Hepatitis and procrastination -- The movie treatment -- What we should do and behavioral economics -- From food to incompatible design -- Taking irrationality into account -- Part I. THE UNEXPECTED WAYS WE DEFY LOGIC AT WORK -- Chapter 1. Paying More for Less: Why Big Bonuses Don't Always Work -- Of mice and men, or how high stakes affect rats and bankers -- Measuring the effects of a CEO-sized bonus in India -- Loss aversion: why bonuses aren't really bonuses -- Working under stress: just how clutch are "clutch" NBA players? -- Stage fright and the social side of high stakes -- Making compensation work for society -- Chapter 2. The Meaning of Labor: What Legos Can Teach Us about the Joy of Work -- You are what you do: identity and labor -- The pains of wasted work -- Lessons from a parrot---and some hungry rats -- Searching for meaning while playing with Legos -- Making work matter again -- Chapter 3. The IKEA Effect: Why We Overvalue What We Make -- Why IKEA makes us blush (with pride) -- Cooking lessons: finding a balance between just adding water and baking an apple pie from scratch -- The real value of a thousand origami cranes (and frogs) -- Customize it! -- Why "almost done" doesn't do much for us -- Why we need labors of love -- Chapter 4. The Not-Invented-Here Bias: Why "My" Ideas Are Better than "Yours" -- Mark Twain describes a universal form of stupidity -- "Anything you can do I can do better": why we favor our own ideas -- The toothbrush theory -- What we can learn from Edison's mistake -- Chapter 5. The Case for Revenge: What Makes Us Seek Justice? -- The joys of payback -- The bailouts and pounds of flesh -- One man's quest for revenge against Audi -- The etiquette of revenge -- Companies beware: when consumers go public -- Uses and misuses of revenge -- Making amends -- Part II. THE UNEXPECTED WAYS WE DEFY LOGIC AT HOME -- Chapter 6. On Adaptation: Why We Get Used to Things (but Not All Things, and Not Always) -- Frogs: to boil or not to boil? -- Adapting to visual cues and pain thresholds -- Hedonic adaptation: from houses to spouses and beyond -- How the hedonic treadmill keeps us buying---and buying more -- How we can break and enhance adaptation -- Making our adaptability work for us -- Chapter 7. Hot or Not? Adaptation, Assortative Mating, and the Beauty Market -- A personal adaptation -- When mind and body don't get along -- Sticking to our own (more or less hot) kind in dating: do we settle or adapt? -- Let's ask the Internet: dating sites and romantic criteria -- How I met your mother -- Chapter 8. When a Market Fails: An Example from Online Dating -- The function of the yenta -- The dysfunctional singles market (as if you didn't already know) -- The difference between your date and a digital camera -- An exemplary failure in dating -- How dating sites skew our perceptions -- Ideas for a better dating future -- Chapter 9. On Empathy and Emotion: Why We Respond to One Person Who Needs Help but Not to Many -- Baby Jessica versus the Rwandan genocide -- The difference between an individual and a statistic -- Identification: needed for more than buying beer -- How the American Cancer Society reels us in -- The effect of rational thinking on giving -- Overcoming our inability to confront big problems -- Chapter 10. The Long-Term Effects of Short-Term Emotions: Why We Shouldn't Act on Our Negative Feelings -- Don't tread on me: my colleague learns a lesson about rudeness -- The dark side of impulses -- Deciding under the influence (of emotions) -- The importance of "irrelevant" emotions -- What a canoe can tell you about your love life -- Chapter 11. Lessons from Our Irrationalities: Why We Need to Test Everything -- A decision about life and limb -- Gideon's biblical empiricism -- The wisdom of leeches -- Lessons learned, hopefully.