Choice Overloads — limit your options
October 13, 2020. Apple announced their new lineup of the iPhone. Everyone had their sights set on what the latest and greatest offerings from Apple would be. Every year, Apple generally releases two variants of the same iPhone number — like iPhone 7 and 7 plus. Then iPhone 8, 8 plus, and X. Then came iPhone XR, XS and XS Max. Then last year, arrived iPhone 11, 11 Pro and 11 Pro Max.
So this year, as you probably know, the trend continued, but there was more.
Apple released iPhone 12, 12 mini, 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max. Many people love the variety. Many others absolutely hate this lineup. Why, you ask?
Well, there are just so many choices, aren’t there?!
Through this piece, we’ll be understanding the role that the number of choices or options play, when making a decision.
You might think that given to choose between 3 shirts would be tough. It would be better if you had more options, say 8 to 10 shirts. Well, by that logic, the more the merrier, right? Yeah, no.
More often than not, we are actually better off making a decision among as less number of options as possible.
But why does this happen? You see, when you have greater variety of options, we set very high expectations from us to make the right decision. And so, we start worrying a lot more about whether we will make the wrong decision. This in turn, takes out all the happiness from the process.
Coming back to the case of the iPhone 12 lineup, at first glance they are all so different — I mean, just by looking at them anyone can spot the differences. But, when it comes to making the purchase, the differences in specifications are almost so negligible that it totally throws you off. Even benchmark reports coming out have shown that the iPhone 12 Pro, edges out the iPhone 12 by a very very small margin. Would you pay an extra 200 dollars for so small a difference? Again if you did decide to go for the iPhone 12 Pro, only a 100 dollars more and you can get the largest iPhone ever! Would that not be a steal? Or should you again check the specs only to be reminded that nothing much is different except for the screen size? You get my point, right?
All these decisions are frustrating enough, keeping aside the fact that you will also be paying a huge price for it, literally, and also figuratively if you later regret the decision.
So what is the moral of this case study?
Choice and options are alluring. We feel like we have so much control over even the tiniest detail. But, it becomes exponentially confusing.
The more choices that you keep juggling in your mind, the more dissatisfied you will be.
That, is Choice Overload.
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