Posts from Pop!Tech: Barry Schwartz

Barry Schwartz is the Dorwin Cartwright Professor of Social Theory and Social Action Psychology, Swarthmore College, and author of The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less.

Barry Schwartz and Grant McCracken had a very lively debate on the pro's and cons of choice. Here's what Barry had to say.

It's important for people to flourish, but no discussion on what to do to flourish. We can't have it all and the quest to have it all is one of the tortures of modern life.

Barry did a quick review of his his grocery store and found:

* 285 brands of cookies
* 230 soups
* 75 iced teas
* 175 salad dressings
* 40 toothpastes
* 275 cereals

At the average electronics store, there are 30 vcr's & 50 dvd's and if you design your own stereo system, 6.5 million different stereo combinations.

Showed funny cartoon that said "Do you have a phone that doesn't do too much?"

When and where you are working is a choice for us, but it also means that there's no excuse for not working.

Being unattractive is now a matter of choice.

Americans have more freedom of choice then ever before
* We have more money them ever before.
* Americans are sadder then ever before
* Clinical depression is twice as frequent as a generation ago.
* Depression is also being observed in younger people then ever before.

What does too much choice do?

Barry gave an example about a test done in a grocery store with jam, offered a table to test jams. Week one, they sampled 24 jams and you could get coupon for a discount to purchase. Next week, they samples only 6 jams. With 24 jams, more sampling, more tasting and 1/10th as many sales.

401(k) investments -- for every 10 funds being offered, the likelihood of participation goes down 2%.

With all choice, people do better, but feel worse.
1. Regrets and anticipated regrets.
2. Opportunity costs. When you pick one over another, you lose the opportunity to try something else. If you walk through one door, another door has to be closed. Showed a great cartoon with two people sitting on the beach and a caption that read -- "I can't stop thinking about all of those parking spaces on west 85th."

At work:
1. Stress related disease costs $300 billion/year
2. comes from overwork and job insecurity
3. whether or not to work is a major source of stress.

Escalation of expectations. With so many choices, we have a higher expectation level and that leads to disappointment.

Self-blame. With so many choices available to us, if we make a bad decisions, it must be our fault.

What really makes people happy is close relationships with other people. They constrain rather then liberate. You must make decisions based on other peoples needs as well.

How can choice be good and bad?
You can't live in a world without choices. However, at some point, the addition of choices does not increase our well being. The more choices you have, you reach an escalation of the negative effects.

It is only with limitations can we really flourish and achieve whatever we want.