The science of money — at work, at home, and across society.
Every day, people make consequential decisions about money — closing deals, leading teams, hiring and firing, pricing products, paying bills, picking funds, weighing risk, and worrying about all of the above. Behind those choices sits a quieter body of work: decades of peer-reviewed research on how money shapes behavior, and how behavior shapes money.
We read that research. We translate it into clear, useful journalism for businesspeople, professionals, and anyone trying to make sense of what money does to a life — or a society.
Science of Money sits between two worlds — and frankly, the gap between them is wider than it should be.
On one side are the personal-finance columnists, business commentators, and creators on every platform: confident, tidy, often unmoored from evidence. On the other are the journals — careful, methodical, and largely inaccessible to anyone outside the academy.
We exist to occupy the middle. Not advice columns. Not market commentary. Not raw academia. We translate behavioral, psychological, and economic research into journalism for readers in two overlapping camps: people making decisions inside businesses, and people making decisions about their own money. The goal is to help both groups make smarter choices and to understand the deeper impact money has on individual lives and on society as a whole.
Nine beats, each anchored to active research.
Money is a single object that touches almost every dimension of human behavior — how we work, how we lead, how we sell, how we save, and how we relate to one another. We organize coverage into nine pillars, each tracked through dedicated research feeds.
From peer-reviewed paper to readable article.
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01We monitor the literature.Across journals, press wires, government data releases, and conference proceedings — tracking new findings the moment they appear.
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02We read the methods, not just the abstract.We assess study design, sample size, and analytic choices before deciding whether a finding is worth covering.
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03We translate, with limits attached.Plain language, real examples, and an explicit note on what the study can and cannot tell us.
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04We link the original.Every article cites and links the underlying paper, dataset, or report, so readers can verify our reading or pursue their own.
Eric Dolan
The founder of PsyPost.org, Eric is a behavioral science journalist with more than fifteen years of experience translating peer-reviewed psychology into clear, useful reporting for the public.
He leads research and writing operations across the PsyPost network, applying the same editorial standards that built PsyPost’s reputation in psychological science to the broader literature on money and behavior.
Science of Money is a natural extension of that project. Money decisions are, at their core, psychological ones — and the research community has spent decades studying how people earn, spend, save, sell, lead, and suffer over money. The gap between that work and a general audience is the one we’re built to close.
The procedures that make our reporting verifiable.
We aim to produce reporting that readers can rely on when they want to move from intuition to evidence. To that end, we follow a set of practical commitments intended to make our coverage accurate, balanced, and easy to verify.
Evidence-based reporting
We prioritize articles grounded in peer-reviewed literature because peer review provides a baseline level of methodological scrutiny. When available, we favor meta-analyses and large, well-powered studies because they offer stronger evidence about whether an effect is robust. Preprints and conference papers are not excluded, but when we discuss them we explicitly label the work as preliminary and note that the findings await peer review.
Every article links to the original source whenever possible so readers can inspect the study directly. If we rely on secondary summaries or press releases, we say so and link to the primary research.
Faithful representation of the research
We aim to describe what studies actually did and what their results suggest — not to oversell tentative findings. Typical elements we report include study design (for example, experiment or survey), sample characteristics, sample size, and the main outcomes reported by the authors.
We distinguish correlational findings from causal claims. Limitations reported by the original authors are included, and we add context about common methodological issues that tend to influence interpretation, such as selection bias or low statistical power.
Conflicts, sponsorships, and corrections
We disclose relevant partnerships, sponsorships, and any financial relationships that could reasonably be seen to affect coverage. Sponsored content or advertorial material is labeled clearly so readers can distinguish editorial reporting from paid material.
If a factual error or material misinterpretation is identified after publication, we correct the item and publish a correction note explaining what changed and why. Readers may report potential errors, request source documents, or ask for clarifications by contacting [email protected]. We take such reports seriously and update the public record when warranted.
Questions about a specific article? Want the original sources? Think we should correct something?
Write us at [email protected]. We welcome scrutiny — transparent debate is one of the best ways to improve both reporting and practice.