Impacts of Visualizations on Decoy Effects.

Yuin Jeong,Younah Kang,Sung-Hee Kim,Sangheon Oh

doi:10.3390/ijerph182312674

Yuin Jeong, Younah Kang + Show 2 more

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https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph182312674

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Abstract

The decoy effect is a well-known, intriguing decision-making bias that is often exploited by marketing practitioners to steer consumers towards a desired purchase outcome. It demonstrates that an inclusion of an alternative in the choice set can alter one’s preference among the other choices. Although this decoy effect has been universally observed in the real world and also studied by many economists and psychologists, little is known about how to mitigate the decoy effect and help consumers make informed decisions. In this study, we conducted two experiments: a quantitative experiment with crowdsourcing and a qualitative interview study—first, the crowdsourcing experiment to see if visual interfaces can help alleviate this cognitive bias. Four types of visualizations, one-sided bar chart, two-sided bar charts, scatterplots, and parallel-coordinate plots, were evaluated with four different types of scenarios. The results demonstrated that the two types of bar charts were effective in decreasing the decoy effect. Second, we conducted a semi-structured interview to gain a deeper understanding of the decision-making strategies while making a choice. We believe that the results have an implication on showing how visualizations can have an impact on the decision-making process in our everyday life.

Highlights

IntroductionThere is extensive research on showing how decision-making is dependent on the context of the choices given
We hypothesized that visual interfaces may be used to decrease the decoy effect, and our study proved that specific types of visualizations help people avoid the decoy
Among the five types of visualizations, one-sided bar charts and two-sided bar charts turned out to be effective in preventing the decoy effect; we suspect this is because these two visualizations supported their decision-making strategy

Summary

Introduction

There is extensive research on showing how decision-making is dependent on the context of the choices given. Inclusion of alternatives in the choice set can alter one’s preference among the others, and such contextual alternatives are called decoys. Decoy effects are prevalent in decision-making situations, such as when purchasing an electronic good, selecting a phone data plan or internet plan. Companies are inherently interested in guiding customers toward higher-margin products and often utilize the decoy effect to maximize their profits. When they price items to create decoys and attract customers to certain options, it is difficult for customers to discern any spurious choices and make an optimal decision. Individual consumers who do not have control over the information could be deceived

Results

Discussion

Conclusion