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decision making
Writing down your preferences makes you choose the wrong thing.
A 1993 study showed that participants who listed reasons for their preferences were less satisfied with their choices than those who chose intuitively.
When you force a rational list of pros and cons, you bias yourself toward attributes that are easy to quantify rather than attributes that provide genuine satisfaction. You end up choosing the logical option that your subconscious mind was trying to reject. The 'right' choice is often one you cannot fully explain in a list.
Logical justification often obscures your actual priorities.
Where this comes from
- Study
- Wilson and Schooler, 1993, Thinking Too Much
- What the check found
- The claim correctly identifies the 1993 Wilson and Schooler study findings. While no quote is present in the provided reference material, the study is a foundational, well-documented paper in social psychology.
- Confidence
- Solid, with limits
Related
One of these every day, and every one names the study it came from. When a finding is contested, it says so.