The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis has a great publication called The Review, which carries interviews with top economists. Click here to read an insightful and wide-ranging recent interview with Richard Thaler, one of the world's leading experts in behavioural finance and economics. Thaler is best known among the wider public for his book Nudge.
My colleague and former PhD student Gareth Campbell has created a website about the British Railway Mania - click here . This episode has been described by the Economist as probably the greatest bubble in human history. Gareth's website provides background on the Mania and posits some explanations for the 'bubble'. In his explanation of why the bubble happened, Gareth places a lot of emphasis on investor myopia regarding future dividends and uncalled capital. His study of investors during the episode does not support the view that this episode was fuelled by naive and irrational investors.