Dr Féidhlim McGowan is a behavioural economist. He joined the J.E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics as a Lecturer Above the Bar in September 2023. His main research interests are using experimental methods to explore individual decision making in different domains, and testing policy interventions to help consumers make better decisions (as judged by themselves). He has published in the following journals: Journal of Experimental Psychology: Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, Journal of Cultural Economics, Resource and Energy Economics, Behavioural Public Policy, Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Journal of Behavioral Public Administration, Psychology and Health, Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Finance, Journal of Consumer Policy, and Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics.

Within the J.E. Cairnes School of Business and Economics, Féidhlim is a member of the Centre for Economic Research on Inclusivity and Sustainability (CERIS). He is also the Programme Director for the new MSc Fintech (Economics and Financial Technology). He will be teaching Behavioural Finance and Economics in the second semester of this MSc. Before joining the faculty at the University of Galway, Féidhlim was an Irish Research Council Fellow based at the Behavioural Research Unit (BRU) in the ESRI, where he conducted experimental research on public support for progressive carbon taxation (specifically, frequent flyer levies designed to reduce the carbon footprint from the aviation sector). He currently works with the BRU to measure psychological barriers to support for active travel infrastructure, and is also involved in a number of other collaborations.

“Two strands of my research are related to the climate crisis. One considers the issue of how individuals decide whether to support climate policies or not. The main determinants of support are perceived effectiveness, perceived fairness and self-interest. These dimensions are sensitive to the information available to people. I test how giving people distributional information (e.g. how many people would be affected by a new tax?) alters support for carbon taxes. I focus specifically on taxing flying, which is one of the most carbon-intensive activities, but the research methods I use could easily be transferred to other domains.

The second strand considers the role of status quo bias as a driver of opposition to active travel infrastructure, which is necessary to facilitate a green transition in the transport sector (as well as being an important factor in tackling the obesity epidemic). A working paper of this research is available here.

A different strand of my research relates to the economic implications of how people think intuitively about numbers. Specifically, I find that when people have to guesstimate the sum of a sequence of numbers, they tend to systematically underestimate the total. My research so far has found this bias is robust to measurement method, and is not sensitive to context either. I have published research on how this bias can help explain the undervaluation of fuel savings from an energy-efficient upgrade.

Another implication of this research is that it can help explain the popularity of subscription services instead of paying up-front for goods and services. In short, when the price is split up over time, people may underestimate the true price they are paying. A working paper of this research is available here.”

“I have a variety of teaching interests. My primary interest is behavioural economics and experimental methods. I enjoy teaching students about how behavioural insights can improve the predictive power of economic models, or more generally, how exploring the psychology of decision making can shed light on the why peopleallocate scarce resources (time, money, effort) as they do.

In Semester 2 of the 2024/25 Academic Year, I will be teaching Behavioural Finance and Economics to the MSc Fintech students. I currently teach Principles of Macroeconomics to first year Commerce students. I enjoy this introductory course as it is important to help students learn to think like an economist, and to develop the fundamental skill of turning words into graphs – and vice versa!

On the final-year Commerce module Ireland and the Global Economy, I taught my students about the research on determinants of climate policy support across countries. This topic is closely linked to my current research on public support for frequent flyer levies. I am passionate about research-led teaching. I also try to use technology where ever possible to make lectures engaging and interactive.