Thorsten Pachur is the new Professor of Behavioral Research Methods

From 2012 to 2022, Thorsten Pachur worked as a senior research scientist and research group leader at the Center for Adaptive Rationality located at the Max Planck Insitut for Human Development. His research targeted various issues in the field of adaptive cognition, which seeks to explain how psychological mechanisms underlying such capacities as learning, reasoning and decisioon making are shaped by the structure of the environment. Central themes in his research portfolio are decision making and judgements under risk and uncertainty and the development of decision making across the life span. To this end, he adopts an integrative multimethod approach that covers behavioral experiments, computational modeling, process tracing and imaging techniques.

With his rich research profile, Thorsten will join the TUM School of Management as a new professor of Behavioral Research Methods as of April 1, 2022: Adaptive cognition and decision making are fascinating fields of research that span a variety of disciplines - they will also form an important intersection between psychological and economic theory. For instance, explanations of the psychological mechanisms involved in decision making can shed light on when and why out decisions are consistent or inconsistent with economic models of rational choice. 

A core priority in the chair's teaching portfolio will be various research methods. In order to gain a comprehensive understanding of human behavior that can also be applied outside the research context, very different perspectives and methodological approaches are required. These can range from computational modeling and measurements of cognitive processes to statistical analysis of large data sets and models for the prediction of future behavior. The goal is to teach students how to make the best use of these approaches, especially in a concerted effort.