I would like to recommend a book, “Feeling smart” by Eyal Winter. I need to admit I have not read this book but I have read his papers which are relevant to this book; I am sure this views in this book will inspire me as much as his papers which provide me with a different angle to look at people’s emotion and the rationality deep inside us. Eyal Winter suggests that feelings can change outcomes (angry feeling can provide more payoff in some cases) and people only change their feelings to gain more payoff. He gave an example that students can appeal to their university about their exam results, the satisfaction rate when students are easier to make appeals is lower when the rule is more stricter, because it can potentially increase their chances of getting more marks when they are sad, angry (the unsatisfied feelings).
This theory can work in a much general environment. We always say when a person is grown up, he or she has a higher EQ; and we may find some people who have brilliant IQ do not have brilliant EQ. These can be explained by this theory. When we are growing up, we realise that being nice can give ourselves more benefits, we will become nicer. Moreover, smart guys may be “lazy” to be nice, since they are smart enough to get great payoff and being nice is not effortless, they may not want to take extra effort to be nice. However, this is a theory, and I believe especially in social science, theories can only explain part of the truth in the reality.
Overall, I highly recommend this book because it builds a bridge between game theory and psychology, emotion was never considered from the rationality aspect.
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