Laurie Santos: How monkeys mirror human irrationality

www.ted.com Why do we make irrational decisions so predictably? Laurie Santos looks for the roots of human irrationality by watching the way our primate relatives make decisions. A clever series of experiments in "monkeynomics" shows that some of the silly choices we make, monkeys make too.
TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at www.ted.com/translate. Watch a highlight reel of the Top 10 TEDTalks at www.ted.com/index.php/talks/top10

[@slinger1000]

Excellent presentation. The message concerning the relationship between having a loss mindset and risk is very insightful - pure gold. Well done Laurie.

[@nonchalantd]

She said a whole lot in 20 min.

[@deezyfasheezy]

I found this top fascinating and I loved the narrator. I am a fast listener and still comprehend the information. So, if they talk too slow, I am bored. Thanks Laurie Santos! I was assigned to watch this video for my college anthropology course. I am glad I watched it. Great thought provoking information.

[@SkepticalBliss]

This was an AMAZING experiment! Both revealing and fascinating! WELL DONE!!!

[@Oliprof]

@Yalaah The point is that if you play it safe in the negative and positive scenarios, you will end up with exactly the same net gain. The asymmetry is that in a positive scenario you will play it safe and in a negative one you will take a gamble and risk losing more because your inner optimist hopes for no loss at all

[@drumfisch]

does anybody see the incredible severeness of what she explained? most of history is made up of this law.

[@seanankerr]

What she describes here is similar to the famous runaway train scenario, if there's a runaway train and you can throw a switch which will divert it between 1 of 2 tunnel the 1st has 5 monkeys working there the other 1, you instinct is to go with the 1, if you change the wording of it say there's a runaway train heading towards 5 monkeys but if you push 1 monkey onto the track you'll stop the train people won't chose the "push" option even though the situation is objectively identical.

[@arpankanungo8688]

Wow! Just wow. Great experiment, great outcome. Left with a lot of information.

[@BasicArray]

@Hippocrocaronarat Being continually amazed throughout the day sounds like a very peaceful way to live.

[@ahmedidris6404]

Great talk and perfectly delivered

[@CosmicCompassionQuest]

i think she was working within the time constraints. considering the speed with which she had to deliver the message I thought she was remarkably clear.

[@eagleeye1975]

One of the best TED talks I've seen.

[@Yaalah]

Re money experiment at 10:55: Can anyone explain to me why "playing it safe" is the "right" option in both scenarios? I understand why it's counterintuitive to change strategy, but since the 50/50 chance makes both options become of equal value, I'm having trouble calling one option "bad", "wrong", or "irrational".

[@vaguerant]

12 years late, but it's not that it's the right choice, it's that logically there's no reason to play it safe when having a win but play it risky when having a loss. It's not the choices that are irrational, what's irrational is changing your behavior when the same problem is presented differently.

[@timeofwonder2009]

@Yaalah Both are equal good/bad choices (in the long run), so it is the irrational thing to favour one strategy over the other depending on whether there is an initial gain or loss.

[@kaminarigaston]

Superb work. Superb presentation.

[@anikinippon]

Awesome Video : ) This is what I watch TED for

[@P1ranh4]

Great conclusion in the end!

[@dismutased]

Great presentation!

[@countryroo123]

@claraescher I agree that it's annoying but you really should go back and watch it. It's a facinating speech! =)

[@FreakazoidDK33]

@ADSwank If you look at the video again, both choices was a two part thing. First choice was to maybe get a 1,000 usd or maybe nothing but you were not certain of the out come and the other part was that you were certain that you would get 500 usd every time. The other set of choices was that you got the 2,000 usd and ran the risk of loosing notihng or a 1,000 usd. Or the certainty of always loosing the 500 usd. in the instance both people and monkeys take the risk of loosing the 1,000 usd.

[@angelwhite]

@Finiras She said the marketplace is a separate smaller enclosure.

[@jursamaj]

@ieatglue44 Yes, you misunderstood. In one setup, you're given 1000 definitely. Then you chose between (risking gaining 0 or 1000) and (gain 500). In the other setup, you're given 2000. Then you chose between (risking losing 0 or 1000) and (lose 500). In both, in absolute terms, you chose between (1000 or 2000) and (1500). since the average of 1000 and 2000 is 1500, the average result of the choice is always the same. and you we chose differently when it's phrased as winning or losing.

[@CookDesigns]

@Jangaboo actually the idea of sweets and sugar is good, we need it, it's just that we have made sweets too accessible and it becomes the norm, anything in excess can be bad. Just because cheesecake or anything else is pleasurable though, doesn't make it bad.

[@plusECON]

Money CAN actually just go away. E.g. if suddenly no one is willing to buy a company's stock, even at $0, all the stockholders suddenly lose all their wealth tied to those assets. Similar scenarios occur frequently. Now, you could argue that the lost money shrinks the money supply, lowering prices and making everyone not holding the stock suddenly wealthier, but the actual value of the assets have disappeared changing the actually amount of money, depending on whether you define stocks as money.

[@azarielZX]

@novrecs definitely , but sure...some people maybe disagree....anyway..concetrate on the words.... tryiiiing!

[@MegF142857]

@kimwlias That's a good point and one that built Las Vegas.

[@TheGodlessGuitarist]

there is a flaw in the experiements if the monkeys are offered the 'risk' vs 'play it safe' options twice or more, because averaging starts to even out the options. They needed to increase the gain/risk ratio to make it a true dilema.

[@ORCA4312]

It's interesting that we value what we have more than what we could obtain. Perhaps because what we have is more concrete (real) to us than what is attainable?

[@askjdog]

Excellent content as usual, however, having watching somewhere between 50 and 100 TED Talks videos (a big fan and advocate), I have to say this one was hard to watch for me due to the presentation style.

[@misterchemita]

I don´t think the bad/wrong is the main issue in this experiment, as the presentator says the possibility of overcoming self-limits is the real human nature. What is not a variable of her experiment is the pleasure, that is the reason behind every bad choice (in economical terms). However, for me it has been inspirational to see how to achieve science... great great presentation.

[@Earthbjorn]

Loss Aversion may have some logic when considering the law of diminishing returns. When you have to choose between no food and 1 piece of food, then 1 piece is priceless. But choosing between 10 pieces and 11 pieces, there is little difference. Thus the value of the first grape is greater than the value of the 11 grape. The makes sense when considering supply and demand.

[@BrutticusForce]

was this work mentioned in Freakonomics?

[@ForAnAngel]

@Yaalah It's irrational to think one option is better than the other in either scenario and even more irrational to think a different option is better in the two scenarios.

[@infernvsnecrohag]

@balasuar HAHAHA YES Superfreakonomics. That was the best part of the whole experiment.

[@Nyxtia]

@leejae That's the point, people go for different options despite the fact that they're indenticle.

[@uwedippel]

@Yaalah I'm not so sure that 'right' is right or good/bad. I think the gist of it is, that humans tend to chose the 'safe' one at winning ($500); but the 'risky' one at losing ($1000 or nothing). And the monkeys did likewise.

[@libanlibanliban]

Great talk.

[@fbn0801]

Watch the talk but imagine that instead of a human speaking to a human audience about monkeys, it's an alien speaker talking to an alien audience about humans.

[@BartenderMix]

@GRNoam can ted post those research papers? that would be awsome. well...maybe just to me

[@maxsteffensen2100]

Great talk. Think its the third time I see this one.

[@ORCA4312]

Wow. Fascinating video.

[@ThroneofEden]

Extremely captivating.

[@jaksproductions4520]

That was a pretty cool talk!

[@facelessone86]

@mateous11 This TEDtalk on irrationality should have been dedicated to you, mateous11.

[@sojourner99]

@battlestrat Also I believe you have to watch to the end or near to the end for it to count as a view. So someone can determine they like, or dont like it, press the button then not watch the rest of the video, resulting in more likes/dislikes than views.

[@Resiliente-Mente]

@mateous11, i meant we have similar gene pool (like with other animals), but we are not directly related.

[@user-pg4wi4ew2g]

Спасибо за видео.

[@dcse55]

@Yaalah It's not that "safe" is "wrong" or "irrational;" it's that changing strategy in circumstances which, though different, amount to the same thing, is irrational. "Safe" is no more right (or wrong) in the adding condition than the subtracting; "taking a risk" is no more right (or wrong) in the subtracting condition than the adding -- if the odds are even. "Safe" is wiser if, over time, the odds are stacked in one direction; "risk" wiser if they're stacked in the other, regardless..

[@Silversnapper2]

so what was the conclusion of the research?

[@SuperiorApostate]

@Finiras why not? how do you know they don't like it?

[@TheDarkSagan]

Great Talk.

[@vmavpt74]

You are Totally right!

[@Mozza314]

@Mozza314 If you don't want to read the whole thing, see the third last paragraph of the second page.

[@charliespider7598]

how about examining what new limitations we create for ourselves with our culture?

[@NsaneNtheNbrane]

@NsaneNtheNbrane They should redo the experiment while monitoring their dopamine levels to see if they are exhibiting addictive behavior during the gain/loss trials.

[@TheRealmsNL]

That was fascinating!

[@santaana36]

It seems to be that we are hard wired to take more risks in a losing situation. Instead of just stating that this is "irrational" it would be interesting to understand why.

[@ShinkaTV]

Unprecidented examples of human ineptitude. Awesome quote.

[@sugarkang]

@Atheistprimate I'm not sure your opinion on who would do a better job in management makes a whole lot of sense if you can't perceive the difference between "then" and "than."

[@chathuriu]

i really didnt think, from the title of the video, that this would offer any solid extrapolations to humans............but i was really impressed with this.......

[@dannyboyfour]

Wow now that was thought provoking!

[@LiamE69]

Oh that grey bar is doing my head in.

[@sugarkang]

@Scottium Awesome. Why is that illegal anyway?

[@NsaneNtheNbrane]

I think the reason for the loss aversion bias is that when we gain something desirable, we become addicted to it and dependent on it being supplied, but if you aren't used to having more than you have, it's easier to do without. Those monkeys were addicted to their three grapes per serving and, like humans, used wishful thinking to assume the best possible outcome would happen because they couldn't accept any loss.

[@friendinmiami]

Dr. Santos is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Yale University, for those who think TED speakers just wander in off the street. If you don't like her conclusions, you could study her methodology and the data sets that are available, and provide a reasoned basis for your disagreement.

[@803brando]

@GuildyDawg i agree

[@retrofutur1st]

Superb!

[@jayfinne626]

“After leaving the monkeys in a community of their own to trade amongst themselves for 3 weeks with the ‘tokens’ and coming back we found the monkeys have now replaced the tokens with meme-coin based derivatives that they lend to each other at exorbitant interest rates, 99% of the monkeys are completely impoverished and one of the monkeys has managed to acquire 98.99% of the monkey meme-coin derivative based money supply. Unfortunately the situation seems to have devolved much further then we could’ve expected; ‘Ooku’, the monkey who acquired all of the monkey coins, has now started his very own monkey media outlet, which all of the monkeys watch on the little time off they have when they aren’t working for him in low wage jobs that manufacture cheap goods for the other monkeys to buy with their memecoin based derivative monkey money credit cards that Ooku also issues. Ooku has also incited a race war amongst the lower class macadamia brown monkeys and the even lower class oak brown monkeys, which has resulted in a coo where Ooku has installed a 1 world banana republic style government known as the monkey’s republic of Ookuland where the law of Ooku reigns supreme and crimes such as expressing free thought via sign language, selling bananas without a license, or having an unregistered spear or rock are punishable by death. The study has concluded: The monkeys are just as dumb as humans.”

[@TedDGPoulos]

... B: This is a consequence of our ability to conceive unbounded choices, a great number of which challenge and oppose health, growth, efficacy and efficiency. No other form of life shares this ability. And as a result, no other form of life has the capacity to make so unsound and resistant decisions as we do.

[@uhila24]

amazing

[@FeelThatChairNow]

If natural selection hold this evolutionary strategies must be beneficial in some way. Why is more interesting. P.S. Great talk

[@badcalculon]

@Saerain actually

[@jursamaj]

@ieatglue44 But the point of the experiment is that the results are *exactly* the same: 50/50 of $1000 or $2000 vs. 100% for $1500. There is no difference in the outcomes, so there can be no rational basis for preferring one in 1 setup and the other in the other setup.

[@dimemangsewel]

i feel you.

[@aleceth]

@mot5600 It could be related easily to pascal's wager.

[@LilliaRosa]

very interesting :)

[@lindahearne5046]

Experimental economics has been doing similar work for an extremely long time. Check out Art DeVany or Ray Battalio's work.

[@lindahearne5046]

Oops - posted to the wrong video! Santos also has a video out about monkeyeconomics ... her results there were extremely old news to anyone familiar with experimental economics.

[@MrTortillasoup]

There are two ways to acquire stock. You can purchase from a public offering/pay the company or you can pay another investor for the stock. When you pay the company the money doesn't just disappear into the company, the money ends up getting used to buy necessary things for investment or goes to other expenses. If you buy a stock on the exchange, the money you pay goes to the investor who sells you the stock. The money you spend still circulates through the economy, you just don't benefit.

[@sashakid]

deep stuff...

[@deedubya286]

@unperson123 So that's what she said. I thought it was someone's name that I didn't quite catch. Thanks.

[@travelwithyourdreams]

Nice

[@MrSifaperdire]

very interesting speech, very few views compared to other ones, unsurprisingly

[@Syafiiqq]

OB brought me here. Damn you RP.

[@ORCA4312]

One point that she is missing (or ignoring) is that our systems are not co-operative. They are competitive. They are complex by design to trap the dumber people and profit off of them. There is no WE to design BETTER systems. Money doesn`t just go away. Someone ends up with it. I would love to see more experiments with monkey money. It could be fascinating.

[@SamediFish]

Did she test what would monkeys choose between 2 grapes and 2 coins for the price of 1 coin?

[@davidventura83]

This is gold

[@Changstax]

Learned this in social Psychology

[@pnatsu35]

4:35 ninja cameraman. lol

[@prasad4094]

WOW

[@softcellelectrical]

I would like to see this scholar teamed up with Lara Broderinsky. I think the insights could be very productive indeed.

[@DeimosSaturn]

@MisterGibs The dietary preference isn't really analogous to what I'm talking about and you're missing the point. Our current risk taking behavior pattern has seen us through deficits AND SURPLUSES. I think the relation of the experiments to real world finances is entirely superficial. And banks are not controlled by individuals. I'm not saying new world order, I'm saying they print the money and they control the interest rates they control period.

[@RajendraJagad]

Dr Laurie Santos is not 16 even though she might look and she has been publishing many papers at Yale University In my opinion she has done a good job of presenting something in a diplomatic way. This however may appear contradictory to people who do not get that. If you look this from behavior perspective you will know that criminal behavior (risk taking) is high among in humans to prevent a loss and similar risk taking is seen in monkeys

[@reapfreak]

@Atheistprimate The problem is the mindset the economy needs run. The fact that market forces weren't allowed to work, that instead there was a violent force pointing guns at individuals, is the reason that economies go sour.

[@shlarl]

I would of liked a definition of what a "mistake" is..

[@kmikze]

well, ironically, at 7:28 the camera guy doesn't look so 'sapiens' :))

[@MisterGibs]

@DeimosSaturn "Wouldn't we have evolved to not take risks to avoid loss if it was the best survival strategy?" It was the best survival strategy for living in the wild but is not the most rational. Just like our dietary preferences have evolved for calorie dense foods (sugars and fats). This was an adaptation that helped avoid starvation in the past but now is works against us. "Our economy is controlled by banks, not by individuals." And banks are controlled by individuals.

[@UncertainTruth]

i get stoned and watch ted talks instead of watching tv ...much much better decision

[@Agnotio]

@Kan2209 yes, but not all the comments are dumb, only most of them

[@Lawh]

@Agnotio Ironically your comment is in the comments.

[@MarkProffitt]

@klinkerhoppen Based on your reaction it would seem self-awareness is over exaggerated and a little bit more other awareness is needed.