Erasmus School of Economics - Erasmus University Rotterdam
MSc Economics and Business - Specialisation in Behavioural Economics
Rotterdam, Netherlands
MSc
DURATION
1 year
LANGUAGES
English
PACE
Full time
APPLICATION DEADLINE
EARLIEST START DATE
STUDY FORMAT
On-Campus
* EEA students: 1 May, non-EEA students: 1 April
Key Summary
About: The MSc in Economics and Business (Specialization in Behavioral Economics) at Erasmus School of Economics teaches you to combine economics, mathematics, and psychology to model actual decision-making. You study mainstream and behavioral economics, experimental methods, and problem-based seminars that apply theory to issues like sustainability. The programme values interactive learning, international perspectives, and ties to the Behavioral Economics Group.
Career Outcomes: You'll be ready for roles in policy design, behavioral consultancy, market strategy, finance, and research. Alumni work in consultancy, the financial sector, governments, and research; you could also pursue product design, marketing strategy, public policy, or behavioral analytics.
Why don't people always act as rational economic decision-makers? How can we apply mathematics and psychology to improve our economic models? Contrary to assumptions in traditional economics, people do not automatically choose the optimal course of action, even if given proper incentives. Intrigued? Our Behavioural Economics programme brings you the skills to optimise strategies and policies by including the framing and context that affect people’s choices.
This skills-based programme addresses the economics and psychology of decision-making. In both mainstream and behavioural economics courses you will acquire a deep understanding of economics as well as the skills to adapt strategies and policies to address deviations from rational behaviour. You will also learn how to run experiments in economics, for instance when testing how to best implement a policy. In the problem-based-learning seminar, students apply their theoretical knowledge to address real-world problems, including encouragement of sustainable and digitally secure behaviour.
Why study Behavioural Economics in Rotterdam?
Few universities offer this increasingly popular stream in economics. If Behavioural Economics is your programme of choice, Rotterdam as a frontrunner in economics makes perfect sense. Select the track that suits you best, study among ambitious and inquisitive students and benefit from the expertise of the internationally renowned Behavioural Economics Group.
The MSc Behavioural Economics programme offers you solid training in economics, coupled with psychological insights. Our students particularly appreciate the interactive nature of this programme.
Study the Behavioural Economics programme at Erasmus School of Economics for:
- Mainstream economics courses enriched with psychological insights
- The skills to design more effective policies, products, and strategies
- The expertise and network of the internationally renowned Behavioural Economics Group
- A degree that is in high demand by economic and financial decision-makers worldwide.
Complete your MSc in Economics and Business with a specialized concentration in Behavioral Economics, navigating a comprehensive curriculum that spans 60 ECTS credits.
Behavioural Economics gives you both solid training in mainstream economics and the tools and models to use psychological insights to improve predictions and design effective products, strategies, and policies. The curriculum consists of courses in empirical methods, mainstream economics, as well as Behavioural Economics.
In two courses, you will learn how to deal with different types of data, and get familiar with popular statistical software such as STATA and R. Additionally, you can choose between three economics tracks, corresponding with our other Economics and Business specialisations:
- Financial Economics track
- Strategy Economics track
- Marketing track
These tracks consist of courses and seminars of the corresponding specialisations of the MSc in Economics and Business.
In the core Behavioural Economics courses (4 credits each) you will learn the most recent insights from Behavioural Economics. In the Behavioural Economics seminar (10 credits) you get the chance to apply these insights in a highly interactive setting. The core behavioural economics courses and seminars include:
- Advanced Behavioural Economics
- Experimental Economics
- Seminar Applied Behavioural Economics
On top of this, students can choose a behavioural elective such as Advanced Behavioural Finance or Economics of Negotiations, depending on their chosen track.
The curriculum consists of:
The coursework for the program entails 50% of behavioural economics courses (22 ECTS), 32% of the chosen track (14 ECTS), and 18% of empirical methods. The core coursework consists of roughly 40% theory (mainly in lectures) and 60% application (mainly in the seminar).
Course Overview
- Take-Off Master
- Applied Microeconometrics
- Advanced Behavioural Economics
- Track
- Experimental Economics
- Advanced Empirical Methods
- Seminar Applied Behavioural Economics
- Master's Thesis Behavioural Economics
Countries like the US, UK, and the Netherlands, and companies worldwide increasingly use the insights from Behavioural Economics to shape their policies. Helping governments to help people make better choices, or companies to identify anomalies in decision-making are common tasks for behavioral economists.
Do you want to design and improve economic policies and strategies for government, for instance with regard to pension design and health policy? Or would you rather work in a private enterprise and help design better marketing policies, contracts, and financial portfolios or even improve negotiation procedures to the benefit of the company? The choice is yours.
Our alumni work in many sectors, including:
- Consultancy
- Financial sector
- Governments
- Research
Is this the right choice for you?
Are you curious about how people make decisions? Do you want to couple rigorous economic thinking with psychological insights? Can you combine analytical thinking with finding creative solutions for real problems? Would you like to help people improve their lives by developing techniques to nudge them toward better choices? In that case, Behavioural Economics might be the right specialization for you.
Factors that will help you make a success of your study in Behavioural Economics are:
- A fondness for critically comparing economics models with reality
- Understanding basic microeconomics and game theory
- Being good at mathematics and econometrics/statistics
