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The Devil Is in the Deliberation: Thinking Too Much Reduces Preference Consistency

2008/12/22 by Loran F. Nordgren, Ap Dijksterhuis · 114 citations
Decision Sciences · Social Sciences · Neuroscience · Psychology · Medicine · #Decision-Making and Behavioral Economics #Experimental Behavioral Economics Studies #Neural and Behavioral Psychology Studies #Deliberation #Preference #Consistency (knowledge bases) #Weighting #Psychology #Social psychology #Cognitive psychology #Computer science #Microeconomics #Economics #Political science #Artificial intelligence #Medicine

paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/596306

published in Journal of Consumer Research 36(1), 39-46 (Oxford University Press)

openalex publication_date 2008/12/22 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/08

Abstract

In five experiments we found that deliberation reduces preference consistency. In experiments 1 and 2, participants who deliberated on their preferences were less consistent in their evaluations compared to those who did not deliberate. Experiment 3 demonstrated that this effect is due to the impediment of deliberation and not to the benefit of nondeliberation. We hypothesized that deliberation leads to the inconsistent weighting of information, especially when the information is complex. As such, we predicted and found in experiments 4 and 5 that the extent to which deliberation decreases preference consistency depends upon the complexity of the information.

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