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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Behavioral Finance by Duke University

4.4
stars
4,159 ratings

About the Course

We make thousands of decisions every day. Do I cross the road now, or wait for the oncoming truck to pass? Should I eat fries or a salad for lunch? How much should I tip the cab driver? We usually make these decisions with almost no thought, using what psychologists call “heuristics” – rules of thumb that enable us to navigate our lives. Without these mental shortcuts, we would be paralyzed by the multitude of daily choices. But in certain circumstances, these shortcuts lead to predictable errors – predictable, that is, if we know what to watch out for. Did you know, for example, that we are naturally biased towards selling investments that are doing well for us, but holding on to those that are doing poorly? Or that we often select sub-optimal insurance payment plans, and routinely purchase insurance that we don’t even need? And why do so many of us fail to enroll in our employer’s corporate retirement plans, even when the employer offers to match our contributions? Behavioral finance is the study of these and dozens of other financial decision-making errors that can be avoided, if we are familiar with the biases that cause them. In this course, we examine these predictable errors, and discover where we are most susceptible to them. This course is intended to guide participants towards better financial choices. Learn how to improve your spending, saving, and investing decisions for the future....

Top reviews

AM

Aug 15, 2017

Great course! It allows to understand the twisted logic that run in our heads. Helps to establish the balance between probabilistic truth and illusions that infect our decision-making. Thanks a lot!

SK

Feb 25, 2020

Good course! There is just one thing I would improve here - an explanation of the mistakes after the tests are done. This improvement should increase the student`s understanding of specific topics.

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51 - 75 of 1,041 Reviews for Behavioral Finance

By Leah F

Apr 30, 2020

While it was interesting, The materials itself I felt was poorly written. When taking the test I found myself thinking this did not go over any of what was in the lesson plans. They need to offer definitions of the words and examples. But for the value I thought it was a fair price. I am however having issues trying to share certificate via anything.

By Adhruth S

May 30, 2020

The content in the slides are good and interesting but other than that it is really not worth doing this course. There are a very few videos and most of the concepts that are important are not covered in them. Videos seem to be missing in the course and the flow of content is not in a proper manner. Not satisfied with this course at all.

By Bhoomi B

Jun 2, 2020

The concepts weren't that clear and and the number of example weren't enough to connect the dots. for new comers like me this course is hard to understand and anticipate the answers. I did it anyways after 12 attempts on the final assignment. I wish to refer to the content available again to freshen up my knowledge again. Thank you

By Dominika M

Apr 12, 2020

Not enough reading material according to questions in quizes and also given material did not explain all the biases sufficiently for answearing questions in quizes. Quiz in week 1 was great because of explanations and I also could see which answer did I pick. Other two quizes showed only if the answear was correct.

By jaiyant

Dec 29, 2019

The course material is not at all good, this course is an epitome of teaching what a tree is and asking in quiz what is the distance between Sun and Moon. The definitions and explanations of all biases were missing , a basic idea is presented but it is incomplete and insufficient .

By Mike M

Aug 19, 2016

The subject matter is good, but the course does not adequately explain behavioral finance concepts. Most of the course consists of slide decks to read. There is a dearth of video content. I expected better quality from a course provided through Duke University.

By Arshish K

Jul 7, 2020

Very poorly executed course, makes you do most of the work yourself. Learn yourself through reading more than what is presented in the videos and reading materials. Grossly under-estimates the time commitment required to complete the course. Not recommended.

By Erica S

Jan 20, 2021

There were parts of the course that were good. The organization of it was not good at all, and the quizzes didn't always match the material covered, or else the quizzes were much more advanced than the material covered.

By Birgitte J

May 22, 2018

Interesting topics, but the course is not well structured, so a bit confusing. Also course views on active vs. passive investing seems too black/white, and does not take the most recent academic evidence into account.

By Niraj P

Aug 5, 2020

Too many documents to read and very few videos. The videos were not very good either. The instructor(s) should have put more effort into building the online course instead of just putting up the reading material.

By Kanha A

Oct 2, 2016

Lots of readings! Would have loved a more engaging format. Also found the content slightly ambiguous, you might have to do some trial and error and might be surprised at the answers in the quiz.

By Cong W

Mar 14, 2020

The lecture is non-useful. The ppt slides are ok but hard to generate information. It is hard to complete and learn knowledge from this course.

By Keith P

Aug 12, 2020

I'm really interested in material like this but I found the tests to be unfair (questions on untaught material, use of ambiguous language)

By Jude N

Aug 2, 2020

The course concentrates mainly on readings. I hope that they include more video resources explaining the course in detail.

By SOUMYA K 1

May 9, 2020

The course contents are interesting but the explanation provided is not sufficient to understand certain topics.

By Aekachan P

Oct 25, 2018

it is a very good and useful course but the content is too little so that I cannot understand the context.

By Niraj S

Jun 19, 2020

The quizzes were very vague in my opinion and there wasn't enough resources provided

By Lakhbir k

Jun 23, 2020

It's a good course from that I had learned basic things of finance

By Thomas L

Jul 25, 2020

Not great, very strange examples, badly explained.

By Rabih I

Sep 10, 2019

The learning path is not smooth

By Hao D

Apr 4, 2020

Not well structured.

By Sarfraz A

Sep 22, 2020

fair

By Mahendra S R

Aug 30, 2018

I

By Irene S F

Sep 11, 2020

I am deeply intrigued by the subject and was excited to embark on this Behavioral Finance course, especially as a person who works in banking. I figured it would be fun because learning why people are inclined towards certain financial decisions is geekily riveting to me! My other experiences with Coursera classes have been worthwhile and engaging, this however, is a disaster. Basically you're given cruddy powerpoint presentations to read through, and heaps of them. Lots of graphs and strange examples which are not tied to the video material. The lectures are brief, uninspiring, and relate in NO WAY to the actual Quizzes. This is a dismal presentation of the subject, and it is clear zero effort was put into developing the course. The team really phoned it in here - just threw some slides up and a couple teleprompter style videos. I've been more educated watching my kid watch YouTube videos of other people playing Minecraft! That's how miserable this course is. Good luck with the quizzes, maybe google some definitions or something.

By Neil E S S

Jul 2, 2020

Overall, did not enjoy the course, sorry. The design was just a hot mess. I sensed little effort from the course. Had I wanted to simply read PDF slides, then I would've visited another source, rather than engage in Coursera. It basically defeats the purpose. Moreover, the instructor just talks about exactly what's in the reading material so I started skipping the videos in the second week. The quizzes were of questionable design, and I don't know how correct answers became correct answers. Further explanation to the answer key would help. Quite frankly, just go with Investopedia - they have a concise article about Behavioral Finance anyways.