Comments on: Too much of a good thing

By: Cottage Smallholder

Cottage Smallholder — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 16:49:59 +0000

I loved reading about the study and the effects of too much choice. Luckily my seed box is enormous so the vast ammount of seeds that I ordered this year are hidden from Danny.

I’ve spent hours drawing up plans to fit them all in! Now considering ploughing up the front garden…

By: Amanda

Amanda — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 02:19:01 +0000

mmmmmmmmm. apples.

By: Kevin F.

Kevin F. — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 22:22:05 +0000

I think you have all made excellent points.
However… having so many choices I am struggling to decide who’s right!

By: beachnitpicker

beachnitpicker — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 16:53:31 +0000

Aaron, I didn’t mean that you sneered at my anecdote, only my attempt to trot it out as evidence for the paradox of choice. I guess most of us have had similar experiences, and because they seem counter-intuitive, we are more likely to remember them than occasions when a variety of choices actually assisted our decision-making.

By: Tamar

Tamar — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 13:55:26 +0000

Amanda — I’m with you on finding the whole problem interesting (after all, I posted it in the first place). And the similarity of choices may have bearings on Aaron’s point.

Aaron — I read Harford, and I think a definitive analysis of this would require more research than I have leisure to do right now. Clearly, there are circumstances in which variety impedes choice, and circumstances in which it doesn’t, and we don’t fully understand which circumstances are which. Similarity of the choices, as Amanda points out, might be one of the circumstances. All I have to offer is my anecdote — being stymied by apple varieties, among which there is not much difference.

By: Aaron Haspel

Aaron Haspel — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 15:54:59 +0000

A guy named Scheibehenne at the University of Basil conducted a bunch of his own choice experiments and did a meta-analysis as well. I haven't read it, but Tim Harford discusses it here.I don't discount, let alone "sneer at," anecdotes, or folk sayings either. They are usually true. But saying something exists in certain individuals is very different from saying it exists in the mass.

By: Amanda

Amanda — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 15:23:49 +0000

Actually, apples aside (though I do fancy those candysweet ones) I thought the most interesting point was about marketing studies involving choice, and there are a lot of further studies, including common sense, to back that up. Faced with many choices, people become overwhelmed. The more similar the choices are, the worse the problem is.

Which is why in terms of marketable product, you do well to offer only a few options in a variety of categories, rather than to focus on ONE category with many choices.

I know. This was neither funny nor fascinating to anyone but myself.

So…. apples?

By: Tamar

Tamar — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 12:22:42 +0000

Jen — Botany of Desire was my introduction to apples. And, despite having written catalog copy, I still see those big healthy trees, groaning with fruit, when I read the descriptions. I, too, am a believer. I think it’s a form of optimism.

Kate — As much as I enjoy sunshine up my skirt, I hope you’re right about Fedco. I think I’ve read about every single on of their apples by now, and at least 2/3 of them sounded appealing. We also picked some good keepers, but didn’t factor in the time of ripening — I need to think farther ahead.

Paula — I hope your trees come as ordered! Keep me posted on their progress.

Aaron — I haven’t seen the studies that come up with different results, but I’d like to. Could you point me in the direction of one or two? Or, better yet, do you know of a meta-analysis that tries to make sense of the lot?

Susan — That’s a lovely story. I like to think I’m not so selfish that, if we ended up leaving this house before my trees mature, I would begrudge the new owners the benefit.

BNP — I think we’ve all been in situations where we’ve felt stymied by too much choice, but I would like to know — once and for all — whether that’s a phenomenon that experimentation can verify.

Christl — If the paradox of choice is widely enough experienced to have a saying in German, that’s certainly evidence that it exists. (For those of you who don’t speak German, that’s roughly “He who has choice has pain.” I had to look up Qual.)

By: Albert

Albert — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 02:47:34 +0000

too many choices…

back home there is a saying, wer die Wahl hat – hat die Qual

I thought you made a good choice, they are all tasty.
Christl

By: beachnitpicker

beachnitpicker — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 02:41:30 +0000

Aaron, of course, will sneer at my anecdotal data, but I do believe in the paradox of choice. Forty-some years ago, I gave up keeping kosher and it was weeks before I was really comfortable in the supermarket again. I didn’t have to read the fine print on labels; I had the run of the meat department. I could buy anything–absolutely anything. I wandered the aisles like a lost soul.