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Author

Alina Petrova

Editor-in-chief

Alina Petrova is a Year 12 student preparing to apply to university, and the founder and editor of The Unreasonable Human. She reads across psychology, economics, behavioural science and neuroscience, and writes about the gap between how people are supposed to decide and how they actually do.

Why she started the journal

Writing by Alina Petrova

Rationality is a human endeavour

What economics, psychology and everyday life can teach us about making better decisions.

23 Sept 20268 min read

People crossing a sunlit concrete hall

Why we hate losing

With Prof. Ulrike Malmendier on why the pain of losing outweighs the joy of winning, what that does to markets and marriages, and whether we should try to fix it.

20 Sept 20263 min read

Pale pink blossom on thin branches in front of a raw concrete wall

Why good people make bad decisions

Hypocrisy is the wrong diagnosis. The ordinary mind is simply built for a different world.

18 Sept 20267 min read

Pale pink blossom on thin branches in front of a raw concrete wall

The price of being kind

Generosity looks irrational on a spreadsheet. Over a lifetime it is the best trade most of us ever make.

14 Sept 20266 min read

Noise

Bias gets the attention. This book argues, at length, that the random scatter in our judgements does more damage.

11 Sept 20266 min read

Loss aversion at the checkout

We tracked 40,000 baskets. Shoppers paid more to avoid a loss than to secure the same gain — every time.

9 Sept 20269 min read

Illustration of a bare tree over a faint grid, overlaid with rust-red, pale blue and black-spotted circles

The limits of the calculator

Expected utility is a fine tool. It was never a description of anyone.

8 Sept 20269 min read

Illustration of a bare tree over a faint grid, overlaid with rust-red, pale blue and black-spotted circles

The economics of forgiveness

With Dr. Molly Crockett on why we punish, why we forgive, and what the price of each turns out to be.

6 Sept 20262 min read

The tyranny of the default

Most of the choices that shape a life were never chosen at all.

2 Sept 202611 min read

A lone figure climbing a pale stone staircase towards an arched window filled with light

Misbehaving

How behavioural economics went from a list of anomalies on a blackboard to a Nobel prize, by the man who kept the list.

30 Aug 20267 min read

Illustration of a bare tree over a faint grid, overlaid with rust-red, pale blue and black-spotted circles

The memory of the group chat

The cost is obvious, the benefit is diffuse, and so the benefit loses.

29 Aug 20269 min read

A lone figure climbing a pale stone staircase towards an arched window filled with light

What the lottery teaches us about hope

A ticket is not a bet on winning. It is a small, weekly permission to imagine.

27 Aug 20266 min read

Pale pink blossom on thin branches in front of a raw concrete wall