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Recommended reading

Books and texts selected by our faculty for anyone interested in our MSc programmes

Behavioural Science

  • Dolan, P., & Kahneman, D. (2014). Happiness by Design : Finding Pleasure and Purpose in Everyday Life.
  • Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, Fast and Slow.
  • Thaler, R., & Sunstein, C. (2009). Nudge : Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth and Happiness.

Organisational and Social Psychology

  • A. Bryman (Ed), Doing Research in Organisations, Routledge, 2013. 
  • P. Dawson & C. Andriopoulos, Managing change, creativity and innovation. Sage. 2017
  • S. Fineman, Y. Gabriel,  & D. Simms, Organizing and Organizations. Sage, 2010.
  • A. Furnham, The psychology of behaviour at work: The individual in the organisation, Psychology Press, 2005.
  • S. Haslam, Psychology in Organisations: The Social Identity Approach, Sage, 2004.
  • S. Haslam; S. Reicher, & M. Platow. The New Psychology of Leadership. Identity, Influence and Power. Psychology Press, 2011. 
  • J. Hayes, The theory and practice of change management. Palgrave. 2018
  • G. Morgan, Images of Organisation, Sage, 2006.
  • E. H. Schein, Organisational Psychology (3rd edn), Prentice Hall, 1988.
  • E.H. Schein, Organizational culture and leadership (Vol. 2). John Wiley & Sons, 2010.
  • P. Spector, Industrial and Organisational Psychology: Research and Practice, John Wiley & Sons, 2012.
  • K. E. Weick, Sense Making in Organisation, Addison Wesley, 1995.
  • K. E. Weick, Making Sense of the Organization, Wiley-Blackwell, 2000.

Psychology of Economic Life

  • Diamond, J. (2005). Collapse. How societies choose to fail or succeed. New York: Penguin Books.
  • Farr, R. M. (1997). “The new economic mind: The social psychology of economic behavior: A. Lewis, P. Webley, and A. Furnham (eds.)” Book review. Journal of Economic Psychology, 18(6), 713-717.
  • Goffman, E. (1959). The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Doubleday Anchor books.
  • Himmelweit, H. T. & Gaskell G. (1990). Societal psychology. London: Sage Publications, Inc.
  • Johansson, T. (2000). Social Psychology and Modernity. Buckingham & Philadelphia: Oxford University Press.
  • Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
  • Lahlou, S. Installation Theory (2017). The societal Construction and Regulation of Behaviour. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
  • Laland, K. N., & Brown, G. R. (2011). Sense and nonsense: Evolutionary perspectives on human behaviour. Oxford University Press.
  • Lewis, A. (Ed.). (2008). The Cambridge Handbook of Psychology and Economic Behaviour. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • Lewis, A., Webley, P., & Furnham, A. (1995). The New Economic Mind. Hemel Hempstead: Harvester/ Wheatsheaf Books.
  • Mead, G. H. (1934). Mind, self & society: from the standpoint of a social behaviorist. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
  • Thaler, R. H., & Sunstein, C. R. (2008). Nudge: Improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness. New Haven & London: Yale University Press.
  • Webley, P., Burgoyne, C., Lea, S., & Young, B. (2001). The Economic Psychology of Everyday Life. Hove & Philadelphia: Psychology Press.

Social and Cultural Psychology

  • M. Billig, Arguing and Thinking: A Rhetorical Approach to Social Psychology, CUP, 1987.
  • M. Cole, Cultural Psychology: A once and future discipline. Harvard University Press, 1996.
  • K. Deaux & G. Philogene, Representations of the Social, Blackwell, 2001.
  • R. M. Farr, The Roots of Modern Social Psychology, Blackwell, 1996.
  • B. Franks, Cognition and Culture: Evolutionary Perspectives. Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
  • U. Flick, The Psychology of the Social. Cambridge University Press, 1998.
  • J. Israel & H. Tajfel, The Context of Social Psychology, Academic Press, 1972.
  • S. Jovchelovitch, Knowledge in Context: Representations, community and culture. Routledge Classics. 2019
  • Marková, The Dialogical Mind: Common Sense and Ethics. Cambridge University Press. 2016.
  • S. Moscovici, Social Representations: Exploration in Social Psychology. Polity Press, 2000.
  • G. Semin & G. Echterhoff, Grounding Sociality: Neurons, Mind and Culture. Psychology Press, 2010.
  • R. Shweder, Why do Men Barbecue? Recipes for cultural psychology, Harvard University Press, 2003. 
  • H. Tajfel, Human Groups and Social Categories; Studies in Social Psychology, CUP, 1981.
  • M. Tomasello, The Cultural Origins of Human Cognition. Harvard University Press, 1999.
  • J. Valsiner and A Rosa (Eds), Cambridge Handbook of Sociocultural Psychology, Cambridge University Press, 2007.
  • L. Vygotsky, Mind in Society. Harvard University Press, 1978.

Social and Public Communication 

  • D.Hook,  B. Franks, M.W. Bauer (2011) (eds) The Social Psychology of Communication, London, Palgrave.
  • J. Fiske,  (2011). Introduction to Communication Studies. (3rd edition) London: Routledge
  • J. Habermas, (1997), Theory of Communicative Action, Vol 1 + 2, Cambridge, Polity Press.
  • H. Mercier, &  D. Sperber, (2017), The Enigma of Reason, Cambridge MA, HUP.
  • C.D. Mortensen, (1997). Miscommunication. London: Sage.
  • R. Rogers, (1995) Diffusion of Innovation, NY, Free Press.
  • E. Rogers, (1994) A History of Communication Studies, NY: Free Press.
  • R. Toye, (2013) Rhetoric – a Very Short Introduction, Oxford, OUP.
  • D. Sperber & D. Wilson, (1995) Relevance: Communication and Cognition, Cambridge, CUP.
  • S. Windahl, B. Signitzer, and J.T. Olsen, (2009) Using Communication Theory (2nd edition), London, SAGE.

Supplemental videos & podcasts of public lectures

Screen shot of an Alison Gopnik podcast from the LSE

Why children learn better

Speaker: Alison Gopnik
Date: 11 May, 2017

Listen to podcast



David Rand public lecture video screen shot


Human cooperation

Speaker: David Rand
Date: 14 Dec, 2016

Watch video



Professor Richard Nisbett presenting


Culture and intelligence

Speaker: Richard Nisbett
Date: 12 April, 2016

Watch video