Did you know that your decision to choose a particular brand of product says a lot about you? Nor did I until I spoke to Sheena Iyengar, author of “The Art Of Choosing”. A professor in Columbia University, Sheena, an expert on choice has put her thoughts and findings in her book to help us master the art of choice.
Sheena conducted her first experiment way back when she was in grad school and what began as curiosity about religion later expanded her research to include the concept of choice and why people make the choices they do. “I found that people who belonged to orthodox faiths were generally much happier than atheists.”
When Sheena chanced upon a study that argued that people's identity was a function of their cultural background she was intrigued, especially since she was Indian-American.
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“I was interested in human motivation and culture and somehow it seemed that everything had to do with choice.”
She slowly discovered that our fundamental lessons like what to eat and wear had to a lot to do with the choices that we made, or were made for us.
Sheena has conducted several experiments and written countless research papers, and this book is an amalgamation of the data she collated from them all.
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In 1996, Sheena did an experiment where she played with variety and consequences on the buyer. “It was an experiment that I conducted called the ‘Jam Study' that received a lot of media attention,” she says.
She had a tasting booth that carried six kinds of exotic, flavoured jam and another which carried 24 flavours. About 60 per cent of the people stopped by the booth that boasted of 24 flavours and only 40 per cent stopped by the booth that had six. But as it turns out, only three percent of the people purchased jam from the booth that carried 24 flavours where as 30 percent of the people bought jam from the booth that carried only six flavours.
While the people were more excited about a larger collection, their choice to buy the product was made simpler by the smaller range. “It was in 2006 that I figured it was a good time to think and put my ideas in a book.
“There are a number of things that affect the choices we make,” says Sheena. While Americans allow their children to make choices which are as basic as what cereal to eat, Indians make choices for their children.
This is a cultural message and while Americans are training their children to think of themselves as the most important thing, the Indian family teaches the child to take other people into consideration. “It all boils down to a debate of mind versus heart and gut versus reason,” she explains.
Sheena, who has been visually challenged from childhood, says that her principle is “Not whether I can do it, but how do I do it, I don't believe in restricting my dreams.”
While most people commonly believe that blind people can do less, Sheena is always in the effort to prove that she can do more than what people expect her to be capable of.