Florian Spitzer is researcher with a background in behavioral and experimental economics at the research group Behavioral Economics (Insight Austria) at the Institute for Advanced Studies (IHS). He studied economics in Heidelberg and Copenhagen and completed his PhD in 2018 at the University of Vienna. During his PhD, he used laboratory experiments to investigate how behavior that is detrimental to other individuals is shaped by the institutional environment. In this work, he focused on competition in markets for medical services, anti-social behavior, markets for experience goods, and on the economic analysis of trust in general. During his PhD, he held positions at the University of Vienna and at the Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU Wien).

At the IHS, he applies insights from the behavioral sciences (“behavioral insights”) to topics in different policy areas. He worked for instance on how to improve the compatibility of family and work life in companies and how to motivate fathers to take more parental leave. Moreover, he is interested in topics in health policy (specifically behavioral measures to increase vaccination rates), sustainable mobility and financial decision making. Additionally, he designs and teaches workshops for policy makers that serve the purpose to familiarize them with possible applications of behavioral insights in their field of work.