customers, ... ..
So my mission (I hope not impossible) is the diffusion of the dynamics of Decision Making and Behavioral Economics through articles, conferences, courses for companies, cultural associations, secondary schools, etc ...
Take a better decision!
