Paul Dolan is an internationally renowned expert on happiness, behaviour and public policy. He is currently a Professor of Behavioural Science in the Department of Social Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science and Director of the new Executive MSc in Behavioural Science.
His international reputation has been further advanced by an invitation from Nobel Laureate Professor Daniel Kahneman to work with him at Princeton in 2004-5. Their 2008 paper in the Economic Journal is the most cited paper in that journal since that year. Since his time at Princeton, he has focussed on more direct measures of wellbeing. He has been developing measures that capture both ‘pleasure’ and ‘purpose’.
Over the past few years, he has begun exploring the influences of automatic responses on individual behaviour, and how these relate to our preferences, health and wellbeing. He was an author of the “Mindspace” report for the UK Cabinet Office. His work on Mindspace is being used across the public and private sectors, and he is increasingly asked for consultancy advice on how to change behaviour in organisations and populations.
His current book ‘Happiness by Design’ is out now.