Too Much Choice
I heard a presentation at the Human Behavior and Evolution Society conference in Berlin a few years ago on why Internet dating may not be such a good idea. No, the problem isn't the way men lie about their income or women lie about their weight, but, actually, too much choice. It turns out, when humans have too much choice, they tend to choose poorly and are dissatisfied with their choices.
Barbara Fasolo, then of Berlin’s Max Planck Instutitute, presented her team’s research about Internet dating, “Shopping” For A Mate: Is Less More? First, she reviewed data from studies of consumer reactions to limited or wide variety of choice, including one comparing the response to two “exotic jam” stands. One stand had 24 exotic jams for sale; the other, only six. More consumers approached the 24-jam stand. But, surprisingly, with more choice, there were, in the end, fewer purchases, and more regrets about the particular purchases made.
Fasolo explained why: The EEA (Environment of Evolutionary Adaptedness); ie, the Pleistocene, during which we adapted to have the psychology that still motivates us today, “shaped us to deal with very simple decision environments.” “Only a few options, one at a time,” explained Fasolo. The contemporary environment “simultaneously gives us a huge number of options,” she said, and added that too much choice leads to what Grinde called “Darwinian unhappiness.”
John Tierney wrote recently in The New York Times of how poorly humans deal with options:
The next time you’re juggling options — which friend to see, which house to buy, which career to pursue — try asking yourself this question: What would Xiang Yu do?Xiang Yu was a Chinese general in the third century B.C. who took his troops across the Yangtze River into enemy territory and performed an experiment in decision making. He crushed his troops’ cooking pots and burned their ships.
He explained this was to focus them on moving forward — a motivational speech that was not appreciated by many of the soldiers watching their retreat option go up in flames. But General Xiang Yu would be vindicated, both on the battlefield and in the annals of social science research.
He is one of the role models in Dan Ariely’s new book, Predictably Irrational, an entertaining look at human foibles like the penchant for keeping too many options open. General Xiang Yu was a rare exception to the norm, a warrior who conquered by being unpredictably rational.
Most people can’t make such a painful choice, not even the students at a bastion of rationality like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where Dr. Ariely is a professor of behavioral economics. In a series of experiments, hundreds of students could not bear to let their options vanish, even though it was obviously a dumb strategy (and they weren’t even asked to burn anything).
The experiments involved a game that eliminated the excuses we usually have for refusing to let go. In the real world, we can always tell ourselves that it’s good to keep options open.
You don’t even know how a camera’s burst-mode flash works, but you persuade yourself to pay for the extra feature just in case. You no longer have anything in common with someone who keeps calling you, but you hate to just zap the relationship.
Your child is exhausted from after-school soccer, ballet and Chinese lessons, but you won’t let her drop the piano lessons. They could come in handy! And who knows? Maybe they will.
Another book on this: The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less, by Barry Schwartz. Here's the video:
P.S. I have all three of the books above on order: Grinde's, Ariely's, and Schwartz's. This is the stuff I'm most interested in reading now -- stuff on human propensity for irrationality. Of course, perhaps I'm a bit irrational in thinking I'll be able to read all of these in any reasonable amount of time, since I rather recently ordered Science and Sanity, by Korzybzki, which looks like a regular book in the picture on Amazon, but is the size of one of those prison-wall concrete blocks. Still, so far, it seems worth the time!
I wonder if this tendency explains the appeal of monasticism and other ascetic lifestyle choices. And maybe more generally, the restrictions that members of most fundamentalist sects (in whatever religious tradition) subject themselves to.
My daughter and her husband converted to Hasidic Judaism before they were married. Their dietary and other behavioral taboos drive my wife and me absolutely nuts when we're around them.
However, the children seem just as happy and well-adjusted as their secular parents.
Axman at March 2, 2008 9:34 AM
One of the extreme ends of this is also interesting, but related. decision paralysis... where you become so afraid of making the wrong decision, that you simply don't decide. Oddly this is sometimes a worthwhile gambit, as you are allowing external forces to narrow the field. The downside is the method for blaming life for the narrowing of choices, instead of making them all yourself.
Xiang Yu presents an interesting counterpoint, but importantly he was single mindedly persuing a goal. A goal where his investment in the accomplishment of it was surprisingly small. It is easy in an extreme situation to make such a decision. The details are small opposed to the persuit of the goal. In a complex life, each decision is less important, and may lead to a nebulous outcome. If there are 4 different routes to get to work, and you choose the one with that isn't quite the best or the worst, what is the actual difference? In battle on the other hand, achieving one goal is the only way to get to the next one. This is why modern warfare, with rules of engagement, and difficult to identify enemies, is far more difficult. There are so many decisions to make, and constrained to potentially not being the best possible decision. The goal is the same, but the options for getting there are far multiplied...
SwissArmyD at March 2, 2008 9:58 AM
You're wrong about this too.
Bad weekend!
The BJ thing probably cool, though.
Crid at March 2, 2008 10:29 AM
Do tell! Or are you working within a word-count limit this weekend?
Amy Alkon at March 2, 2008 11:10 AM
I think articles such a these go a long ways toward explaining the high number of "moderate" voters who have such an affinity for socialism and other totalitarian forms of government. At their core, a moderate is someone who is afraid of making a decision for fear of being wrong. If you're afraid to make the wrong decision then what's better than having to make no decisions? Get the "free health care" that you deserve, get the "high paying job" that you deserve, get the "free college education" that you deserve, get the "low flush toilet" that you deserve, and if none of it turns out to your satisfaction then you'll find comfort in not having made all of the bad decisions. You'll still have to live with the consequences but at least you won't have been wrong.
Curly Smith at March 2, 2008 12:19 PM
Actually I agree with this. Child development educators will tell you that when kids are presented with too many choices, their little brains overload and that's where the out-of-control behavior often comes from. We were taught to give our son a choice between two or three options, and that he seems able to handle.
But I think this is true to some degree for adults too. I've been working on paring down my wardrobe, because I'd found that having too many choices often left me paralyzed in the mornings trying to figure out what to wear to work. When we visited Paris last year, my husband made a list of about 200 things he wanted to see/do, and had trouble prioritizing and planning because the list was so overwhelming, and we wasted some time on things we didn't really care about that much, and missed some things that were more important to us. So this year, I'm in charge of the itinerary.
deja pseu at March 2, 2008 12:24 PM
I think it's pathetic --deeply, reprehensibly pathetic-- when timid little consumer-bots clutch at Mommy's skirts and weep "The free market is so big and flexible that I'm just overwhelmed! The world needs to be made small enough that I can understand everything and not make a mistake!"
(And by the way, fellow truth-seekers: Is this kind of panic not obviously about other things? How could you trust such a person to pick a mate, or even a friend?)
If failing to achieve maximal fulfillment in any given transaction is such a deadly threat to you, you should stay home and do your nails. The rest of us will be laughing our way through an economy that offers values undreamt of in human history. And we'll be glad to know that even the products we didn't buy are keeping their builders on the job, so that those workers can put braces on their children's teeth and get them into good schools. It works out for everybody.
Go to the grocery and pick out a tomato. You don't have to buy them all. If you're overwhelmed, feel free to limit your selection to the tomatoes on the top layer in the northeast corner of the bin. Then move to the apple cart. Repeat and proceed to the wine rack... Do that for every goddamn decision you ever make in your entire life and quit being such an infantile, manipulative, vaguely-authoritarian pussy.
The real solution to this is to read Postrel. Postrel's also a big part of the solution to your problems with Freud, too, but we'll cover that later, I gotta gota work.
Crid at March 2, 2008 12:54 PM
Hey, Curly understands this.
Maybe the problem isn't “Darwinian unhappiness”, maybe the problem is that Grinde is a "Darwinian Asshole."
Crid at March 2, 2008 12:56 PM
Sylvia Plath's fig tree is back! What Barry Schwartz doesn't realize is the world is designed around me. Yes, I do need that phone, goddamnit. And I can't believe you didn't comment on his outfit, Amy. Looks like he's going to go meet the President or something.
Paul Hrissikopoulos at March 2, 2008 2:16 PM
One of the big issues with our ability to make decisions is limitations in our working memory capacity. We can really only perform operations on between 3-5 concepts at a given time. If we have lots of choices, decision making becomes problematic if we can't tackle things sequentially, encode them into higher-order chunks or otherwise reduce the number of relationships that must be maintained at a given time.
justin case at March 2, 2008 4:30 PM
I don't know Crid, I agree with you to a certain degree. But I think there is something to be said for breaking down choices into smaller bites. Artificially simplifying our own lives.
Take going out to eat in Portland. That can be a huge decision in a town with more restaurants per-capita than any other city in the U.S. So you need to break that decision down into various limitations. How much do you want to spend? How crowded are you willing to deal with? What kind of food interests you right now? How far do you want to go to get it? Etc. Give most people a comprehensive listing of all the restaurants in Portland and tell them to choose, their head is likely to explode. Throw in a few parameters to remove some of the choices, you make the decision much more palatable.
Nobody needs to close down any of the restaurants in Portland, to recognize the need to express limitations on the decision from the outset. Nor is it authoritarian to point out that fact that the more wide open the field of choices, the harder it becomes to make a decision. Recognizing this nature of decision making, can lead one to develop more skills for breaking down decisions and simplifying the process.
At the same time, I do find that some "simplify" people can get rather shrill about it, demanding that the entire world conform to their version of simple. Some of us thrive on spending hours on end, agonizing over this decision or that. One of my very favorite pass times is doing precisely that, in a used bookstore. Actually, choosing restaurants is another one that gets me off.
deja pseu -
My ADHD boy can be positively paralyzed by too many options. We have found that using a sticker chart with prize bag is far more effective, when the prize choices are limited. He has, on several occasions, refused to pick a prize, because he couldn't decide. Occasionally this is also excuse for a good melt down.
So the sticker chart was doing rather little, until a friend suggested that we take out all but four or five choices from the prize bag. Next thing you know, it's become a raging success.
DuWayne at March 2, 2008 5:23 PM
Agree: French or Italian? That's doable.
If I give you a list of 24 different restaurants...tougher.
Especially if you're ADHD.
Amy Alkon at March 2, 2008 5:32 PM
Hey, don't forget that "decisions" can be and are forced on people, which fatigues them into being less discriminating. Then, superficialities can be all that counts. Then you'll vote for or blame the only name you know.
Radwaste at March 2, 2008 5:48 PM
> Artificially simplifying
> our own lives.
Agreed, agreed! Like I was saying about the tomatoes. The fact that all those individual pieces are in the marketplace doesn't mean that each deserves a full twenty minutes of appraisal. What you're talking about may not be any more artificial than any other discipline you bring to your life.
I may not actually disagree with these authors that much. Yeah, sure, our nature and primitive origins are working against us. So what? I have a lot of problems with the Christian milieu in which I was raised, not the least of which is that no one explained how to spell 'milieu' without spell check. But it was always made clear that we were expected to struggle against the natural world, not just within it, and that includes the nature of our own souls.
When people say "Life is too complicated" as if they want to do something about it on my behalf, I get pissy. The comfort and meaning in your life will not be delivered by distant authorities.
Crid at March 2, 2008 7:03 PM
> Take going out to
> eat in Portland.
Breakfast: That diner with the b&w tiles near the river... Maybe this is it... I can't remember the name, and Google maps is too slow, but the facade is west-facing. Don't worry about it, I'll get up a few minutes early and call you on the cell when it turns up.
Lunch: Old Wives' Tales on Burnside.
Dinner: That Asian place near the Heathman, it has north-facing windows. Maybe here. Whatever, we can walk.
Crid at March 2, 2008 7:25 PM
The jam sale experiment was actually in the book "Blink", by Malcom Gladwell. It's a book that describes the whole idea that more is not necessarily better when dealing with information, but a little good info is what we are wired for.
Gladwell describes in many ways the idea of "thin slicing" information to get to the gist of how we actually make decisions. Very interesting book with a whole bunch of real life studies on how this works.
Ang at March 2, 2008 9:48 PM
I can relate to this as it applies to online dating. When I started my membership at Match.com, I was responding to everyone who contacted me, because I should give everyone a shot, right? I burned out quickly. Now I've narrowed my focus to only people with profile pictures, then to only the people I think are attractive in their pictures, and then further to men who share my political leanings and education level.
Some have argued that I'm shallow for narrowing the field as I have, but I've noticed that my satisfaction with the dates I've been on has gone up tremendously.
Monica at March 3, 2008 7:47 AM
Actually, because of that, the best dating sites are those that allow you to filter down your results. Also, when I was dating online, I put a lot of stuff in my profile to chase away people I wasn't interested in, like people who believe in god and men who were under 6'2". Knowing what your dating/relationship minimums are and being open about them is very helpful.
Amy Alkon at March 3, 2008 8:23 AM
I found the same challenge when I was dating on line. I started with a pretty wide open profile and "open mind". I guess I didn't realize how many people were actually on the thing. Even after I narrowed the field with allowable criteria, I was pretty quick to ask some specific questions when I first got in contact with a guy. I had a couple on-line arguments with guys who figured I should give them a chance anyway.
The funniest was a guy who seemed quite sweet, but was short, bald and round. One or two of those traits in a decent guy, I can handle, but all three...just couldn't do it. I tried to be nice, but I finally had to answer his whining about giving him a chance: "Look, at some point you'd expect to get naked together and I just can't imagine doing that with you." He quit bugging me after that.
moreta at March 3, 2008 11:43 AM
Well, this certainly explains today's divorce rate. With so many choices, who can be satisfied with the person they "settled" for? And with the "ships and cooking pots" of no-fault divorce and support payments always available, why do anything difficult(such as keeping vows like "for better or worse")?
Jay R at March 3, 2008 12:54 PM
I've done the internet dating thing too, and I think it helps you know yourself and figure out what you want. I had the give everyone a chance mentality too, but then I realized that I actually only am attracted to guys over 6' (I'm 5'10"), fit (I'm fit), non-religious, and stable.
I found that it made me appreciate the guys that fit those parameters, because it was so hard to find what I was looking for.
The high divorce rate is caused by marriage being a silly idea.
Chrissy at March 3, 2008 1:08 PM
I'm mystified by the men who completely disregard my stated preferences. "Average-to-fit man 30-41 years old, no kids" does not mean "overweight 63-year-old with three kids who live with their mom."
Monica at March 3, 2008 2:06 PM
Amy -
But try dealing with better than fifty options, within reasonable travel time and budget. Make momma and the six year old happy, while also satisfying my own desires. How is said six year old behaving today? It can get adventuresome.
We have the standby of Ethiopian if nothing else excites. The six year old loves using bits of bread as his silverware and we always take a ton home with us. On top of that the owners absolutely adore the six year old, so if he gets a little iffy, it's not a disaster. We actually end up eating in the kitchen with the family that owns it, fairly regularly.
On the ADHD front, I managed an impressive mistake today. In spite of regular calls from my blackberry, telling me where I'm supposed to be going at any given point, I managed to drive to the wrong job today. When I finally made it to the right one, my sub had already gone and picked up the materials I was bringing him. On the up side, I got a hell of a deal on walnut faced plywood, so I'm not sweating holding the extra. Momma's been complaining we need a couple more sets of bookshelves anyways.
Crid -
The comfort and meaning in your life will not be delivered by distant authorities.
Indeed. This is something that a whole lot of people would do well to understand. There exists a lot of hardship because people just don't get that.
Email me if you come to Portland again, address is on my site.
Cup and Saucer is another great breakfast location. They are a little on the strange side, but it's high quality, semi-standard diner fare. Great prices for quality of the food
Some of the very best lunch food available, is out of trailers. Gyros are a big favorite of mine. The very best I have ever had (I've tried it in over forty cities in five countries) comes from a cart that lives about two blocks from the main branch library. There is a Thai food cart that melt-in-your-mouth perfection - they have a daily menu with five or six different dishes, the sides never change but their dessert menu is everchanging as well. There is also a Philly cheese steak cart, that serves some of the best beef in Portland. The proprietor actually chooses his cows at the farm. Organically raised grazers, fattened with malt grains, for their last six months. I actually prefer to get his burgers because you can really taste the beef. His fries suck though.
Dinner is just a tough one. It depends on what sort of fare your into. Not only can you get food from a whole lot of different countries, you can get food from various regions of various countries. There are several that offer "world" menus, including a couple that serve only two or three dinner options each day.
DuWayne at March 3, 2008 2:38 PM
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