Elliott, Catherine S., 281
elliptic curve digital signature algorithm, 5, 9
emotions: affect heuristic and, 67, 233; Bitcoin epidemic and, 5–6; in construction of narratives, 65;
of financial panics, 115; flashbulb memory and, 80–81, 307n13; of gold standard debate, 160, 172;
Harding’s references to normalcy and, 244; historians’ explanatory use of, 14; in housing boom of
1997–2006, 217; perceptions of people’s reactions to story and, 64; profiteer narratives and, 247,
249; in quantitative study of narratives, 287; in response to narratives, xi, 35, 54; revealed in
stories, 79; risk assessment and, 67; studied in economics without being partisan, 279;
underconsumption narrative during Depression and, 188. See also anger about inflation; anger at
businesspeople; anger at oil crisis of 1970s; fear
The Engineers and the Price System (Veblen), 193
entrepreneurship: cryptocurrencies and, 4, 92; labor-saving machinery narrative and, 209; Reagan
policies and, 52
The Epic of America (Adams), 151
epidemic curve, 18–24, 19f, 22f, 289–93, 291f
epidemics of diseases: AIDS, 24; co-epidemics with narratives, 23; recurrence and mutation of, 108;
repeats of variants of, 271; size of, 292–93. See also Ebola epidemics; influenza; Kermack-
McKendrick SIR model
epidemics of economic narratives: on automation, 199–200; on bimetallism, 22–23, 22f; on Bitcoin,
22–23, 22f; co-epidemics of diseases with narratives, 23; co-epidemics of narratives, 294–95,
322n9; on cost-push inflation, 258, 259f; on electronic brain, 195; forecasting and, xi, 295, 322n9;
of “going viral” and “trending now,” x; on housing market, 227; on leading indicators, 125;
medical model and, 21–23, 22f, 292; not heard by everyone in the population, 292; on profiteer,
241–42, 243f; random events affecting, 75; repeats of, with unpredictable timing, 271; self-
fulfilling prophecies and, 74; sizes and time frames of, 88–89, 292–93; on technological
unemployment, 183–85, 294, 295; with varying contagion rates and recovery rates, 295; volatility
and, 5; on wage-price spiral, 258, 259f. See also compartmental models of epidemics; Kermack-
McKendrick SIR model; viral narratives
epidemics of narratives: random events affecting, 40, 99–100; recognized since ancient times, 58–60.
See also epidemics of economic narratives; viral narratives
epidemiology, insights from, xviii, 14, 17, 23–24, 277, 289
Escalas, Jennifer Edson, 77
“Every day in every way I get better and better,” 121
The Evolution of Beauty (Prum), 65
excess profits, 242
excess profits tax, of US during World War I, 249, 265
exogenous shocks to economy, 73, 75–76
expectations, and representativeness heuristic, 66–67
extraordinary popular delusions, 59, 119
Facebook, meme quickly going viral on, 88
fact-checking websites, 85, 96
fair wage-effort hypothesis, 250
fair wage narratives, 249–50
fake news, 84–85, 273
fake wrestling matches, 84–85
Falk, Emily B., 54
false narratives, 95–97
family circle, literature read aloud in, 274
Famous First Bubbles (Garber), 5

famous people: patterns of mentions in books, 24. See also celebrities
Farmer, Roger E. A., 74
farmers: impact of gold standard on, 157–58, 161, 163; labor-saving machinery and, 176–77, 183,
185, 187, 209
farmland: earlier real estate talk centered on, 212; as speculative investment, 213, 214
Farnam, Henry W., 72–73
fear: of automation, 196; brain structures involved in, 56–58; changing economic behavior years after
relevant narrative, 109; extended to unrelated events, 67; false narratives and, 95; in financial
crises, 55–58; during Great Depression, 109, 127–28, 141; of human irrelevance, 208; identified as
cause of Great Depression, 132; of machines replacing jobs, 175; “of fear itself,” 128; Roosevelt’s
exhortations about, 128, 129; suicides after crash of 1929 and, 233; technocracy movement leading
to, 194. See also panic
Federal Reserve: cause of Great Depression and, 132–33; Consumer Expenditure Survey of, 282;
control of inflation and, 262; creation of, 111, 117; J. P. Morgan and, 111, 117–18; warning about
speculation in 1929, 126
Federal Reserve Act of 1913, 117
feedback loops: 1930s-style models of, 287; between postponing consumption and job loss, 144–45;
of prices in speculative bubbles, 216–17
Feelings in History (MacMullen), 14
Ferguson, Hill, 219
Festinger, Leon, 218
fiat money, 156
fiction, xii, 16. See also novels
films: less luxurious during the Depression, 142; predicting the success of, 41–42
finance, lagging in attention to narratives, 13f
financial advisers, automated, 275
financial crises, 55–56, 86. See also bank runs; world financial crisis of 2007–9
financial panic narrative, 114, 115, 116f; crowd psychology and, 119–20, 120f; frequency of
appearance of five major occurrences, 118f; J. P. Morgan and, 117–18; nineteenth-century
worldviews and, 116–17; rekindled in 2007 in United Kingdom, 119. See also panic
“fire in a crowded theater” narrative, 127, 129
fiscal policy, motivations of, 281
Fisher, Irving, 75–76, 128, 247, 266
Fisher, R. A., 65
Fisherian runaway, 65
flashbulb memory, 80–83, 307n13; of stock market crash of 1929, 233; of stock market crash of
1987, 233
flipping, 223–24
Florida land boom of 1920s, 214, 215, 220–21
flu epidemics. See influenza
fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging): of brain activation by analogy and metaphor, 17; of
sharing content in form of stories, 54
focused interviews, as research tools, 281
focus groups, 282–84
folklore studies, 15, 16
forecasting. See economic forecasting
forgetting, in epidemic model, x, 25, 296. See also memory
forgetting rates: differences in, 89; effect of slight changes in, 40; lowered by identified personality,
100; lowered by symbols or rituals, 62; lowered by visual detail, 45, 46. See also recovery rates
The Forgotten Depression (Grant), 242, 251