The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz
Summary
If you’ve ever experienced some form of stress or anxiety from making a decision, then you might find this to be a read well worth your time. This book looks at multiple studies in psychology and tries to explain how choices don’t necessarily make our lives better. It defines the critical points of choices, how we make them, how they are influenced, how they affect our satisfaction or how our satisfaction has something to do with the choices we had. For example, when faced with multiple choices, sometimes our satisfaction of the choice we make will depend on the missed opportunities (our own self-created hypothetical trade-offs).
Are you the kind of person that has to search for the BEST of something? If you are, you’ll spend countless time, energy, money…a lot of effort on finding the best option - those of us are referred to as maximizers. Satisficers, on the other hand, are those that have a set criteria or standard in mind and when they find that, they settle for it, not being bothered that something better will exist out there. There’s too much in this book to summarize so I’ll just leave it at that. It references many studies, gives you interesting points and theories to consider and lastly, also offers tips and strategies to alleviate some of the stress we face from the plethora of choices that exist.
My key Takeaways
If you’re looking for something - you’ll be looking at many choices. It’s better to have a set standard and honour that standard instead of tirelessly looking for the best of the best - This is my personal takeaway as I’ve found it has helped me a lot
Hypothetical trade-offs are one way we measure our satisfaction from a choice, however, looking at the potential positive effects of the choice - ie using positive emotions can help remedy the initial regret
We may strive for something and when we attain it, often get too comfortable (with our pleasure) and then our expectations of satisfaction change again. Scientists call this the hedonic treadmill/hedonic adaptation - referring to the satisfaction we get from new pleasures and how our level of pleasure then dissipates to the levels we had known before. For example, lottery winners will lose the outburst of pleasure once it fades and their happiness will return to the pre-lottery levels. People who’ve been in accidents will face the initial change and challenge of coping and will eventually return to the state of their pre-accident happiness (this depends on how hard they work to adapt, their support network etc.). Gratifications are activities that give us the right kind of challenge and focus and are immune to the hedonic adaptation of pleasure. Engaging in these kinds of activities means greater, long lasting satisfaction. One way of looking at what we crave in our choices is to determine how they stand the test of the hedonic treadmill
I would recommend this book to
If you want a fast-paced, engaging read filled with case studies and examples
You are baffled by choice or it makes you uncomfortable and creates stress