David Savage

Background

About David Savage

My primary research interest lies between an applied microeconomic and behavioural analysis of disasters and extreme environments, while this interest stems from a behavioural economics perspective, it extends to encompass the broader social sciences. This is evident in my research publications which has focused on the empirical analysis of decision making outside normal con- ditions, such as high pressure environments and life-and-death situations. In line with this I have explored the factors that may affect or lead to a change in the decision making process from a behavioural economics perspective and explore various methodological approaches to better un-derstand the (behavioural) preferences of decision makers in these environments. The extreme nature of my research area often makes it difficult to obtain an understanding of behaviour or the underlying decision making process, because of this the most viable avenues for research is an experimental approach. Throughout my research I have utilised a mixture of laboratory, field and natural experiments, in order to elicit/reveal the individuals preferences in the decision process. The field experiments employed versions of common behavioural experiments, such as risk, public goods, other regarding preferences and over-confidence, but also include a raft of demographic, sociometric and psychometric questions (big five personality, locus of control etc.). The inclusion of sociometric and psychometric markers are used to broaden and generalise the findings across multi-disciplinary boundaries I have presented my research at many conferences around the world. Much of my work disasters reopens lines of research that has been over looked by economists for many years or builds links across disciplines, by demonstrating that behaviour of individuals in disasters does not follow the traditional mythology of mass panic or self-interest.