Most behavioral decision studies are about internal inconsistencies of decisions - that decisions (choices or judgments) made in one condition are different from decisions made in an apparently different but normatively equivalent condition. The present article reviews behavioral decision...

This research investigated the relationship between the magnitude or scope of a stimulus and its subjective value by contrasting 2 psychological processes that may be used to construct preferences: valuation by feeling and valuation by calculation. The results show that when people rely on...

This research identifies a new source of failure to make accurate affective predictions or to make experientially optimal choices. When people make predictions or choices, they are often in the joint evaluation (JE) mode; when people actually experience an event, they are often in the single...

This research investigates an understudied decision heuristic, the majority rule. By using the rule, decision makers choose the option superior on most of the available cues. Cues are broadly defined, including advisors and attributes. We propose that decision makers are more likely to use the...

Recent years have witnessed a growing interest among psychologists and other social scientists in subjective wellbeing and happiness. Here we review selected contributions to this development from the literature on behavioral decision theory. In particular, we examine many, somewhat surprising,...

In a field study, we identified an intriguing inconsistency between real estate developers' desired sales pattern (selling all apartments at the same rate) and the actual sales pattern (selling good apartments faster). We explained this inconsistency with Tversky, Sattath and Slovic (1988)'s...

Imagine you are a realtor and are showing a prospective buyer a house with a lake view, but it is foggy and the view is less than ideal. Are you inclined to tell the prospective buyer, “Unfortunately it is foggy outside. If it were not foggy, the view would be even better!”? Eight studies,...

We offer a framework about when and how specifications (e.g., megapixels of a camera and number of air bags in a massage chair) influence consumer preferences and report five studies that test the framework. Studies 1-3 show that even when consumers can directly experience the relevant products...