Friday, July 8, 2016

The paradox of choice

On any given day, I maybe remember 5% of what I learned in college. Recently, one thing that popped back into my brain from some forgotten corner was a concept called the paradox of choice. The idea behind this is that the more options we have when making a decision, the less satisfied we will be with the decision we ultimately make. 

The examples my professor used were peanut butter and jeans. The example that I experienced that brought it into my head was car seats. Regardless, the idea is the same: if you only have a few options, you're going to be satisfied that the one you pick is good enough. If you have a lot of options, you're not going to be satisfied unless you pick one that is perfect. Babies R Us has easily 30 car seats in the store, and 2,000 online. How the hell am I (or anyone else) supposed to know which one is the best, most perfect car seat out of 2,000? There is literally no way. 

What is the solution here? For peanut butter and jeans, I would usually just go for it. For car seats, I'm going to do more research and hope for the best. 

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