Daniel Kahneman: A Pioneer in Human Judgment and Decision-Making

Often referred to as one of the world’s most influential living psychologists until his passing in 2024, Daniel Kahneman is arguably most well known as being the recipient of The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel (2002) for his pioneering work in behavioural economics in areas of judgement and decision making under uncertainty. Daniel undertook this ground-breaking body of research that earned him this award in collaboration with his colleague and close friend, the late Amos Tversky. A summary of these insights was published in ‘Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision under Risk’ (Kahneman & Tversky, 1979). Prospect Theory diverted from the conventional wisdom of the time, which described how people ‘ought’ to think and behave based on rational judgment and decision-making processes by proposing that people value gains and losses differently and tend to favour perceived gains rather than perceived losses when presented with equal choices. At the time of this article, ‘Prospect theory’ received more than 90,000 citations, and Daniel remains the only non-economist awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics.