Seeing differently, doing differently Essays on visual attention and individual decision-making

This dissertation explores how attention shapes the way we make decisions. It looks at how people gather and process information, and how this can influence their choices. By studying both personal goals and external factors—like product placement or packaging—the research shows how attention can affect everything from financial decisions to sustainable shopping. Using insights from psychology, neuroscience, and economics, it develops new methods to understand and predict decision-making. The work is structured into three key papers: Chapter 2 (Hirmas et al. 2024) focuses on attention in risk-related decisions, Chapter 3 (Hirmas & Engelmann, 2023) explores the causal impact of attention on choices, and Chapter 4 (Hirmas & Engelmann, 2024) examines attention's role in sustainable consumption.
Alejandro Hirmas is a behavioral economist who obtained his bachelor’s degree in Economics and Business Administration from Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (2013) and got his MSc. in Economics at Tilburg University (2014). He later completed an MPhil at the Tinbergen Institute and the University of Amsterdam (2019). For his PhD, he joined the Center for Experimental Economics and Political Decision Making (CREED) at the University of Amsterdam.