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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Narrative Economics by Yale University

4.8
stars
420 ratings

About the Course

Dear Potential Learner, Please take some time to read through this note before deciding to enroll. This course, Narrative Economics, is relatively short and proposes a simple concept: we need to incorporate the contagion of narratives into our economic theory. You can think of narratives as stories that shape public beliefs, which in turn influence our decision making. Understanding how people arrived at certain decisions in the past can aid our understanding of the economy today and improve our forecasts of the future. Popular thinking heavily influences our answers to questions such as how much to invest, how much to spend or save, whether to go to college or take a certain job, and many more. Narrative economics is the study of the viral spread of popular narratives that affect economic behavior. I believe incorporating these ideas into our research must be done both to improve our ability to anticipate and prepare for economic events and help us structure economic institutions and policy. Until we better incorporate it into our methods of analysis and forecasting, we remain blind to a very real, very palpable, very important mechanism for economic change. Even in the dawning age of the Internet and artificial intelligence, so long as people remain ultimately in control, human narratives will matter. Maybe they will especially matter as the new technology exploits human weaknesses and creates new venues for narrative contagion. If we do not understand the epidemics of popular narratives, we cannot fully understand changes in the economy and in economic behavior. The course is broken into 4 modules: Part I introduces basic concepts and demonstrates how popular stories change over time to affect economic outcomes, including recessions, depressions and inequality as well as effective inspiration and growth.. These stories can be observed from diverse sources such as politics, the media, or even popular songs. Part II seeks to answer why some stories go viral, while others are quickly forgotten, by defining our narrative theory more firmly. This module enumerates and explores a list of seven propositions to help discipline any analysis of economic narratives. Part III examines nine perennial narratives that have proved their ability to influence important economic decisions. They include narratives regarding artificial intelligence, stock market bubbles, and job insecurity. Part IV looks to the future and highlights the opportunities for consilience in Narrative Economics. We share some thoughts about where narratives are taking us at this point in history and what kind of future research could improve our understanding of them. This course offers only the beginnings of a new idea and a few suggestions for how it could be used by economists and financial professionals. The tone is not prescriptive or authoritative, as perhaps my Coursera course, Financial Markets, is in places. It represents the beginning of the journey (epidemic). This course is my way of floating the “germ” of this idea out into the broader community of not only professionals but of anyone who is interested in discovering how and why things become “important” to us as a society. I hope some of you will become infected by this idea, mutate it, spread it, and advance it. The beginning of the journey is the easy part. The challenge will come in taking these concepts to the next level. We have the tools to incorporate narratives into our research and the moral obligation to act; only the work remains. - Robert J. Shiller...

Top reviews

AV

Jun 6, 2023

A very insightful and approachable course about the effects of human biases over the economic landscape and how social trends tend to leave a permanent mark on history and exact sciences like finance.

LA

Mar 10, 2024

I really enjoyed this course, it opened my eyes so much and I might keep going even though I only took this course out of fun, I was very interested in this topic. lucky me it Was interesting! Thanks

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101 - 125 of 135 Reviews for Narrative Economics

By Zhang M

Dec 7, 2023

Very practical and perfect!

By Deleted A

Aug 19, 2023

Great, insightful class.

By Don W

May 17, 2023

Very thought provoking!

By Ramón M H

Nov 21, 2023

Muy original y ameno

By Douglas P G

Apr 24, 2023

Very helpful course.

By João l P

Jul 31, 2023

Very instructive.

By Isaac H

May 8, 2023

Excellent course!

By shihyang y

Mar 7, 2024

it is very good

By Iván A

May 2, 2023

Great course

By Saverio I

Jul 20, 2023

Excellent!

By Andres V

May 25, 2023

Incredible

By BABA K U

Feb 21, 2024

thank you

By Marcelo S

Jul 14, 2023

Great!!!

By Sydni O

Aug 14, 2023

amazing

By Richard D

Jun 14, 2023

An interesting course, but in a sense it tells us an obvious thing, that how people understand the economic world affects their economic decisions (spending, saving, investing, founding, ...), and they in turn affect the economic conditions that constrain or enable those decision. The course also gives a useful technique involving Google to help research particular narratives.

I think the subject of narrative economics faces a huge problem. Narratives carry values, and any study of narratives risks imposing the researcher's narrative and values rather than being an "impartial" study. Professor Schiller himself exhibited this - in many instances he seemed to impose his pwn values on the interpretation of historic narratives.

Anyway, thanks for an interesting course.

By Donald H

May 15, 2023

Professor Schiller is an economist, thus the name and the focus of the course. The lessons of the course lean very heavily to the importance, power and necessity of narratives. These lessons could just as easily be applied to many other fields, especially in the social sciences.

By Flavio L

Apr 7, 2023

Interesting point of view about the forces of narratives in economics. Nevertheless the most important concept of this course is "consilience".

It perhaps becomes the key to producing something really important and new in science.

By Russell H

Apr 1, 2023

Interesting perspectives on an under-appreciated driver of economic and social direction, in society at large and personally. Also argues for the importance of multidisciplinary study vs. narrowly-focused specialization.

By Rebecca H

Jun 28, 2023

This short course is not as useful as Prof. other class Financial Markets but thank you for introducing the new concept for narrative economics to me

By fozan t

May 12, 2023

A great introduction to the new field of Narrative Economics, A must course to understand how Narratives influence our everyday life and Economics.

By Antoine F

Mar 12, 2024

Good introduction to the concept of narrative (economics focused but with many other examples too including politics...)

By Henry, W Y W

Aug 24, 2023

The course is quite inspiring and was an eye-opening journey into the narratives and their impact on economic behavior. 

By Philip H

Apr 11, 2023

Very relevant during the reemergence of the AI narrative and concerns about the impact of the technology to employment.

By Jill M

May 3, 2023

Enjoyed learning about this subject as I had no prior knowledge in this area. Was able to learn something new.

By Robert O

Apr 3, 2023

Very broad look into narrative economics, would suggest you do this cert if you are doing an economics degree