Freedom of Choice Is What You've Got, Freedom From Choice Is What You Want

New at Reason: Is it possible to have too many options? Is Choice Anxiety destined to become our next fake epidemic? Do you look at a menu and say "OK"? Ron Bailey chooses his side.

Comments

[Ken]

Great Devo reference!

[Todd Fletcher]

"One suspects that his unspoken converse is that sound public policy consists of the government restricting options and forcing Americans to do what people like Professor Schwartz think is good for them."

Nice understatement, Ron.

[JD Weiner]

I'd buy it. A few articles I've read on the topic have just barely avoided coming out and openly saying that since more choice doesn't make people happy, then it's OK for someone else (usually the gummint, natch) to restrict our choices. I doubt that the writers really think of themselves as strict utilitarians, although that's what the stance boils down to - it's just a stalking horse for control.

[dhex]

and an odd one at that.

such thinking can easily be turned into support for jim crow policies - since white southerners had a difficult time accepting blacks as humans, walling them off legalistically helped prevent mental anguish.

that swarthmore guy is a fucking asshole, man. a lieberman-quality asshole.

[I. Dyegress]

"a lieberman-quality asshole"

Wow, dhex, thats even lower than asshat or fucktwit pond scum!

[R C Dean]

Logical extension to politics:

One man, one vote, one time.

Or perhaps:

One man, one vote. Professor Schwartz is the man, so he's got the vote.

[Nagol Rotceps]

My favorite line by Prof Schwartz was this:

"Who has the time to find the best digital camera, the best cellphone plan, the best 401(k), the best health insurance or the best school for his children?"

Uh, Consumer Reports or your local paper?

[dhex]

"best" is also truly ridiculous for a lot of the things he names. unless you're an avid photographer your pricerange is going to determine what digital camera you buy. you won't notice the difference unless you buy into getthelatestnowitis. in which case you're a fuckwit and deserve to be confused.

sometimes you just gotta pick one. tomatoe sauce and other non-lethal choices have a perfectly acceptable degree of wiggle room.

401ks, investment strategies in general, school choices for kids and so on -- these are all things that you should set aside time for.

i guess the question is whether we should be ruled by a nation of fuckwits. the lowest common fuckwit rule of law.

i'm not really sure what prof. schwartz is actually advocating, outside of "choice makes thine head hurt, noble retarded american." like i said, a lieberman-quality asshole.

[Con (law) Man]

Schwartz should also consider the possibility that saying "I don't have time to figure out the best cell phone plan" means either you don't want a cell phone that badly or are indifferent to the costs between plans. Why do crybaby professors always conclude that life's inconveniences symbolize some deep, structural problem with the way things are?

[dhex]

to be fair, i don't necessarily disagree. people get more choices, people get confused. but the only way to get less confused is to continue to increase choices.

and seeing as how so many life choices were sealed off legalistically and culturally for most of the population only 100 years ago, even such a small thing as jam (FUCKING JAM!!!!!) seems almost heartening.

plus you can always make your own. ta-da!

[Jennifer]

I just remember in Margaret Atwood's horrifying novel The Handmaid's Tale, the Taleban-esque Christians who oppressed women in the book justified themselves by saying, "There are two types of freedom: freedom TO and freedom FROM." Atwood, of course, meant for the statement to be horrifying; Professor Schwartz would nod his head wisely and say, "Yes, that's exactly what I'm trying to say."

[Russ D]

"or the best school for his children?"

Well, if my kid's a psych major, I know Swarthmore ain't the best. Thanks for the help, Prof!

[Chuck]

A couple of things worth noting:

1) I ran the numbers for the second study discussed in Iyengar's paper: the difference in essay response rates *barely* makes the grade for significance (p=.0467). If only two fewer students in the limited-choice group turn in an essay, the p-value goes up to .1164, meaning no significant difference, and hence no publication. I wonder if they accepted any late papers?

2) Schwartz also has an article in a recent issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education (you must be a paid subscriber to access online), where he lays all this out somewhat more fully. I found it interesting that in that article he often conflates the terms "less satisfied" and "worse off", using the phrase "worse off" to describe resluts where people reported some sense of reduced happiness (or well-being, or whatever). One can be confused by lots of choices; I don't think that makes you "worse off" in any real sense.

[Larry]

"Political tags-such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth-are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort."
Robert A. Heinlein

[LB]

Shopping for food, reading investment prospecti and researching local schools cuts into the time I spend watching bad tv and downloading porn.

The great Dr. Schwartz must and will chose for me and relieve me of those burdens.

What the hell is this - a Mel Brooks movie?

[Brad S]

"Who has the time to find the best digital camera, the best cellphone plan, the best 401(k), the best health insurance or the best school for his children?"

If it's important enough to me (which the 401k, health insurance, and school issues are), you'd better believe I'm going to make time for it. Retirement, health, and my child's education are important to me. If I don't make time to manage these things, then I am guilty of neglecting some of my life's greatest priorities. The value of "choice" in these items is that the best 401k for me may not be the best 401k for someone else. The best health insurance for me may not be the best health insurance for someone else. And, of course, the best school for my kid may not be the best school for some other kid. What this Schwartz dufus seems to be missing (but which is obvious to most people with any common sense) is that we are all unique individuals with a unique set of needs, goals, desires, and priorities. There is no one size fits all solution for everyone, as much as Schwartz would apparently like to force his choices on everyone.

Now, on the other hand, digital cameras and cell phone plans just aren't that big a deal to me. If I shopped around, I might be able to get a comparable cell phone plan for $2 less per month. But I'm not going to. I'm going to find a plan that's good enough for my purposes and buy it. And that's what I've done. To someone else (i.e. someone who uses the cell phone more than I do), the cell phone plan may be a more important decision, so that person may spend more time researching, contemplating, even negotiating, to get a better cell phone deal. Ditto for digital cameras - I'm going to find one that's good enough for me, that I can afford, and buy it. A professional photographer might spend more time and effort on this choice. And that's fine. Again, different people, different priorities.

Boiled down, Schwartz's argument might as well be: "choice is bad because, for everyone, the right choice is exactly the same. Therefore, we are better off if someone else (i.e. enlightened profs like Schwartz or, worse yet, the government) makes choices for us." The simple counterargument is: "choice is good because, for everyone, the right choice is not exactly the same. Therefore, individuals are better off if allowed to make their own choices based on their own unique needs, values, and priorities."

Am I missing something here?

[nobody]

I choose not to comment.

[Brad S]

nobody - according to Schwartz, choosing not to comment is not a viable choice. Therefore, Schwartz has chosen for you, and you WILL comment.

[Economist]

And I thought economists had a hard time dealing with statistics! Is the online version of the paper missing a table of results, or are they simply left out?

Is it standard in psychology to do hypothesis tests on correlations of r=0 when you really believe that r=1? At least you get significant results... yeah.

[anonymous]

Ignoring the authoritarian implications of Schwartz's argument, the point that he's trying to make agrees with my limited experience. I am most at peace AFTER I've made an irrevocable choice -- when there's nothing left to choose. The anguish of life comes from trying to make the decision to begin with. (I seem to recall Sartre saying something along these lines.)

[Brad S]

anonymous - so, from a government/legislative standpoint, what is the actionable part of Schwartz's argument?

I guess if Schwartz is just trying to say that some choices just aren't all that important and we're better off not putting that much time, thought, and effort into making them, then I would tend to agree. At the end of the day, there are really only so many choices in life that truly matter.

But if Schwartz is trying to say that some government entity should come in and try to pass various laws and regulations to protect us poor sheep from having so many choices, that's where I draw the line.

[Lesley Stevens]

Small correction: Some people are missing that Schwartz wrote about the studies, but Sheena Iyengar is the one who conducted them.

Anyway,

I think I see where Anonymous is coming from, at least, it jibes with my own impression of Schwartz. He's a psychologist, right? He's thinking in terms of stress and anxiety. The situation of the posters who aren't bothered by picking the "right" digital camera because it's not that important to them is not the situation that's relevant here. If the decision isn't that important, you don't experience stress at the array of choices. It's when the decision IS important that it becomes difficult.

My husband and I bought our first DVD player after our VCR died on the model of "Hey this one over here is a DVD/VCR combo and the price is good, let's buy it!" The error correction turned out to be SO lousy (skipping on clean, brand new out of the box DVDs), that it was intolerable. Upon researching, we discovered it was probably not just our player, but that model. Determined not to get another lemon, we spent several hours poring over DVD player reviews to try to find the best one in our price range. Our first purchase was easy and stress free, our second purchase was time-consuming and anxiety producing (What if we take all this time, and still end up with a crappy player?)

When you have what you consider a VERY important choice to make (health care, investments, etc), and you are faced with a broad array of choices, the decision making process can be very stressful. This is what the psychologist sees. All this stress and anxiety and time with all these choices. Wow, that can't be good! If there's only one or two choices, then the bad feelings go away. Much more healthy for the psyche.

When there's a wide array of choices on something trivial, like friggin' JAM, or an extra credit essay, many people decide it's not worth the time to make any choice at all. But this doesn't really tell us anything about the value of having many choices. For someone who runs a catering business, a wide choice on jam may be very important, and worth his time and anxiety to evaluate all the options. The student who needs that extra credit to pass the class will take the time to choose among 30 essay topics, and may be glad to have such wide flexibility on extra credit in a course where she's struggling.

Iyengar's studies might be more useful if she looked at choices that a larger number of people would consider non-trivial like cars, houses, or retirement plans, instead of jam and extra credit assignments.

Schwartz seems to be solely looking at the negatives of increased choice: anxiety, time investment, confusion, and not the positives.

One of you who looked at the studies and links in detail, can you tell me: Do Iyengar or Schwartz ever ask whether people feel the trade-off is worthwhile? I would think he would discover that most folks would much prefer the anxiety of sifting through many choices to the alternative, of having hardly any choices at all. I know I would.

[Lesley Stevens]

RE: my correction. Oops. Actually, I don't think anybody's confused the two, I just wasn't reading your posts closely enough. =)

[Ken Silber]

Contrary to Prof. Schwartz's worry, policy issues aren't usually about whether there should be say 5,000 choices in something or just five. The most bitter controversies are often about whether there should be a few choices or just one/none (think abortion, school vouchers, Social Security privatization).

[Not as confused in Manchester]

choices, choices, CHOICES! Yahoo! Thank you Ron Bailey, how could I have been so blind? Choice is GOOD! So how come there's only two parties to choose from?

[AJMB]

No offense to your taste in authors Jennifer, but you could have stopped at Margaret Atwood's horrible.

[rst]

While I agree with Schwartz that freedom can be a bad thing for some people, what he and his ilk fail to demonstrate is why the rest of us should have to suffer in any way for it. I understand that there are some people dumb enough to put hair dryers in bathtubs, so give them hair dryers and draw them a bath.

[nobody]

I STILL choose not to choose.

[Brad S]

nobody - "you can choose a ready guide in some celestial voice...if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice...you can choose from phantom fears and kindness, acting pure...I will choose a path that's clear...I will choose freewill..."

[Randy]

Whatever you guys say is fine with me.