NeuroEconomics: An overview from an economic perspective

Until now, economic theory has not systematically integrated the influence of emotions on decision-making. Since evidence from neuroscience suggests that decision-making as hypothesized in economic theory depends on prior emotional processing, interdisciplinary research under the label of "neuroeconomics" arose. The key idea of this approach is to employ recent neuroscientific methods in order to analyze economically relevant brain processes. This paper aims to provide an overview of the current state of neuroeconomic research by giving a brief description of the concept of neuroeconomics, outlining methods commonly used and describing current studies in this new research area. Finally, some future prospects and limitations are discussed. (c) 2005 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.