For the naturally indecisive, Hell is choosing what to put in your supermarket
trolley. Successfully negotiate the 38 choices of milk that I counted for
sale in my local Tesco (organic, skimmed, soya, omega3 enriched or filtered
for purity) and you’re then confronted with jam overload: 154 flavours.
Selecting from the banks of rosehip jam handcrafted in the Pyrenees, fig
conserve, Scandinavian blackcurrant with “bits” or without, could take you
all day. Then there’s the aisle with 107 varieties of pasta and 98 types of
fruit cordial . . .
Choice aplenty – indeed, so much that psychologists now believe that it is
making us miserable. Most big supermarkets provide us with about 30,000
products, and each year they add more. Indeed, for a taste of what the
future might look like in every store, visit the latest temple of runaway
choice – the giant new American Whole Foods Market in Kensington High
Street, West London. Here, choice rules supreme. You can choose from 1,000
wine labels, 100 types of nuts, oats and grains and more than 40 varieties
of sausage.
“I feel as though I’ve been punched in the face after I’ve been round
somewhere like Morrisons,” says Joy Miller, 39, who runs a communications
business in Norwich. “It’s so overwhelming that it just makes you feel
awful. If you carefully considered every aspect – ethics, food miles, price,
flavour and ingredients – you’d never get round to buying anything, ever.”
Of course, it doesn’t stop at groceries. Everywhere you turn there is a
mind-boggling parade of clothes, gadgets, financial products, holidays and
entertainment. Tantalised by all these buying options, we stockpile our
shopping baskets, homes and lives with ever more consumer goods that we
probably don’t need or even appreciate. And this isn’t good for our
happiness.
“The huge number of choices that assault us every day makes many of us feel
inadequate and in some cases even clinically depressed,” says Professor
Barry Schwartz, a psychologist from Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania and
the author of The Paradox of Choice.“ There is vastly too much choice in
the modern world and we are paying an enormous price for it. It makes us
feel helpless, mentally paralysed and profoundly dissatisfied.”
Professor Schwartz believes that the dogma of all Western societies – that
maximising freedom and choice increases welfare – is deeply flawed. “It
wouldn’t surprise me if eventually you’ll be able to buy a mobile phone with
integral nasal-hair trimmer and crème brûlée torch,” he speculates
sardonically.
So why does having so much choice make us feel miserable? Shouldn’t we be
delighted that we can travel to any corner of the planet for our holidays,
or select from tens of thousands of financial plans? Sadly not. Because
making a decision is now a nightmare. We can easily end up with what
psychologists call “consumer vertigo”, that is, swamped with so many options
that we can’t make any decision, or decide wrongly.
“So much choice makes decision-making increasingly complex,” says David
Shanks, a psychology professor and the co-author of Straight Choices,
a new book that examines how to make the best decisions when faced with a
perplexing array of options. We feel bad that every time we do make
a choice, it seems we are missing out on other opportunities. This makes us
feel inadequate and dissatisfied with what we have chosen. Often, we feel
bamboozled and just shove a familiar or prominently displayed brand into our
basket. Then we feel useless because we can’t cook gourmet dinners like
Jamie Oliver and don’t know what to do with any of these exotic new
ingredients. So we end up buying and eating the same meals time and again.
This excess also numbs us to the heady pleasure felt by previous generations
when they bought something new in an era when budgets were leaner and
consumer goods in shorter supply. All we can think about now is what we
still want to buy, rather than appreciating what we have.
Children are not immune, either. How can choosing yet another throwaway
plastic trinket from the zoo gift shop ever equal the intensity felt by the
1940s child unwrapping just a couple of presents a year – on their birthday
and at Christmas?
Experiments confirm that the less choice we have, the better we feel.
Professor Mark Lepper and his team at Stanford University in America found
that consumers who tested six jams went on to buy more and feel happier than
those offered 24 jams to taste. Another experiment showed that giving
students a choice of fewer essay topics made them produce better work.
“This suggests that we thrive when we have less choice,” says Professor
Lepper. “Excess choice is paralysis rather than liberation.”
Yet the number of consumer choices available continues to multiply. “It
doesn’t help that there is an ever-decreasing amount of expert advice
available from shop assistants – if you can find one at all,” says Paco
Underhill, chief executive of Envirosell, a research and consulting company.
Consequently, many people’s homes are filled with high-tech products that
offer still more unwanted choices: washing machines with a host of setting
options (though we only ever use two); phones that could send e-mails if
only we knew how to use them.
But if all this choice is actually harming us, what can we do about it?
Professor Lepper suggests that, for a start, we should lighten up when
selecting, say, a type of bread or a disposable camera. “Don’t take making
mundane choices too seriously or it gets to feel like an onerous task,” he
says.
Opt for small shops that offer less choice – it’s harder to feel angst-ridden
in a smaller supermarket where the choice is simply between big potatoes and
small potatoes. In addition, decide on priorities before you look at what’s
available – for instance, you could look only at cameras that offer a large
playback screen, if that’s crucial for you. And don’t expect to become an
expert; ask others who know what to look for.
To preserve mental wellbeing, save your decision-making effort for serious
things that merit a large expenditure of time and effort. Then you can make
better use of techniques such as those outlined by Professor Shanks and his
colleagues.
“Choose when to choose,” says Professor Schwartz. “Don’t worry about what type
of mobile-phone package to opt for. Pick a sofa from IKEA in 30 seconds and
you’ll feel better than if you spend hours researching sofas – because you
won’t know what else you’re missing out on.”
He adds that when it comes to achieving happiness it is better to be a
“satisficer” who accepts a good-enough choice than a “maximiser” who always
wants to make the best possible decision.
Perhaps we should all learn to love the constraints on our lives. After all,
being restricted to a local job because you can’t move your children out of
school, or having to buy a house near elderly relatives, makes you (and
them) feel better.
“It challenges a lot of our beliefs, but it could just be that choice within
constraints will make us feel a lot better,” says Professor Schwartz. “We
need to live in the moment, appreciate what we have and not think about all
the other things that we could choose instead.”
If having too much choice in life is all one has to be depressed about .... What the hell!
Allan, Ormskirk, UK
Liz Hollis has picked up an interesting subject here and writes with real verve and insight. I look forward to her next article.
Mark, Norwich,
The key empirical finding discussed in this article is that, when faced with a consumption decision, individuals who have fewer options to choose from experience higher levels of satisfaction with their ultimate choice (on average). The reason this is an interesting finding is that it is counter-intuitive in our culture which has created the niche brand, the category killer" retail center, mass customization, etc.
Dissatisfaction, clinical depression, and anxiety are not substitutable constructs. Under certain circumstances, large choice sets apparently can engender all three (more likely 2 of the three). However, under other circumstances, large choice sets might result in delight, confidence, etc.
A key issue is that the actual research is buried under two layers of literary licence: non-peer-reviewed book, and online magazine article. While this makes for more interesting reading, it also requires that readers take the above text with a grain of salt (or maybe a few grains).
Mike, Tallahassee, Florida
It's interesting that people are responding to this article as if it was just an opinion. This is based on scientific research; psychologists have conducted experiments, giving people more or less choice and then asking how they feel (as well as rather more sophisticated studies). What they have found is that people tend to be happier when given less choice. This is not just a matter of opinion.
Rachel, Cambridgeshire,
I'm not sure, was it Sartre who said "Man is condemned to be free" ?
Seems very apt.
Kate, London,
It's not so much that a multitude of choices is wrong or depressing or that they aren't market driven, but that the processes by which these zillions of items are manufactured and transported to our shelves are costing us dear ecologically. The question is, can our earth sustain our desire for more and more? I think the answer is becoming climatically clearer every day.
A good choice is a blessing, too much choice is just greedy and I think we are living in a wonderous, but greedy world and I think the earth agrees with me. However, greed and vanity seem to be two words that have disappeared from our vocabulary and when spoken are now considered rather taboo.
It's all about maintaining a sensible balance, I think the article just questions whether the balance of choice has been tipped just a little too far for us to comfortably control its consequences as regards the bigger and longer term picture be it physcologically or ecologically.
S Johnson, Adliya, Bahrain
i'm suprised Katheryn and Ben stopped short of accusing Dr Schwartz of Communist propoganda! He merely said that an excess of choice can be a contributary factor in a feeling of helplessness... so why the polemic? Or are some of our choice obsessed cousins somewhat defensive about their role in the disproportionate wealth in the world today?
Mike, Gloucester, England
I am really surprised that this article has generated so much venom! I do not think anyone is suggesting that we should have no choice, merely that there is an optimum number of choices which has now been exceeded. I have a lot of sympathy with the article. I often end up going home with nothing because I find the choice overwhelming. This often turns out to be a good thing - I have spent less money and I later realise I didnt need it in the first place. Another thing which was not mentioned - if this is how we feel when buying jam, how might endless choice affect someone who has just been diagnosed with cancer? I am a doctor and believe that the government's "choice agenda" is a flawed dogma, and is either irrelevant to or causes additional stress for my patients.
sarah, york, uk
I almost thought this article was a joke. It is absolutely ridiculous. I happen to enjoy having many choices in life and in shopping. For example, I love tea. I like trying new types of tea often. I enjoy having the choice of a variety of teas. I never have a mental breakdown when purchasing tea. How awful it would be if "someone" made it "easier" on me and removed all my tea "choices". Luckily in a free market, there would be another shop that offered my teas.
Sometimes the variety of choices is of no benefit to me. However, I am not paralyzed with indecision just because there are many choices available. While it is not important for me to have choices for some products, others may value the different choices.
I think people/psychologists will always find something to blame for their unhappiness. Choices are not the root of unhappiness.
Katheryn, Richmond, USA / Virginia
I worked as a missionary nurse in Zaire in 1994 during
the Rwandan conflict. Our camp had 800,000 refugees in it.
Once back in the States, I went to the grocery store and unexpectedly started crying in the cereal aisle. I was overwhelemed with the fact that Americans have 45+ choices of cereal, and the refugees who had no shoes and were short on clean water had nothing. We Americans I know are terribly spoiled and don't realize what we have. And many are miserable even with all the choices.
Cindy, Baton Rouge, USA/Louisiana
What a ridiculous article! A multitude of choices makes one feel inadequate? Get serious.
Is Professor Schwartz suggesting that the way to happiness is having no choice? (But then someone will have to choose for the rest of us.)
Ben Hoff, NJ, USA
This may be true. If it is, it means a radical change in our thinking about politics and society; there is no obvious reason why the psychological pressures of choosing a lifestyle or a political allegiance from a large selection should be less than those in shopping decisions.
In a traditional agricultural society you could (literally) see your life mapped out for you; your older relatives courting, your parents married, your grandparents declining and finally a row of family graves in the communal churchyard. Little or no choice of occupation, religion or culture. Sexual roles were more or less fixed, as was the social hierarchy.
Is it really true that people were happier then? And if it is, and we act on the knowledge - bang goes democracy. Out goes a woman's (or anyone's) right to choose. Goodbye social mobility. Goodbye physical mobility and variety in any aspect of life. Out with liberty, except "within constraints."
Really? Would we be happier? Dream on.
Michael Bruce, Selby, Yorkshire
I think Liz Hollis is spot on target. The travel industry is a specially good example of how too much choice can cause decision paralysis. Every post brings a deluge of brochures, offers and special deals at all times of the year and some times invitations to book for 18 months ahead. Why make a choice now when you know that more offers will arrive tomorrow?
The result can be an inability to do anything and to live in a permanent state of procrastination. Life was much simpler in the 60s when it was the Costa Brava or Cornwall.
David Jones, Abingdon,
It's a bit like going into a polling booth.....except that there, the choices are all awful
Avana Beach, London,
"Pick a sofa from IKEA in 30 seconds and you’ll feel better than if you spend hours researching sofas – because you won’t know what else you’re missing out on.â€
What nonsense! I have a custom-made large L-shaped sofa that is a great disappointment. Poor padding, structural beams in uncomfortable places, etc. Had I had more time I would have made a better decision. Now I MAKE the time for such decisions. In fact, it has become part of the fun.
This professor Schwartz seems to think that we should all be happy where we are. His type certainly didn't help mankind move on from the stone age.
Fred, Hong Kong,
One would assume Tesco, like other multiple retailers judge a product on an item's sales per shelf space and overall, the store's profitability on sales per square metre. Therefore the choice is not there by chance but by design.
If you are an Archers addict, you would have heard the story-line of John's organic sausages, which proved too expensive, and actually were removed because they did not justify the shelf space, along with John's girlfriend, who happened to be the buyer, a most original idea to remove a member of the cast.
As a male buyer, I do not have a problem , I have a list, I avoid the offers, I make straight for the check-out and join the queue, where we discuss politics, social and other current issues, a recommendation I would give to any aspiring politician or Prime Minister, who wants to consult with his electorate. Where better to find a natural focus group? However,when he hears all,the diversive opinions, too may agree that Tesco offers too much choice!
M. Fishman, London UK,
This is one of the stupidest pieces I've ever seen. How did it get published? No, as a matter of fact I haven't ever had a panic attack in the jam aisle of Tesco. Neither has anybody else I know. And I bet that nobody Liz Hollis knows has either.
Mary, London,
I fear some people will get depressed about anything. This is just a 'reason'.
Some people actually prefer to feel like a 'victim'.
It turns out we had depressed people before there was so much choice in life. Some people actually got depressed because of a 'lack' of choice. Weird eh?
No matter what happens in life, some people are going to get depressed, if things are too perfect, they get depressed because it may stop being perfect. If things are going wrong, they will get depressed because it's not perfect (which, as I said, would depress them, incase it went back to not being perfect).
Arthur, Newcastle,
I seem to recall this was a problem encountered by pre-glasnos Russian tourists to London. They usually went home empty handed, unable to make a decision as to which or what to buy.
Robin Smith, Southsea, UK
Splendid article! I have to say that Liz Hollis is a superb writer.
Peter, Manchester, Manchester
And now for a probably sexist comment from New Jersey. Men buy, women shop and agonize.
Allan Bilder, Hammonton, New Jersey, USA
Too much choice? How terrible! The left-wing local-shopping ecomentalists tell us supermarkets destroy choice, now we have psychologists telling us we have to much choice than is good for us. Is there anything we wont use as a stick to (fashionably) beat the supermarkets with?
Peter, Manchester,
I gave up buying yoghurts years ago because I couldn't decide what to buy. I also walk out of Jigsaw empty handed because I want everything and, since I can't have everything, can't decide on the one or two somethings I do want. At least I'm not alone!
Anon, London,
What did we all do without psychologists to tell us how unhappy we are?
Anne, Ireland,