The paradox of choice
17,049,684 views | Barry Schwartz • TEDGlobal 2005 Barry Schwartz
Psychology professor
Barry Schwartz studies the link between economics and psychology, offering startling insights into modern life.
00:00
I'm going to talk to you about some stuff that's in this book of mine that I hope will resonate with other things you've already heard, and I'll try to make some connections myself, in case you miss them.
00:10
But I want to start with what I call the "official dogma." The official dogma of what? The official dogma of all Western industrial societies. And the official dogma runs like this: if we are interested in maximizing the welfare of our citizens, the way to do that is to maximize individual freedom. The reason for this is both that freedom is, in and of itself, good, valuable, worthwhile, essential to being human, and because if people have freedom, then each of us can act on our own to do the things that will maximize our welfare, and no one has to decide on our behalf. The way to maximize freedom is to maximize choice.
00:55
The more choice people have, the more freedom they have, and the more freedom they have, the more welfare they have. This, I think, is so deeply embedded in the water supply that it wouldn't occur to anyone to question it. And it's also deeply embedded in our lives. I'll give you some examples of what modern progress has made possible for us.
01:23
This is my supermarket. Not such a big one. I want to say just a word about salad dressing. A hundred seventy-five salad dressings in my supermarket, if you don't count the 10 extra-virgin olive oils and 12 balsamic vinegars you could buy to make a very large number of your own salad dressings, in the off-chance that none of the 175 the store has on offer suit you. So this is what the supermarket is like. And then you go to the consumer electronics store to set up a stereo system -- speakers, CD player, tape player, tuner, amplifier -- and in this one single consumer electronics store, there are that many stereo systems. We can construct six and a half million different stereo systems out of the components that are on offer in one store.
02:11
You've got to admit that's a lot of choice. In other domains -- the world of communications. There was a time, when I was a boy, when you could get any kind of telephone service you wanted, as long as it came from Ma Bell. You rented your phone, you didn't buy it. One consequence of that, by the way, is that the phone never broke. And those days are gone. We now have an almost unlimited variety of phones, especially in the world of cell phones. These are cell phones of the future. My favorite is the middle one -- the MP3 player, nose hair trimmer, and crème brûlée torch. And if --
02:48
(Laughter)
02:49
if by some chance you haven't seen that in your store yet, you can rest assured that one day soon, you will. And what this does is it leads people to walk into their stores, asking this question. And do you know what the answer to this question now is? The answer is "no." It is not possible to buy a cell phone that doesn't do too much.
03:08
So, in other aspects of life that are much more significant than buying things, the same explosion of choice is true. Health care. It is no longer the case in the United States that you go to the doctor, and the doctor tells you what to do. Instead, you go to the doctor, and the doctor tells you, "Well, we could do A, or we could do B. A has these benefits and these risks. B has these benefits and these risks. What do you want to do?" And you say, "Doc, what should I do?" And the doc says, "A has these benefits and risks, and B has these benefits and risks. What do you want to do?" And you say, "If you were me, Doc, what would you do?" And the doc says, "But I'm not you." And the result is -- we call it "patient autonomy," which makes it sound like a good thing, but what it really is is a shifting of the burden and the responsibility for decision-making from somebody who knows something -- namely, the doctor -- to somebody who knows nothing and is almost certainly sick and thus, not in the best shape to be making decisions -- namely, the patient. There's enormous marketing of prescription drugs to people like you and me, which, if you think about it, makes no sense at all, since we can't buy them. Why do they market to us if we can't buy them? The answer is that they expect us to call our doctors the next morning and ask for our prescriptions to be changed.
04:30
Something as dramatic as our identity has now become a matter of choice, as this slide is meant to indicate. We don't inherit an identity; we get to invent it. And we get to reinvent ourselves as often as we like. And that means that every day, when you wake up in the morning, you have to decide what kind of person you want to be. With respect to marriage and family: there was a time when the default assumption that almost everyone had is that you got married as soon as you could, and then you started having kids as soon as you could. The only real choice was who, not when, and not what you did after.
05:13
Nowadays, everything is very much up for grabs. I teach wonderfully intelligent students, and I assign 20 percent less work than I used to. And it's not because they're less smart, and it's not because they're less diligent. It's because they are preoccupied, asking themselves, "Should I get married or not? Should I get married now? Should I get married later? Should I have kids first or a career first?" All of these are consuming questions. And they're going to answer these questions, whether or not it means not doing all the work I assign and not getting a good grade in my courses. And indeed they should. These are important questions to answer.
05:51
Work. We are blessed, as Carl was pointing out, with the technology that enables us to work every minute of every day from any place on the planet -- except the Randolph Hotel.
06:05
(Laughter)
06:08
(Applause)
06:10
There is one corner, by the way, that I'm not going to tell anybody about, where the WiFi actually works. I'm not telling you about it, because I want to use it. So what this means, this incredible freedom of choice we have with respect to work, is that we have to make a decision, again and again and again, about whether we should or shouldn't be working. We can go to watch our kid play soccer, and we have our cell phone on one hip and our Blackberry on our other hip, and our laptop, presumably, on our laps. And even if they're all shut off, every minute that we're watching our kid mutilate a soccer game, we are also asking ourselves, "Should I answer this cell phone call? Should I respond to this email? Should I draft this letter?" And even if the answer to the question is "no," it's certainly going to make the experience of your kid's soccer game very different than it would've been.
07:00
So everywhere we look, big things and small things, material things and lifestyle things, life is a matter of choice. And the world we used to live in looked like this.
07:13
[Well, actually, they are written in stone.] That is to say, there were some choices, but not everything was a matter of choice. The world we now live in looks like this.
07:21
[The Ten Commandments Do-It-Yourself Kit]
07:23
And the question is: Is this good news or bad news? And the answer is "yes."
07:31
(Laughter)
07:33
We all know what's good about it, so I'm going to talk about what's bad about it. All of this choice has two effects, two negative effects on people. One effect, paradoxically, is that it produces paralysis rather than liberation. With so many options to choose from, people find it very difficult to choose at all. I'll give you one very dramatic example of this, a study that was done of investments in voluntary retirement plans. A colleague of mine got access to investment records from Vanguard, the gigantic mutual fund company, of about a million employees and about 2,000 different workplaces. What she found is that for every 10 mutual funds the employer offered, rate of participation went down two percent. You offer 50 funds -- 10 percent fewer employees participate than if you only offer five. Why? Because with 50 funds to choose from, it's so damn hard to decide which fund to choose, that you'll just put it off till tomorrow, and then tomorrow and then tomorrow and tomorrow, and, of course, tomorrow never comes. Understand that not only does this mean that people are going to have to eat dog food when they retire because they don't have enough money put away, it also means that making the decision is so hard that they pass up significant matching money from the employer. By not participating, they are passing up as much as 5,000 dollars a year from the employer, who would happily match their contribution.
09:10
So paralysis is a consequence of having too many choices. And I think it makes the world look like this.
09:16
[And lastly, for all eternity, French, bleu cheese or ranch?]
09:20
(Laughter)
09:23
You really want to get the decision right if it's for all eternity, right? You don't want to pick the wrong mutual fund or wrong salad dressing. So that's one effect. The second effect is that, even if we manage to overcome the paralysis and make a choice, we end up less satisfied with the result of the choice than we would be if we had fewer options to choose from. And there are several reasons for this. One of them is, with a lot of different salad dressings to choose from, if you buy one and it's not perfect -- and what salad dressing is? -- it's easy to imagine that you could've made a different choice that would've been better. And what happens is, this imagined alternative induces you to regret the decision you made, and this regret subtracts from the satisfaction you get out of the decision you made, even if it was a good decision. The more options there are, the easier it is to regret anything at all that is disappointing about the option that you chose.
10:20
Second, what economists call "opportunity costs." Dan Gilbert made a big point this morning of talking about how much the way in which we value things depends on what we compare them to. Well, when there are lots of alternatives to consider, it's easy to imagine the attractive features of alternatives that you reject that make you less satisfied with the alternative that you've chosen. Here's an example.
10:47
[I can't stop thinking about those other available parking spaces on W 85th Street]
10:51
If you're not a New Yorker, I apologize. Here's what you're supposed to be thinking. Here's this couple on the Hamptons. Very expensive real estate. Gorgeous beach. Beautiful day. They have it all to themselves. What could be better? "Damn it," this guy is thinking, "It's August. Everybody in my Manhattan neighborhood is away. I could be parking right in front of my building." And he spends two weeks nagged by the idea that he is missing the opportunity, day after day, to have a great parking space.
11:21
(Laughter)
11:23
Opportunity costs subtract from the satisfaction that we get out of what we choose, even when what we choose is terrific. And the more options there are to consider, the more attractive features of these options are going to be reflected by us as opportunity costs.
11:38
Here's another example.
11:40
(Laughter)
11:43
Now, this cartoon makes a lot of points. It makes points about living in the moment as well, and probably about doing things slowly. But one point it makes is that whenever you're choosing one thing, you're choosing not to do other things, and those other things may have lots of attractive features, and it's going to make what you're doing less attractive.
12:02
Third: escalation of expectations. This hit me when I went to replace my jeans. I wear jeans almost all the time. There was a time when jeans came in one flavor, and you bought them, and they fit like crap. They were incredibly uncomfortable, and if you wore them long enough and washed them enough times, they started to feel OK. I went to replace my jeans after years of wearing these old ones. I said, "I want a pair of jeans. Here's my size." And the shopkeeper said, "Do you want slim fit, easy fit, relaxed fit? You want button fly or zipper fly? You want stonewashed or acid-washed? Do you want them distressed? Do you want boot cut, tapered?" Blah, blah, blah on and on he went. My jaw dropped. And after I recovered, I said, "I want the kind that used to be the only kind."
12:44
(Laughter)
12:49
He had no idea what that was.
12:51
(Laughter)
12:52
So I spent an hour trying on all these damn jeans, and I walked out of the store -- truth -- with the best-fitting jeans I had ever had. I did better.
13:01
All this choice made it possible for me to do better. But -- I felt worse. Why? I wrote a whole book to try to explain this to myself. The reason is --
13:13
(Laughter)
13:17
The reason I felt worse is that with all of these options available, my expectations about how good a pair of jeans should be went up. I had very low, no particular expectations when they only came in one flavor. When they came in 100 flavors, damn it, one of them should've been perfect. And what I got was good, but it wasn't perfect. And so I compared what I got to what I expected, and what I got was disappointing in comparison to what I expected. Adding options to people's lives can't help but increase the expectations people have about how good those options will be. And what that's going to produce is less satisfaction with results, even when they're good results.
13:59
[It all looks so great. I can't wait to be disappointed.]
14:01
Nobody in the world of marketing knows this.
14:04
Because if they did, you wouldn't all know what this was about. The truth is more like this.
14:11
[Everything was better back when everything was worse.]
14:14
The reason that everything was better back when everything was worse is that when everything was worse, it was actually possible for people to have experiences that were a pleasant surprise. Nowadays, the world we live in -- we affluent, industrialized citizens, with perfection the expectation -- the best you can ever hope for is that stuff is as good as you expect it to be. You will never be pleasantly surprised, because your expectations, my expectations, have gone through the roof. The secret to happiness -- this is what you all came for -- the secret to happiness is: low expectations.
14:50
(Laughter)
14:53
[You'll do]
14:54
(Applause)
14:56
(Laughter)
14:59
I want to say -- just a little autobiographical moment -- that I actually am married to a wife, and she's really quite wonderful. I couldn't have done better. I didn't settle. But settling isn't always such a bad thing.
15:14
Finally, one consequence of buying a bad-fitting pair of jeans when there is only one kind to buy is that when you are dissatisfied and you ask why, who's responsible, the answer is clear: the world is responsible. What could you do? When there are hundreds of different styles of jeans available and you buy one that is disappointing and you ask why, who's responsible, it is equally clear that the answer to the question is "you." You could have done better. With a hundred different kinds of jeans on display, there is no excuse for failure. And so when people make decisions, and even though the results of the decisions are good, they feel disappointed about them; they blame themselves.
15:58
Clinical depression has exploded in the industrial world in the last generation. I believe a significant -- not the only, but a significant -- contributor to this explosion of depression and also suicide, is that people have experiences that are disappointing because their standards are so high, and then when they have to explain these experiences to themselves, they think they're at fault. So the net result is that we do better in general, objectively, and we feel worse. So let me remind you: this is the official dogma, the one that we all take to be true, and it's all false. It is not true. There's no question that some choice is better than none. But it doesn't follow from that that more choice is better than some choice. There's some magical amount. I don't know what it is. I'm pretty confident that we have long since passed the point where options improve our welfare.
16:55
Now, as a policy matter -- I'm almost done -- as a policy matter, the thing to think about is this: what enables all of this choice in industrial societies is material affluence. There are lots of places in the world, and we have heard about several of them, where their problem is not that they have too much choice. Their problem is they have too little. So the stuff I'm talking about is the peculiar problem of modern, affluent, Western societies. And what is so frustrating and infuriating is this: Steve Levitt talked to you yesterday about how these expensive and difficult-to-install child seats don't help. It's a waste of money. What I'm telling you is that these expensive, complicated choices -- it's not simply that they don't help. They actually hurt. They actually make us worse off.
17:51
If some of what enables people in our societies to make all of the choices we make were shifted to societies in which people have too few options, not only would those people's lives be improved, but ours would be improved also. This is what economists call a "Pareto-improving move." Income redistribution will make everyone better off, not just poor people, because of how all this excess choice plagues us. So to conclude.
18:19
[You can be anything you want to be -- no limits.] You're supposed to read this cartoon and, being a sophisticated person, say, "Ah! What does this fish know? Nothing is possible in this fishbowl." Impoverished imagination, a myopic view of the world -- that's the way I read it at first. The more I thought about it, however, the more I came to the view that this fish knows something. Because the truth of the matter is, if you shatter the fishbowl so that everything is possible, you don't have freedom. You have paralysis. If you shatter this fishbowl so that everything is possible, you decrease satisfaction. You increase paralysis, and you decrease satisfaction.
19:01
Everybody needs a fishbowl. This one is almost certainly too limited -- perhaps even for the fish, certainly for us. But the absence of some metaphorical fishbowl is a recipe for misery and, I suspect, disaster.
19:16
Thank you very much.
19:17
(Applause)
Shawn Zhang, Translator
Wang Qian, Reviewer
00:00
我想在这里谈谈我这本书里的部分内容 希望它和你们已经听到过的一些事物 引起共鸣 如果有哪些你们不清楚的我在这里会试着 帮你把它们联系起来。 我想从一个公认的信条讲起。 什么样的公认的信条呢？ 就是整个西方工业社会所笃信不疑的 一个信条。 这个信条是这么说的： 如果我们要想使民众获得最大限度的福利， 其方法就是使个人自由达到最大化。 原因就是自由这东西在与本身就是美好的， 具有价值，为人们所必需。 另外，一旦人们有了自由， 我们每个人都可以自己做主 用各种办法最大限度地获得福利， 用不着别人来替我们做主。 使自由达到极大化的途径就是 最大限度的增加选择性。
00:56
人们的选择越多，自由也就越多， 自由越多， 得到的福利也就越多。
01:04
我觉得，这个观念就像掺进了我们的 自来水里那样根深蒂固 以至于没人想起来会对它提出疑问。 同样这个观念也深嵌于我们的日常生活之中。 我来给你们举些例子看看当代社会的 进步发展让我们变得有可能做些什么事。 这是我家附近的一个超市。不算很大。 我只想说说这里的色拉调料。 我这家超市有175种各式色拉调料， 还没算上10种不同牌子的特级初榨橄榄油 和12种 Balsamic 葡萄醋任你选购， 如果碰巧那175种色拉酱都不和你的口味， 你就可以用它们调出另一大批 你自己的色拉酱。 你看，这就是超级市场的样子。 然后你转身出来到一家家用电器店去配置 一套立体音响系统 - 音箱啦，CD机啦，磁带机，收音机，放大器。 就这么一家家用电器店里 立体音响系统就多得数不清。 用这家店的组件你可以配出近650万种 各种组合的立体音响系统来。
02:12
你没法不承认这可是不小的一堆选择吧。 换个行业，说说通讯。 我还是孩子那会儿， 你要想接通电话服务， 那就得去玛贝尔公司，只此一家。 你不用买，只需去租一架电话机回来。 通常情况是，那电话用到死都不会坏。 那种日子早已一去不返了。 如今我们几乎有无穷无尽的电话品种， 尤其是手机。(显示漫画） 这些都是未来的手机。 其中我最津津乐道的是中间那款 - 带着MP3播放机，鼻毛剪和法式焦糖布丁的喷火枪。 如果你还没在你家旁边的商店里见过的话， 不必担心，用不了多久你就会看到的。 这事的结果是， 人们跑到商店里问: 你们有没有一款不带这么多功能的? 你想,回答会是什么？ 回答是“没有”。 如今你已经不可能买到一款不干 那么多事的手机。
03:09
同样，在生活里的其它一些比购物更 对我们产生影响事情上， 这种选择的爆炸同样存在。 医疗保健 - 在美国，现在早已不是那种 你去看医生，医生直截了当告诉 你该如何做的时代了。 相反，你到了医生那里， 医生会对你说：我们可以用治疗方案甲， 也可以用方案乙 方案甲有如此这般疗效和风险。 方案乙有如此这般疗效和风险。 你想怎么治？ 然后你说：“大夫，我该如何做？” 医生又说一遍，甲有这些疗效和风险， 乙有那些疗效和风险。 你想怎么治？ 你再问医生：“大夫，你要是我，你选那种？” 医生说：“但是我不是你。” 其结果就是我们所说的“病人自治。” 听起来好像挺不错的。 其实是把做决定的担子和责任 从一个知道该怎么做的人 我指的是医生， 转嫁到一个对治疗方案一无所知， 而且正在为病痛所困扰， 根本不在能做决定的状态的人身上， 那人就是病人。
04:13
现在那些处方药品的广告铺天盖地， 都是针对着 你我这些普通人的。 你如果仔细想想，一点也说不通。 既然我们不能直接去柜台买， 他们为什么还要向我们做市场宣传？ 回答是，他们希望我们看了广告后 第二天早上会去给自己的医生打电话， 让医生把处方上的药换成他们的。 如今像我们的性别身份这类的事 都成了选择的话题了。 就像这张幻灯片试图说明的那样。 现在我们的性别不是从父母那里继承下来， 而是由自己来发明。 这样我们就可以随心所欲地的 重新塑造自己的性别身份。 这也意味每天早上你醒来 你先得对今天你想做个什么样的人 男的还是女的做出决定。 在婚姻家庭方面， 在过去每个人到了年龄就结婚 这几乎是理所当然的事， 然后就是尽快生儿育女。 唯一你需要选择的就是和谁结婚， 而不是什么时候结，也不是结婚以后做什么。
05:13
而如今呢，所有的事都可以拿来挑挑拣拣。 我教的是一群优秀又聪明的学生， 可是现在我给他们布置的作业 比从前少了五分之一。 这不是因为他们（比以前的学生）笨， 也不是因为他们不那么勤奋。 原因是他们现在脑子都装满了各种事情， 总是在问自己： 我到底该结婚还是不该结婚？ 是该现在结？ 还是以后再说？我是该先要孩子， 还是先顾事业？ 这些都是费脑筋的问题。 这些问题他们都必须回答， 不论他们是做还是不做我布置的功课， 也不论他们在我的课上拿个什么成绩。 他们的确应该去想这些问题， 因为这都是些重要问题。 如今做工作，像卡尔先前说的， 我们真的是有福气， 技术的进步使得我们可以 在一天的任何时间， 在地球的任一角落工作 当然这个篮道夫旅店除外。
06:06
（笑声）
06:11
但是，这个饭店里的确有一个地方 可以无线上网，可我不会告诉你们在哪， 不告诉你的理由是我也想用。 话说回来，我们工作中的这些 难以置信的选择自由 给我们带来的就是我们必须 在选择中做出决定， 一次，一次，又一次地， 为自己现在该工作还是该休息左右摇摆。 我们去看孩子踢足球的时候 一个裤兜里装着手机， 另一个裤兜里装着黑莓（Blackberry）， 膝上还架着笔记本电脑。 即使它们都关着， 我们还是在看着孩子在场上争抢的同时 不断地问自己， 接还是不接这个电话？ 回还是不回这个Email？ 我该不该写这封信稿？ 即使你给自己的回答是不， 你对孩子的这场球赛的体验还是 还是大打折扣。 环顾四周， 不论大事还是小事， 物质的还是生活方式方面， 生活就是选择。 我们过去生活的世界是这样的。 就是说，选择还是有的， 但不是事事都需要选择。 而今天我们生活的世界则是这样的。 问题是，这到底是好事还是坏事？ 答案是肯定的。
07:31
（笑声）
07:33
我们都知道它的好处。 那么就让我来说说它的不好之处吧。 所有这些选择对人们有两个影响， 而且是两个负面的影响。 其一，说起来有些自相矛盾， 就是，（选择）给我们带来的不是解放， 而是束缚，是麻痹。 面对这么许多的选择 人们发现要做出决定非常困难。 让我给你举个非常生动的例子来说明这点， 这是一个关于对等退休金 计划投资方面做的调查。 我的一个同事有幸接触到 Vanguard的投资记录。 Vanguard是一家巨大的互助基金公司， 拥有约百万员工和2,000多个办公地点。 她的调查发现是 当这些客户（向他们的雇员） 提供的互助基金种类每增加10个 参加的人数就减少2个百分点。 你提供50种基金，雇员参加的 人数比你提供5种基金时 下降百分之十。为什么呢？ 因为面对50种基金来选择 想要决定选那种那简直是难上加难 所以你干脆放到明天再说。 明日复明日， 明日何其多， 当然，明天永远也不会到来。 我们知道这其实意味着 当人们退休时，可能只有用狗粮充饥， 因为他们没有划出足够的钱给将来， 同时，由于做决定是一件如此之难的事， 以至于连雇主给他们的那笔相当 可观的对等补助金都白白放弃了。 不参加这种对等计划，他们每年让多达 5千元的雇主对等补贴从手边溜掉。 雇主本来是很乐于提供这种补贴的。 所以，选择可能性过多的结果是麻痹僵化。 它使得我们的世界变成这样样子
09:16
（笑声）
09:23
当你进入极乐世界时， 你一定希望你做出的决定是正确的，是吗？ 在那里你一定不想再选错互助基金， 或者是沙拉调料。 刚才那是第一个（负面）影响。 再来说说第二个。 即使我们通过努力克服了僵化和 麻痹而终于做出了一个正确的决定， 我们对自己的做出的决定 反而不如可选性少时做出的决定更加满意。 这里有几个原因。 其中之一是，面对如此多的沙拉调料品种， 如果你买了一种，觉得不尽如人意， 你很容易去想象如果你挑另外一种就好了。 结果怎么样？ 这种想象中的另外选择引得你对 你已经做出的决定感到后悔， 这种后悔心情让你对你原先做出的 选择的满意度打了折扣， 即便那其实是个很不错的选择。 选择越多，就越容易莫名其妙地 对一些事感到后悔。 这就是其一，总是不满意自己做出的 选择决定。
10:20
其二，是经济学家称之为“机会成本”的东西。 今天早些时候丹。吉尔伯特讲了个大道理 就是，我们看一个东西的价值 取决于那些我们用来作比较的那些其他的东西。 嗯，当人们有很多选择可以考虑时， 就很容易去想象那些你放弃了的选择的 吸引人的方面。 这就使得你总是对你选中了的那个觉得美中不足。 举个例子吧 不过你如果不是纽约人的话，我先道个歉
10:51
（笑声）
10:52
但这是你此时此刻应该想的事。 看看汉普顿的这两口子， 昂贵的富人区， 华丽的海滩，阳光明媚，他们拥有这一切。 还能比这更好么？这位此时却在想“哼，真倒霉，” “现在是八月啊，” “曼哈顿的邻居们都不在家，” “我要是回去就能把车停到我自己的门前了。” 结果整整两个星期他都被这么个想法折磨着， 天天都在念叨失去了占到那个 好停车位的机会。 “机会成本”总是让我们对已经做出的 决定不够满意 哪怕这个决定实际上很英明。 我们面临的选项越多 这些选项里吸引人的东西也就越多， 这些东西最后都成了机会成本。 这又是一个例子。（笑声） 这幅漫画说明了好几个问题。 它也说出了“活在当下”这个道理。 也许还包括做事情要一步一步来。 但是，其中一条道理就是，当你选择了做某件事， 你同时就选择了不做其它的事。 这些其它的事往往会有很多吸引你的地方， 并且会削弱你正在做的事对你的吸引力。
12:02
第三点，期望值增高。 这点在有一次我去买一条 新牛仔裤时对我触动很大。 我差不多总是穿牛仔裤。 过去，牛仔裤就那一种样式， 你买回来，裤子不合适，糟糕透顶， 而且非常不舒服， 直到你把它穿得时间足够长， 洗了无数次以后， 裤子才变得凑合。 就这么，穿了这许多年的旧裤子， 我终于上街去要买条新的了。 我说：“喂，我想要一条牛仔裤，这是我的尺寸。” 店员说： 你要紧身型的，舒适型的，还是宽松型的？ 前面要扣子的还是拉锁的？石磨的还是酸洗的？ 要那种快磨破的么？ 直口的，还是缩口的？他喋喋不休地问着。 我的下巴差点掉下来。等我缓过神来，我问， “我要的是那种曾经是唯一一种的样式。”
12:44
（笑声）
12:49
他一头雾水， 结果我花了一个钟头试穿了 所有这些该死的牛仔裤， 最后，说实话，我带着一条 我从未有过的最合身的裤子走出店门。 我做得的确不错。这些选择 使得我有机会做的更好。 但是心里感觉却更糟。 为什么？为这我还专门写了一本书 来为我自己找借口。 让我感觉更糟糕的理由就是， 由于有了这么多的可选性， 我对于一条牛仔裤到底该有多好 才算好的期望值大大升高。 我以前期望值很低。 当牛仔裤就那么一种时，我没有过多指望。 当它们有一百种规格时，哼， 最好至少有一条是极致完美的。 我那条的确不错，但是它还是不够完美。 所以我拿我已有的去和我期望的进行比较， 和我期望的比起来， 我这条就变得令人失望了。 在人们的生活里加进选择， 除了提高人们对事情到底能有多好的 期望值以外 并没有给人们带来多少好处。 带来的只是使人们对结果不那么满意了， 即使那是好结果。 搞市场的人没有人懂得这个道理。 因为如果他们里面有人懂的话， 你也就不会有机会知道这是什么意思了 事实很像这个（漫画文： 在所有东西都很糟糕的过去一切都比现在更好。）
14:12
（笑声）
14:15
原因在于 当一般的东西都不怎么好时 人们有可能体验到某些惊喜。 如今，在我们这些富裕的， 工业化的市民生活的世界里， 尽善尽美已是理所当然的， 对于每一件东西你最多也只能 希望它不比你预期的差。 你再也不会被什么所惊喜， 因为你我的期望值比天还高。 什么是幸福的秘密， 这是你们今天来这里想要知道的， 幸福的秘密就是：知足常乐， 不要期望过高。
14:51
（笑声）
14:53
（掌声）
14:59
我想抽一点时间说说自己， 我娶了我现在的太太， 她是一个很好的妻子 这件事上我没有凑合，我尽力了。 但是能凑合并不一定是坏事。 最后，买一条不合身的牛仔裤的结果之一就是， 当商店里只有一种样式可以买到时， 你觉得不满意，想知道为什么， 这责任归谁？答案很明显。 这个世界该为此负责。 你有什么能做的么？ 现如今店里有上百种牛仔裤供你选择， 你买了一条回来，觉得不满意， 这时候你问为什么，谁的责任？ 现在这个问题的答案显然就是：你。 你完全可以做得更好。 那里摆着上百种牛仔裤， 你没有借口把事情搞砸。 结果是，当人们做出决定时 即使那个决定达到的结果很好 他们还是（对决定）感到失望， 要责备自己。
15:59
在我们过去的这一代人里， 工业化世界中临床压抑症爆炸性增长。 我相信造成这种爆炸性增长的 压抑和自杀的一个重要的， 不是唯一的，但是是重要的因素 就是人们所有的那些的令人失望的经历。 原因就是他们的标准太高。 当他们必须去解释这些经历到底是怎么回事时， 他们认为这是他们自己的过错。 最后的净效果就是，尽管客观上 我们做得比以往好了， 但是感觉上却不如从前。 我再提醒大家， 这个（选择带来幸福）的公认的信条， 我们都觉得是对的， 其实是错的。完全不对。 毫无疑问有选择比没选择要好， 但是不能就此推论选择越多越好。 这里有一个关键值，我不知道是多少。 但是我可以肯定我们早就远远超出了 ‘选择令我们富有’ 所需要的这个关键值了。
16:55
我快说完了。现在说说一个政策问题， 我们该想想的一个政策问题是， 给我们这个工业化社会带来这么多选择的， 是物质的极大丰富。 我们这个世界上还有很多地方， 至少我们听说过其中几个， 在那里问题不是选择太多， 而是几乎没有。 所以我在这里谈的这个话题是现代富裕的西方社会的 一个特殊问题。 史蒂夫。里维特昨天就说过， 令人气愤的问题是，我们生产的那些 昂贵而又难以操作的婴儿汽车座椅 于事无补，只是在浪费钱。 而我今天要说的就是这些昂贵的，复杂的选择 不仅仅是于事无补， 它们其实在给我们带来伤害。 它们其实让我们变得不如从前。
17:52
如果我们把给这个社会创造出 这些选择的人力物力拿出一部分来 投入到那些现在人们还没有足够选择的社会中去， 那么不仅那里人们的生活可以得到改善， 我们自己的生活质量也同样得到提高。 这就是经济学家称之为的帕累托改善的做法。 产品的再分配会使得所有人， 不仅仅是穷人，的生活好起来， 因为我们摆脱了那些像瘟疫般困扰 我们的多余的选择 结束之前，你们该看看这幅漫画， 并站在一个智者的立场说， “哼，这条鱼懂什么？ 告诉你，在这个鱼缸里一切都是不可能的。” 毫无想象力，目光短浅- 我第一次看到这幅画时是这么解读的。 可是，我越想越明显地感到 这鱼肯定知道些什么。 因为说实话 如果你想让一切都变得有可能而把鱼缸打破， 你得到的不是自由，而是瘫痪（鱼会死）。 如果你想让一切都变得有可能而把鱼缸打破， 你反而降低了满意度。 你增加了的是瘫痪，减少了的是满足。 每个人都需要这么个“鱼缸”。 至于这个（鱼缸）嘛，对这条鱼 可能是小了点，对于我们几乎肯定是太小了。 但是，没有这么个象征性的鱼缸那就 意味着苦难将至， 也许是，灾难。 非常感谢。
19:18
（掌声）
https://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_the_paradox_of_choice/transcript?referrer=playlist-our_brains_predictably_irrati&autoplay=true
