MBA-Association and BDVDB visit the Transatlantic Institute
The first meeting of the MBA-Association Rhineland-Palatinate and the bdvb Rhein-Neckar on April 2, 2008 focused on the human brain. With an exciting lecture Prof. Dr. Gerhard Raab introduced the still relatively young research branch of neuroeconomics. The importance of neuroeconomics lies, among other things, in the fact that it uses novel methods to study economic behavior. Great hopes are placed in particular on imaging techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).
One subfield of neuroeconomic research is addictive buying behavior, which is currently the subject of a scientific investigation at the Transatlantic Institute of the Ludwigshafen University of Applied Sciences. Substance-free forms of addiction or behavioral addictions such as pathological buying behavior have increasingly been the subject of scientific research for several years.
The core objective of the research project is to investigate the neurological causes of pathological shopping behavior using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). Against the background of the proven increase of uncontrolled and pathological buying behavior in society as well as the increasing indebtedness and over-indebtedness of individuals, the need for a better understanding of the causes becomes obvious. The research project thus serves both clinical and economic questions and addresses an area of neuroeconomics that has not yet received attention.
Prof. Dr. Raab presented the facts and the latest research results in a very informative and entertaining way, in order to answer the questions of the more than 50 audience members in the discussion that followed.
To the conclusion of the evening the present members of the bdvb and the MBA-Association had still sufficient opportunity to exchange themselves with a glass of sparkling wine among themselves.