School | Business School | College | College of Humanities and Social Science | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) | Availability | Not available to visiting students | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
SCQF Credits | 15 | ECTS Credits | 7.5 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Summary | This course is designed to provide an overview of an exciting new and fast growing area in finance, which takes as its premise that investment decision-making and investor behaviour are not necessarily driven by 'rational' considerations but by aspects of personal and market psychology. Behavioural finance recognises that our abilities to make complex financial decisions are limited due to the biases and errors of judgement to which all of us are prone. This course introduces cognitive biases, discusses the impact of such biases on the financial decision-making, and explores the behaviour of individual investors, fund managers and corporate managers. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Course description | This course is intended to complement other finance courses that are mainly based on the traditional paradigm which assumes that investors and managers are generally rational. Specifically, this course has three main objectives. First, we aim to examine how the insights of behavioural finance theories shed light on the behaviour of individual investors and finance professionals in investment decision-making and corporate financial decision-making. Second, we explore the possibility to improve investment performance and corporate performance by recognising the cognitive biases and applying appropriate 'debiasing' techniques. Finally, we investigate the implications of behavioural finance for the construction of good corporate governance mechanisms. Syllabus Overview of behavioural finance Student Learning Experience: The learning occurs primarily through reading and thinking about the papers or chapters of books recommended and discussion in class. This reading is supported by the programme of ten lectures and nine tutorials, in each of which an overview of the topic is presented and the findings of a number of relevant papers are reviewed in some detail. Students are required to write a report. All students are expected to participate actively in class discussion. Learning takes place in four stages. Prior to each session you are required to complete the reading assignments given. During the session, the lecture slides will be used to focus the discussion and to help to summarise key issues. As the structure of the elective is designed to be cumulative, you will be expected to bring your learning and insights from previous sessions to bear on subsequent sessions. You will bring together and test out your understanding of the issues discussed in the course during the lectures. |
Pre-requisites | Co-requisites | ||
Prohibited Combinations | Other requirements | Business School students only unless an arrangement has been made. Please contact the course secretary. |
Academic year 2015/16, Available to all students (SV1) | Quota:None | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Course Start | Semester 2 | Timetable | Timetable | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) | Total Hours:150( Lecture Hours 20, Seminar/Tutorial Hours 10, Summative Assessment Hours 2, Other Study Hours 115, Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 3,Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours0 ) | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Additional Information (LearningandTeaching) | Prep Reading 40 Assignment: 45 Exam Prep 40 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Assessment (Further Info) | Written Exam60 %,Coursework40 %,Practical Exam0 % | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Additional Information (Assessment) | Group written assignment 40% (made up of group written report 25% and individual essay on the group work 15%) Final exam 60% | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Feedback | All students will be given at least one formative feedback or feedforward event for every course they undertake, provided during the semester in which the course is taken and in time to be useful in the completion of summative work on the course. Such feedback may be at course or programme level, but must include input of relevance to each course in the latter case. For this course specifically students will get written feedback on the assignment and guideline answers and general feedback on the student performance in the exam. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Exam Information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Exam Diet | Paper Name | Hours & Minutes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Main Exam Diet S2 (April/May) | 2:00 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
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Required: Nofsinger, J. (2014), The Psychology of Investing, 5th edition (international edition), Pearson, ISBN: 0133382877. Recommended: Forbes, W. (2009), Behavioural Finance, 1st edition, John Wiley, ISBN: 9780470028049. |
Graduate Attributes and Skills | Intellectual Skills and personal development On completion of the module, students should: Subject Specific Skills Students will be familiarised with the latest developments and issues in behavioural finance and understand their implications for securities pricing, financial analysis, and corporate finance decision-making. |
Keywords | finBehaviouralFinance |
Course organiser | Dr Arman Eshraghi Tel: (0131 6)50 4311 Email: Arman.Eshraghi@ed.ac.uk | Course secretary | Miss Rachel Allan Tel: (0131 6)51 3757 Email: Rachel.Allan@ed.ac.uk |
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