Barry Schwartz Quotes

No matter how much a person has, it may not be enough.

The dissatisfaction that comes with social comparison can be fixed by teaching people to care less about status.

Adding the second option creates a conflict, forcing a trade-off between price and quality.

At present, the potential causal role that the availability of choice has in making people into maximizers is pure speculation. If the speculation is correct, we ought to find that in cultures in whic...

FIRST, I THINK INCREASES IN EXPERIENCED CONTROL OVER THE YEARS have been accompanied, stride for stride, by increases in expectations about control. The more we are allowed to be the masters of our fa...

How people look is yet another thing that they are now responsible for deciding for themselves.

Something as trivial as a little gift of candy to medical residents improves the speed and accuracy of their diagnoses. In general, positive emotion enables us to broaden our understanding of what con...

According to a survey conducted by Yankelovich Partners, a majority of people want more control over the details of their lives, but a majority of people also want to simplify their lives. There you h...

And once people are in the position to be able to work at any time from any place, they face decisions every minute of every day about whether or not to be working.

Ask yourself what is the point of advertising prescription drugs (antidepressant, anti-inflammatory, antiallergy, diet, ulcer—you name it) on prime-time television. We can’t just go to the drugstore a...

But if money doesn´t do it for people, what does? What seems to be the most important factor in providing happiness is close social relations. People who are married, who have good friends and who are...

Hedonic lag. Lane says that there is a tendency of every culture to persist in valuing the qualities that made it distinctively great long after they have lost their hedonic yield. This, he says, expl...

ANYTIME YOU MAKE A DECISION AND IT DOESN’T TURN OUT WELL or you find an alternative that would have turned out better, you’re a candidate for regret.

AS WE HAVE SEEN, REGRET WILL MAKE US FEEL WORSE AFTER DECISIONS—EVEN ones that work out—than we otherwise would, especially when we take opportunity costs into consideration.