Page 48 - Decoding Decisions ~ Making sense of the messy middle

48 CHAPTER 4 INFLUENCING THE MESSY MIDDLE

In the context of shopping decisions, we might be tempted to propose that
the degree of rationality increases with the size and importance of the
purchase. But as anyone who has ever bought a car, a house, or an expensive
holiday knows, the moment the deal closes can still be fraught with complex
emotion. And at the other end of the scale, even a seemingly functional,
low-cost purchase like buying a favourite shampoo can be prompted by
emotional or rational considerations, depending on the individual.

And of course, muddying the water of reason and emotion further is

advertising – particularly branding. Brands often seek to cultivate an emotional
connection with consumers – in fact, many people will openly describe
themselves as loving or hating a particular brand. These associations, often
bound up in our sense of ourselves and our aspirations for who we want to be,
are a powerful source of behavioural change in themselves.

To design an experiment looking at how behaviour is influenced during the
crucial explore and evaluate phases of our model, we needed to draw up a

list of behavioural science biases to test. For this, The Behavioural Architects
returned to the literature of academic behavioural science. Over the course of
more than 50 years, the discipline has codified some 300 principles that explain
the conscious and unconscious workings of the human mind. Of course, not all
of the 300 are relevant to the kind of decision-making we’re exploring here, so
during a thorough review, the team whittled down the list to six biases that are
closely associated with the explore and evaluate phases of our model.