Theories of
rational decision-making often focused on a very narrow and informed decision:
an individual must choose between two options and has complete information
about both – hence he makes a logical decision based on the likelihood of each
option to achieve a desired outcome.
In an actual
purchasing situation, the customer has a very complex decision and little
information. In a typical American
supermarket, there may be 100 or more different options in the breakfast cereal
aisle. The customer is not an expert in
breakfast cereal, and knows only a little bit about some of the options and
nothing at all about most of them.
And
while the ostensible problem the product solves is nutrition, there are many
other concerns: would a young adult male consume a cereal that is primarily
marketed to elderly women? What would
his friends think of him if they saw it in his cupboard?
So in the
cereal-buying situation, and virtually every consumer decision, the consumer is
not able to act as the perfectly rational and perfectly informed individual
that are presumed by the logical decision-making process.
This is not to say it is not possible: one
can study about nutrition, learn about all 100 breakfast cereals on the market,
document the decision-making process to carefully exclude any subjective or
nonsensical criteria, and so on – but it is not at all reasonable to expect
anyone at all to put in that level of effort.
It’s just breakfast, after all.
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