Single Option Aversion

This work documents an effect labeled ‘Single Option Aversion’ where the choice share of an option increases (relative to deferral) when a competing attractive option is added to the choice set, contrary to the predictions of rational utility based models of search (Weitzman 1979), and recent work in consumer behavior on choice conflict and choice deferral (Dhar 1997; Iyengar and Lepper 2000; Tversky and Shafir 1992). A series of studies demonstrate this effect, and establish some of its boundary conditions.