How to make a choice when the options suck | Amitai Shenhav | TEDxNewEngland

Key Concepts:

• Paradox of Choice: Having too many good options can lead to anxiety and difficulty in making a decision.
• Vote Counting: The brain collects "votes" for each option when making a decision.
• Option Competition: Forcing options to compete with each other makes decision-making more anxious and less efficient.
• Independent Evaluation: Evaluating options independently, as in a buffet, reduces decision-making anxiety.
• Lose-Lose Choices: Decisions where all options are undesirable, leading to difficulty in finding positive aspects.
• Rejection Strategy: Focusing on rejecting the worst option instead of selecting the best one in lose-lose scenarios.

1. The Problem of Choice Overload

• The speaker introduces the concept of "Buridan's donkey," a philosophical paradox where a donkey placed exactly between two equally appealing bales of hay starves to death due to indecision.
• The speaker argues that this paradox resonates with people because we often face numerous choices daily, leading to bottlenecks and anxiety.
• Examples include choosing what to work on, what to eat, or how to word an email.
• The core issue is not the presence of choices but the difficulty in choosing among them.

2. The Paradox of Win-Win Choices

• The speaker's lab studies how people make decisions, particularly tough choices.
• The hardest choices are those where options are equally appealing and intensely desired, leading to the "paradox of choice."
• Examples include multiple dream school admissions, job offers, or enticing desserts.
• While it seems counterintuitive, having many good options can lead to agonizing over the decision.

3. How the Brain Makes Decisions: Vote Counting and Competition

• When faced with a decision (e.g., where to have dinner), the brain collects "support votes" for each option.
• The problem arises because choosing one option means sacrificing others.
• The brain internalizes this by counting a vote for one option as a vote against the others, forcing options to compete.
• This competition makes us more anxious and worse at deciding.

4. Experiment: Gift Registry and Option Competition

• Participants were asked to choose items for a gift registry from groups of products (e.g., chocolates, wine opener, coffee table book, board game).
• Before the choices, participants rated all items, allowing researchers to identify highly desired (10/10) and less desired (4/5/6) items.
• Groups of options were pre-arranged to create win-win (all highly desired) and less desirable (all mediocre) choices.
• Participants reported more agony when facing win-win choices.

5. Reducing Anxiety: The Buffet Analogy

• The experiment was modified to reduce the sense of competition between options.
• Participants were told that after choosing their favorite item, they could add other items from the group to their registry.
• This "buffet-like" mindset, where options are not mutually exclusive, reduced worry and increased decision-making efficiency.
• Participants still chose their favorite option first but did so faster.

6. Applying the Buffet Mindset to Real-World Decisions

• Even when choices seem mutually exclusive, we can often revisit options (e.g., returning a product, revising an email, buying the other product later).
• The key is to treat options as inherently independent, where a vote for one doesn't necessarily mean a vote against the others.
• This mindset makes it easier to choose when faced with too many good options.

7. The Challenge of Lose-Lose Choices

• Lose-lose choices (where all options are undesirable) are also difficult to make.
• While mediocre choices are easier than highly desired ones, they are also easier than highly undesired ones.
• The problem is that each option receives more votes against it than for it.
• It's easy to identify negative aspects, making it hard to find a "good enough" choice.

8. Shifting the Focus: Rejecting Instead of Selecting

• Instead of counting votes for lose-lose options, focus on counting votes against them to identify which options are bad enough to reject.
• This aligns the decision-making process with the natural flow of negative information.

9. Experiment: Voting and Candidate Rejection

• Participants were asked to choose between hypothetical candidates with varying positions on issues.
• Candidates were tailored to match or oppose participants' views, creating win-win and lose-lose scenarios.
• In lose-lose scenarios, most participants (over 75%) chose a "no vote" option.
• A second group was asked to choose which candidate to reject.
• This significantly reduced the number of "no vote" choices, making lose-lose decisions easier.

10. Conclusion: Controlling How We Choose

• Decisions are unavoidable and pervasive in daily life.
• We value having choices, but the act of choosing can be agonizing.
• By controlling how we approach choices, we can reduce anxiety.
• Strategies include:
  • Evaluating options independently.
  • Recognizing future opportunities to revisit options.
  • Tuning decisions to the natural flow of positive or negative information.
• The way we make decisions impacts productivity, well-being, relationships, and even societal choices.
• While we can't always control the options presented, we can control how we approach them.

Key Quotes:

• "If I could get a donkey exactly between two equally sized bales of hay, would that donkey starve to death from indecision?" (Attributed to a French philosopher)
• "...the hardest choices are ones where a person not only feels the same way about their options, but where they feel similarly intensely about those options."
• "It's not choice that we have a problem with. It's choosing."

Technical Terms and Concepts:

• Buridan's Donkey: A philosophical paradox illustrating indecision when faced with equally appealing options.
• Paradox of Choice: The observation that having too many options can lead to anxiety and difficulty in making a decision.
• Vote Counting (Metaphorical): The brain's process of weighing the pros and cons of different options.
• Win-Win Choice: A decision where all options are desirable.
• Lose-Lose Choice: A decision where all options are undesirable.