Keeping Ones Options Open: The Detrimental Consequences of Decision Reversibility

Lottie Bullens , Frenk van Harreveld , Jens Förster

People generally prefer to have the opportunity to revise their decisions. Surprisingly however, research has shown that keeping ones options open yields lower satisfaction with the decision outcome (Gilbert & Ebert, 2002). Two studies aimed to gain more insight into the detrimental consequences of decision reversibility and the cognitive processes underlying decision reversibility. Building upon literature on goal fulfillment we hypothesized and found in a first experiment that as long as decisions are still open to change, accessibility of decision-related constructs is increased compared to neutral constructs. A second experiment demonstrated that decision reversibility undermines working memory capacity. Moreover participants experienced higher regret after having made a reversible decision, an effect that was mediated by decreased working memory capacity. The study set implies that reversible decisions yield lower working memory capacity because people continue to think about the, still relevant, choice options. In the end this might increase dissatisfaction with the decision and regret.

Mots clés: Decision reversibility; accessibility; goal fulfillment; working memory capacity; cognitive dissonance; regret

Domaines: Psychologie et comportements

Lottie Bullens, Frenk van Harreveld, Jens Förster. Keeping Ones Options Open: The Detrimental Consequences of Decision Reversibility. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 2011, ⟨10.1016/j.jesp.2011.02.012⟩. ⟨hal-00981132⟩