Dr. Graeme Walker is a Canadian-born and educated economist. At Fulbright, he is the Associate Dean of Faculty Affairs and an Associate Professor of economics. His research interests lie at the cross-section of psychology, sociology, and neuroscience – commonly referred to as behavioral economics. More specifically, Graeme’s research has been concerned with the origins and formation of beliefs and their role in decision making.
Graeme first became interested in behavioral economics while participating in experiments as a graduate student. Graeme’s inability to select a Nash Equilibrium in many of these experiments made him start wondering why. It was this experience that led to a research agenda investigating how various aspects of our psyche could lead people to hold different beliefs on how they should behave. Graeme’s earlier work investigates the role of cognitive dissonance in the formation of beliefs and social networks. This work has shed light on phenomena such as political polarization, bubbles in financial markets, gentrification in urban societies, and the market microstructure of the news media industry. His current work investigates the role of social identity on economic primitives such as trust and reciprocity in Vietnamese society. Graeme received his Bachelor of Science degree from McGill University where he majored in Mathematics and Computer Science. He then completed his Master of Arts and Ph.D. in Economics at Simon Fraser University. Prior to joining Fulbright University Vietnam in May 2018, Graeme was the Director of the MBA Program at RMIT University Vietnam.
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