Are we in control of our decisions? | Dan Ariely

Translator: Rune Sejr Fjord Reviewer: Anders Finn Jørgensen

I'll tell you a little bit about irrational behavior.

Jeg vil fortælle jer lidt om irrationel opførsel.

Not yours, of course -- other people's.

Selvfølgelig ikke jeres. Andre personers.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

So after being at MIT for a few years,

Efter at have været på MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) et par år,

I realized that writing academic papers is not that exciting.

blev jeg klar over, at det ikke er særligt spændende at skrive akademiske afhandlinger.

You know, I don't know how many of those you read,

Nu ved jeg ikke hvor mange af dem i har læst,

men de er ikke sjove at læse og er ofte ikke sjove at skrive.

but it's not fun to read and often not fun to write --

even worse to write.

Faktisk meget værre at skrive.

So I decided to try and write something more fun.

Så jeg besluttede, at prøve og skrive noget der er mere sjovt.

And I came up with an idea that I would write a cookbook.

og jeg kom på den idé at jeg ville skrive en kogebog.

And the title for my cookbook was going to be,

Og titlen på min kogebog skulle være

"Spise uden krummer: Kunsten af spise over håndvasken."

"Dining Without Crumbs: The Art of Eating Over the Sink."

(Latter)

(Laughter)

And it was going to be a look at life through the kitchen.

Og det skulle være et kig på livet, gennem køkkenet.

I was quite excited about this.

Og jeg var meget spændt på dette. Jeg ville snakke lidt

I was going to talk a little bit about research,

om forskning og en lille smule om køkkenet.

a little bit about the kitchen.

I ved, vi gør så mange ting i køkkenet, så jeg syntes det ville blive interessant.

We do so much in the kitchen, I thought this would be interesting.

Jeg skrev et par kapitler.

I wrote a couple of chapters, and took it to MIT Press and they said,

Og jeg tog det til MIT press og de sagde

"Sødt, men ikke for os. Gå ud og find nogle andre."

"Cute, but not for us. Go and find somebody else."

I tried other people, and everybody said the same thing,

Jeg prøvede andre, men alle sagde det samme.

"Sødt. Ikke for os."

"Cute. Not for us."

Until somebody said,

Indtil en eller anden sagde,

"Look, if you're serious about this,

"Hør, hvis du er seriøs,

you have to write about your research first; you have to publish something,

skal du først skrive en bog om din forskning. Do bliver nød til at udgive noget.

then you'll get the opportunity to write something else.

Og herefter får du muligheden for at skrive noget andet.

Hvis du virkelig vil gøre det, så skal du først gøre dét."

If you really want to do it, you have to do it."

Så jeg sagde, "Ved du hvad, jeg vil virkelig ikke skrive om min forskning.

I said, "I don't want to write about my research.

I do it all day long,

Jeg gør det her hele dagen lang. Jeg vil skrive noget andet.

I want to write something a bit more free, less constrained."

noget mere frit, mindre regelbundet."

And this person was very forceful and said,

Den her person var meget bestemt og sagde

"Look, that's the only way you'll ever do it."

"Hør, det er den eneste måde hvor du nogensinde vil få det gjort"

So I said, "Okay, if I have to do it --"

Så jeg sagde, "Okay, hvis jeg blive nødt til at gøre det."

I had a sabbatical.

Jeg tog fri og sagde "Jeg vil skrive om min forskning

I said, "I'll write about my research, if there's no other way.

hvis der ikke er andre veje, og så vil jeg kunne lave min kogebog "

And then I'll get to do my cookbook."

Så jeg skrev en bog om min forskning

So, I wrote a book on my research.

og det viste sig at være sjovt på to måder,

And it turned out to be quite fun in two ways.

First of all, I enjoyed writing.

for det første, nød jeg at skrive,

But the more interesting thing was that I started learning from people.

men det mere interessante var

at jeg begyndte at lære fra andre.

It's a fantastic time to write,

Det er en fantastisk tid at skrive i,

because there's so much feedback you can get from people.

for der er så meget kritik man kan få fra andre.

People write to me about their personal experience,

Folk skriver til mig med deres personlige oplevelser,

and about their examples, and where they disagree,

og om deres eksempler og hvad de er uenige i,

and their nuances.

og nuancer.

And even being here -- I mean, the last few days,

Også det at være her, de sidste par dage

I've known heights of obsessive behavior

har jeg opnået nye højder indenfor tvangsmæssig adfærd

I never thought about.

jeg aldrig havde tænkt over

(Laughter)

(latter)

Which I think is just fascinating.

Hvilket jeg synes er fascinerende.

I will tell you a little bit about irrational behavior,

Jeg vil fortælle jer en smule om irrationel adfærd.

and I want to start by giving you some examples of visual illusion

Og jeg vil starte med at give jer nogle eksempler på visuelle illusioner.

as a metaphor for rationality.

som en metafor for irrationalitet.

So think about these two tables.

Tænk på de her to borde,

And you must have seen this illusion.

og i må have set den her illusion.

If I asked you what's longer, the vertical line on the table on the left,

Hvis jeg spurgte jer :"hvilken streg der er længst

den lodrette på det venstre bord eller den vandrette på det højre?"

or the horizontal line on the table on the right,

which one seems longer?

Hvilken en virker længst?

Can anybody see anything but the left one being longer?

Er der nogen der ikke kan se at den venstre er længst?

No, right? It's impossible.

Nej vel? det er umuligt.

But the nice thing about visual illusion is we can easily demonstrate mistakes.

Men det gode ved illusioner er at vi nemt kan vise fejl

So I can put some lines on; it doesn't help.

så jeg kan sætte nogle streger, hvilket ikke hjælper

I can animate the lines.

jeg kan animere stregerne

And to the extent you believe I didn't shrink the lines,

og hvis i ikke tror jeg gør stregerne kortere,

which I didn't, I've proven to you that your eyes were deceiving you.

hvilket jeg ikke gjorde, har jeg vist at jeres øjne snød jer.

Now, the interesting thing about this is when I take the lines away,

Det interessante ved det her

er at hvis jeg fjerner stregerne,

it's as if you haven't learned anything in the last minute.

er det som om i ingenting har lært

(Laughter)

(Latter)

You can't look at this and say, "Now I see reality as it is."

I kan ikke se på det her og sige "okay, nu ser jeg det rigtige"

Right? It's impossible to overcome this sense that this is indeed longer.

Ikke sandt? det er umuligt at undgå

at tro at den her faktisk er længere.

Our intuition is really fooling us

Vores intuition snyder os på den gentagelig og forudsigelig måde,

in a repeatable, predictable, consistent way.

and there is almost nothing we can do about it,

og der er næsten ingenting vi kan gøre ved det,

aside from taking a ruler and starting to measure it.

bortset fra at tage en lineal og begynde at måle.

Here's another one. It's one of my favorite illusions.

Her er en mere -- det her er en af mine yndlingsillusioner.

What color is the top arrow pointing to?

Hvilken farve peger den øverste pil på?

Brun, mange tak.

Audience: Brown. Dan Ariely: Brown. Thank you.

Den nederste pil? Gul.

The bottom one? Yellow.

Det viser sig at de er ens.

Turns out they're identical.

Can anybody see them as identical?

Er der nogen der kan se at de er ens?

Very, very hard.

Det er meget meget svært.

I can cover the rest of the cube up.

Jeg kan dække resten af terningen,

If I cover the rest of the cube, you can see that they are identical.

og hvis jeg dækker den, ser i at de er ens.

If you don't believe me, you can get the slide later

og hvis i ikke tror på mig kan i få den bagefter

og klippe-klistre og se at de er ens.

and do some arts and crafts and see that they're identical.

But again, it's the same story, that if we take the background away,

Igen er det den samme historie:

Hvis vi tager baggrunden væk,

the illusion comes back.

kommer illusionen tilbage. ikke?

There is no way for us not to see this illusion.

Der er ingen måde at undgå at se illusionen.

I guess maybe if you're colorblind, I don't think you can see that.

Måske hvis du er farveblind.

I want you to think about illusion as a metaphor.

Jeg vil have at i tænker på illusionerne som en metafor.

Vision is one of the best things we do.

At se er en af de ting vi er bedst til.

We have a huge part of our brain dedicated to vision --

Vi bruger en stor del af vores hjerne på at se --

bigger than dedicated to anything else.

en større del end vi bruger til noget andet.

We use our vision more hours of the day than anything else.

Vi ser i flere timer om dagen end vi gør noget andet.

We're evolutionarily designed to use vision.

og vi er udviklet til at se,

And if we have these predictable repeatable mistakes in vision,

og hvis vi laver disse forudsigelige og gentagelige fejl med synet,

which we're so good at,

som vi er så gode til,

what are the chances we won't make even more mistakes

hvorfor skulle vi så ikke lave endnu flere fejl

in something we're not as good at, for example, financial decision-making.

med noget vi ikke er så gode til --

som for eksempel, økonomisk beslutningstagen:

(Laughter)

(Latter)

Something we don't have an evolutionary reason to do,

Noget vi ikke har nogen evolutionær grund til at gøre,

we don't have a specialized part of the brain for,

vi har ikke en specialiseret del af hjernen,

og vi gør det ikke så mange timer om dagen.

and we don't do that many hours of the day.

og argumentet er at når det er sådan

The argument is in those cases,

it might be that we actually make many more mistakes.

kan det måske være at vi laver endnu flere fejl.

And worse -- not having an easy way to see them,

og værre endnu, at vi ikke har en nem måde at se dem.

because in visual illusions, we can easily demonstrate the mistakes;

for ved visuelle illusioner kan vi nemt vise fejlene,

in cognitive illusion it's much, much harder

ved tankemæssige illusioner er det meget, meget sværere

to demonstrate the mistakes to people.

at vise folk fejlene.

So I want to show you some cognitive illusions,

Så jeg vil vise jer nogle tankemæssige illusioner,

or decision-making illusions, in the same way.

eller beslutningsmæssige illusioner, på samme måde.

And this is one of my favorite plots in social sciences.

og det her er et af mine yndlingsgrafer i socialstudier.

It's from a paper by Johnson and Goldstein.

Det er fra en artikel af Johnson og Goldstein,

It basically shows the percentage of people who indicated

og basalt set viser den

procentdelen af folk der siger

they would be interested in donating their organs.

at de gerne vil være organdonorer

These are different countries in Europe.

i forskellige lande i Europa, og grundlæggende

You basically see two types of countries:

ser man to slags lande :

countries on the right, that seem to be giving a lot;

Landene til højre som ser ud til at donere meget;

and countries on the left that seem to giving very little,

og landene til venstre der ser ud til at donere lidt,

or much less.

eller meget mindre,

The question is, why?

spørgsmålet er, hvorfor? hvorfor donerer nogle lande meget

Why do some countries give a lot and some countries give a little?

og nogle lande kun en smule?

When you ask people this question,

Når du stiller det spørgsmål til folk,

they usually think that it has to be about culture.

tror de som regel at det er pga. forskellige kulturer,

Hvor meget du bekymrer dig om folk,

How much do you care about people?

Giving organs to somebody else

at give dine organer til en anden,

is probably about how much you care about society, how linked you are.

har nok noget at gøre med hvor knyttet du er til samfundet.

Or maybe it's about religion.

Måske handler det om religion,

But if you look at this plot,

men hvis du ser på det her,

you can see that countries that we think about as very similar,

så kan du se at lande som vi tænker som meget ens

actually exhibit very different behavior.

faktisk opfører sig meget forskelligt.

For example, Sweden is all the way on the right,

for eksempel, Sverige er helt ude til højre,

and Denmark, which we think is culturally very similar,

og Danmark, som vi tænker som kulturelt meget ens,

is all the way on the left.

er helt ude til venstre.

Germany is on the left, and Austria is on the right.

Tyskland er til venstre, og Østrig er til højre,

The Netherlands is on the left, and Belgium is on the right.

Holland er til venstre, og Belgien er til højre,

And finally, depending on your particular version

og til sidst, afhængig af din personlige mening

of European similarity,

om europæiske ligheder,

you can think about the U.K. and France as either similar culturally or not,

tænker du England og Frankrig som kulturelt ens eller ej,

but it turns out that with organ donation, they are very different.

men det viser sig at med organdonation er de meget forskellige.

By the way, the Netherlands is an interesting story.

Forresten, Holland er et spændende tilfælde,

You see, the Netherlands is kind of the biggest of the small group.

de er de højeste i den lave gruppe.

It turns out that they got to 28 percent

Det viser sig at de fik 28% til at donere

after mailing every household in the country a letter,

ved at sende et brev til hver husholdning

begging people to join this organ donation program.

hvor de bad folk om at melde sig til donorprogrammet.

You know the expression, "Begging only gets you so far."

I kender udtrykket "Du kommer kun så langt ved at tigge"?

It's 28 percent in organ donation.

det er 28% i organdonation.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

But whatever the countries on the right are doing,

Men hvad end landene til højre gør,

they're doing a much better job than begging.

så gør de noget meget bedre end at tigge,

So what are they doing?

så hvad gør de faktisk?

Turns out the secret has to do with a form at the DMV.

Det viser sig at det har at gøre med et skema hos motorkontoret,

And here is the story.

her er historien :

The countries on the left have a form at the DMV

Landene til venstre har et skema

that looks something like this.

der ser nogenlunde sådan her ud.

"Check the box below if you want to participate in the organ donor program."

Sæt kryds hvis du vil deltage

i organdonorprogrammet.

And what happens?

og hvad sker der?

People don't check, and they don't join.

Folk sætter ikke kryds, og de melder sig ikke til.

The countries on the right, the ones that give a lot,

Landene til højre, de der giver meget,

have a slightly different form.

har et lidt anderledes skema.

It says, "Check the box below if you don't want to participate ..."

det beder dig om at sætte kryds hvis du ikke vil deltage.

Interestingly enough, when people get this,

interessant nok, når folk får det her,

sætter de igen ikke kryds -- men nu melder de sig til.

they again don't check, but now they join.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

Now, think about what this means.

Tænk på hvad det her betyder,

You know, we wake up in the morning and we feel we make decisions.

vi står op om morgenen og tror at vi beslutter ting

We wake up in the morning and we open the closet;

Vi står op og åbner skabet,

we feel that we decide what to wear.

og føler at vi bestemmer hvad vi tager på,

we open the refrigerator and we feel that we decide what to eat.

så åbner vi køleskabet og føler at vi vælger vores mad,

What this is actually saying,

hvad det her faktisk viser er

is that many of these decisions are not residing within us.

at mange af de her beslutninger ikke tages af os,

They are residing in the person who is designing that form.

men tages af personen der designer skemaet.

When you walk into the DMV,

Når du går ind i motorkontoret,

the person who designed the form will have a huge influence

vil personen der har designet skemaet have stor indflydelse

on what you'll end up doing.

på hvad du ender med at gøre.

Now, it's also very hard to intuit these results.

Det er svært at huske de her resultater, tænk over det

Think about it for yourself.

How many of you believe

hvor mange af jer tror

that if you went to renew your license tomorrow,

at hvis i fornyede jeres kørekort imorgen,

and you went to the DMV,

og i gik ind til motorkontoret

and you encountered one of these forms,

og stødte på et af de her skemaer,

that it would actually change your own behavior?

at det faktisk ville ændre jeres adfærd?

Very hard to think that it would influence us.

Det er svært at tro at det vil påvirke os.

We can say, "Oh, these funny Europeans, of course it would influence them."

Vi siger "De sære europæere, selvfølgeligt vil det påvirke dem"

men når det handler om os selv

But when it comes to us,

we have such a feeling that we're in the driver's seat,

føler vi at det er os der bestemmer,

Vi føler det i sådan en grad,

such a feeling that we're in control and we are making the decision,

og vi tager de her beslutninger,

that it's very hard to even accept the idea

at det er meget svært at acceptere

at vi faktisk bare har

that we actually have an illusion of making a decision,

illusionen af at tage en beslutning.

rather than an actual decision.

Now, you might say,

Nu siger i måske,

"These are decisions we don't care about."

"Det her er beslutninger vi er ligeglade med."

In fact, by definition, these are decisions

Faktisk, per definition, er det her beslutninger

about something that will happen to us after we die.

om noget der skal ske efter at vi er døde,

How could we care about something less

hvordan kunne man være mere ligeglad

than about something that happens after we die?

end med noget der sker efter man er død?

So a standard economist, somebody who believes in rationality,

Så en standard økonom, en der tror på det rationelle,

would say, "You know what?

ville sige "Ved du hvad? det koster mere at løfte blyanten

The cost of lifting the pencil and marking a "V" is higher

og sætte kryds,

than the possible benefit of the decision,

end hvad jeg får ud af beslutningen

so that's why we get this effect."

og det er derfor der er denne her effekt."

(Laughter)

Men faktisk, er det ikke fordi det er nemt,

But, in fact, it's not because it's easy.

It's not because it's trivial. It's not because we don't care.

det er ikke fordi de er ligegyldigt eller vi er ligeglade,

It's the opposite. It's because we care.

det er fordi vi netop ikke er ligeglade.

It's difficult and it's complex.

Det er svært og det er indviklet,

And it's so complex that we don't know what to do.

og det er så indviklet at vi ikke ved hvad vi skal gøre,

And because we have no idea what to do,

og fordi vi ikke ved det

we just pick whatever it was that was chosen for us.

vælger vi bare det der var blevet valgt for os.

I'll give you one more example.

Jeg giver jer et eksempel mere på det,

This is from a paper by Redelmeier and Shafir.

det her er fra en artikel af Redelmeier og Schaefer.

And they said, "Would this effect also happens to experts?

og de siger "Det sker også for eksperter,

People who are well-paid, experts in their decisions,

folk der er godt lønnet og eksperter

and who make a lot of them?"

gør det her ofte."

And they took a group of physicians.

De tog en gruppe læger

They presented to them a case study of a patient.

og viste dem et eksempel på en patient,

They said, "Here is a patient. He is a 67-year-old farmer.

her er patienten, han er en 67-årig landmand,

He's been suffering from right hip pain for a while."

som i noget tid har lidt af smerter i højre hofte,

And then, they said to the physicians,

så sagde de til lægen,

"You decided a few weeks ago

"Du besluttede for nogle uger siden,

that nothing is working for this patient.

at intet virker på den her patient,

All these medications, nothing seems to be working.

intet af det her medicin virker til at virke,

So you refer the patient for hip replacement therapy.

så du henviser patienten til at få udskiftet hoften.

Hip replacement. Okay?"

En hofteoperation, ikke?"

So the patient is on a path to have his hip replaced.

Så patienten er på vej til at få udskiftet hoften,

Then they said to half of the physicians,

og så siger de til halvdelen af lægerne

"Yesterday, you reviewed the patient's case,

"Igår gennemgik du patientens journal,

and you realized that you forgot to try one medication.

og du indså at du glemte at prøve en medicin,

You did not try ibuprofen.

du glemte ibuprofen.

What do you do? Do you pull the patient back and try ibuprofen?

Hvad gør du? trækker du patienten tilbage og prøver ibuprofen?

Or do you let him go and have hip replacement?"

eller lader du dem få udskiftet hoften?"

Well, the good news is that most physicians in this case

Den gode nyhed er at de fleste læger i det her tilfælde

decided to pull the patient and try ibuprofen.

trak patienten tilbage og prøvede ibuprofenen,

Very good for the physicians.

godt for lægerne,

To the other group of physicians, they said,

Til den anden gruppe af læger sagde de

"Yesterday when you reviewed the case, you discovered there were two medications

"Igår da du gennemgik journalen

opdagede du at der var to slags medicin du ikke har prøvet

you didn't try out yet -- ibuprofen and piroxicam."

ibuprofen og piroxicam."

You have two medications you didn't try out yet.

"du har to slags medicin du ikke har prøvet, hvad gør du?

What do you do? You let him go, or you pull him back?

Lader du dem fortsætte, eller trækker du dem tilbage?

And if you pull him back, do you try ibuprofen or piroxicam? Which one?"

Og hvis du trækker dem tilbage, hvilken medicin prøver du så?"

Now, think of it:

Tænk over det, den her beslutning

This decision makes it as easy to let the patient continue with hip replacement,

gør det ligeså nemt som før, at lade patienten fortsætte,

but pulling him back, all of the sudden it becomes more complex.

men at trække dem tilbage, bliver mere indviklet.

There is one more decision.

Der er nu en ny beslutning.

What happens now?

Hvad sker der så?

The majority of the physicians now choose to let the patient go

Nu beslutter størstedelen af lægerne at lade patienten fortsætte

for a hip replacement.

med at få hoften udskiftet.

I hope this worries you, by the way --

Jeg håber det her bekymrer jer forresten,

(Laughter)

(Latter)

when you go to see your physician.

Når man tager ind og ser sin læge,

The thing is that no physician would ever say,

der er ingen læge der nogensinde ville sige,

"Piroxicam, ibuprofen, hip replacement. Let's go for hip replacement."

"Piroxicam, ibuprofen, hofteudskiftning.

lad os udskifte hoften."

But the moment you set this as the default,

Men i det øjeblik hvor udskiftning bliver standardløsning

it has a huge power over whatever people end up doing.

har den en stor magt over hvad folk ender med at gøre.

I'll give you a couple of more examples on irrational decision-making.

Jeg giver jer et par eksempler mere på irrationel beslutningstagen.

Imagine I give you a choice:

forestil jer at jeg giver jer et valg.

Do you want to go for a weekend to Rome, all expenses paid --

Vil du helst en weekend til Rom?

Alt betalt:

hotel, transportation, food, a continental breakfast, everything --

Hotel, transport, mad, morgenmad,

stor morgenmad, alt.

or a weekend in Paris?

Eller en weekend til Paris?

Now, weekend in Paris, weekend in Rome -- these are different things.

En weekend i Paris og en i Rom er forskellige

They have different food, different culture, different art.

de har forskellig mad, kultur og kunst.

Forestil jer at jeg tilføjede en mulighed

Imagine I added a choice to the set that nobody wanted.

som ingen havde lyst til

Imagine I said, "A weekend in Rome,

forestil jer at jeg sagde "En weekend i Rom,

a weekend in Paris,

en weekend i Paris, eller at din bil bliver stjålet?"

or having your car stolen?"

(Laughter)

(Latter)

It's a funny idea, because why would having your car stolen,

Det er en sjov ide, for hvorfor ville den mulighed

in this set, influence anything?

ændre på noget?

(Laughter)

(Latter)

But what if the option to have your car stolen was not exactly like this?

Men hvad nu hvis det at få din bil stjålet

ikke var helt sådan.

What if it was a trip to Rome, all expenses paid,

hvad hvis det var, en tur til Rom, med alt betalt,

transportation, breakfast,

transport, morgenmad

but it doesn't include coffee in the morning?

men uden kaffe om morgenen,

If you want coffee, you have to pay for it yourself, it's two euros 50.

hvis du vil have kaffe skal du selv betale 2.5 Euro.

(Laughter)

På en måde nu,

Now in some ways,

given that you can have Rome with coffee,

hvor det er givet at du kan få Rom med kaffe,

why would you possibly want Rome without coffee?

hvorfor skulle du så ville have Rom uden kaffe?

It's like having your car stolen. It's an inferior option.

det er ligesom at få din bil stjålet, en dårligere valgmulighed.

But guess what happened?

Gæt hvad der sker, i det øjeblik Rom uden kaffe bliver en mulighed

The moment you add Rome without coffee,

bliver Rom med kaffe mere populært, og folk vælger det.

Rome with coffee becomes more popular, and people choose it.

The fact that you have Rome without coffee

det faktum at du har Rom uden kaffe

makes Rome with coffee look superior,

gør at Rom med kaffe virker overlegent,

and not just to Rome without coffee -- even superior to Paris.

og ikke bare til Rom uden kaffe, men også til Paris.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

Here are two examples of this principle.

Her er to eksempler på det her princip,

This was an ad in The Economist a few years ago

Det her var en reklame i The Economist for nogle år siden,

that gave us three choices:

den gav os tre valg,

an online subscription for 59 dollars,

et internet abonnement for 59 dollar,

a print subscription for 125 dollars,

et papir abonnement for 125,

or you could get both for 125.

eller begge dele for 125.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

Now I looked at this, and I called up The Economist,

Jeg så det her, og ringede til The Economist.

and I tried to figure out what they were thinking.

Jeg forsøgte at regne ud hvad de tænkte på,

And they passed me from one person to another to another,

og de henviste mig fra en person til en anden til en tredje,

until eventually I got to the person who was in charge of the website,

indtil jeg til sidst kom til ham der stod for hjemmesiden,

and I called them up, and they went to check what was going on.

og jeg ringede til dem, og de tjekkede hvad meningen var.

The next thing I know, the ad is gone, no explanation.

og pludseligt var reklamen væk, uden forklaring.

So I decided to do the experiment

Så jeg besluttede mig for at udføre eksperimentet,

that I would have loved The Economist to do with me.

som jeg ville have elsket at The Economist havde været med i,

I took this and I gave it to 100 MIT students.

jeg tog annoncen og gav den til 100 studerende,

I said, "What would you choose?"

og spurgte dem "Hvad ville du vælge?"

These are the market shares -- most people wanted the combo deal.

Det her er er et diagram over beslutningerne,

Thankfully, nobody wanted the dominant option.

de fleste valgte at få begge, ingen valgte kun papir,

That means our students can read.

hvilket betyder at vores studerende kan læse.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

But now, if you have an option that nobody wants,

Men hvis du har en mulighed som ingen vil have,

you can take it off, right?

så kan du bare fjerne den, ikke?

So I printed another version of this,

Så jeg lavede en ny version af den her,

where I eliminated the middle option.

hvor jeg fjernede papir-muligheden,

I gave it to another 100 students. Here is what happened:

og gav den nye reklame til 100 studerende, her er hvad der skete,

Now the most popular option became the least popular,

nu bliver den mest populære den mindst populære,

and the least popular became the most popular.

og den mindst populære blev den mest populære,

What was happening was the option that was useless,

det der skete var at den ubrugelige mulighed,

in the middle, was useless in the sense that nobody wanted it.

i midten, var ubrugelig ved at ingen havde lyst til den,

But it wasn't useless in the sense that it helped people figure out

men den var ikke ubrugelig ved at hjælp folk

med at finde ud af hvad de ville have,

what they wanted.

In fact, relative to the option in the middle,

faktisk, i forhold til den midterste mulighed,

which was get only the print for 125,

som var kun at få papir-versionen for 125,

the print and web for 125 looked like a fantastic deal.

virkede kombinationen og papir- og netversionen for 125 fantastisk,

And as a consequence, people chose it.

og derfor valgte folk den.

The general idea here, by the way,

Den generelle ide er, for resten,

is that we actually don't know our preferences that well.

at vi ikke kender vores præferencer særligt godt,

And because we don't know our preferences that well,

og fordi vi ikke kender dem særligt godt,

er vi tilbøjelige til at blive påvirket udefra:

we're susceptible to all of these influences from the external forces:

the defaults, the particular options that are presented to us, and so on.

Standarden, den specifikke løsning vi bliver vist, osv.

One more example of this.

Et mere eksempel.

People believe that when we deal with physical attraction,

Folk tror at når det handler om fysisk tiltrækning,

we see somebody, and we know immediately whether we like them or not,

ser vi nogen og ved med det samme om vi kan lide dem eller ej,

if we're attracted or not.

om vi er tiltrukket eller ej.

This is why we have these four-minute dates.

Hvilket er grunden til at vi har de her 4-minutters dates.

So I decided to do this experiment with people.

Så jeg besluttede mig for at lave et eksperiment,

I'll show you images here, no real people, but the experiment was with people.

jeg vil vise nogle tegninger af folk, ikke rigtige folk.

eksperimentet gik ud på

I showed some people a picture of Tom, and a picture of Jerry.

at jeg viste folk et billede af Tom, og et af Jerry,

and I said, "Who do you want to date?

og spurgte "Hvem vil du date? Tom eller Jerry?"

Tom or Jerry?"

But for half the people, I added an ugly version of Jerry.

Men for halvdelen af personerne tilføjede jeg en grim version af Jerry.

I took Photoshop and I made Jerry slightly less attractive.

Jeg brugte Photoshop og gjorde Jerry lidt grimmere.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

For the other people, I added an ugly version of Tom.

Hos den anden halvdel, tilføjede jeg en grimmere version af Tom.

And the question was, will ugly Jerry and ugly Tom

og spørgsmålet var, vil grimme Jerry og grimme Tom

help their respective, more attractive brothers?

hjælpe deres kønnere brødre?

The answer was absolutely yes.

og svaret var absolut ja.

When ugly Jerry was around, Jerry was popular.

Når grimme Jerry var der, var Jerry populær,

When ugly Tom was around, Tom was popular.

når grimme Tom var der, var Tom populær.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

This of course has two very clear implications

Det her har to klare konsekvenser

for life in general.

for livet generelt.

If you ever go bar-hopping, who do you want to take with you?

Hvis du tager i byen, hvem vil du så have med dig?

(Laughter)

(Latter)

You want a slightly uglier version of yourself.

Du vil have en lidt grimmere version af dig selv.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

Similar, but slightly uglier.

Ens, men en lille smule grimmere.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

The second point, or course, is that if somebody invites you to bar hop,

Den anden konsekvens er selvfølgeligt

at hvis nogen inviterer dig med i byen, ved du hvad de synes om dig

you know what they think about you.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

Now you get it.

Nu forstår i det.

What is the general point?

Hvad er hovedpointen?

The general point is that,

Hovedpointen er at når vi tænker på vores økonomiske system,

when we think about economics, we have this beautiful view of human nature.

det smukke billede af menneskelig natur.

"What a piece of work is a man! How noble in reason!"

"Hvilket et pragtstykke er mennesket, så fornuftigt!"

We have this view of ourselves, of others.

Har vi det her billede af os selv, og af andre,

The behavioral economics perspective is slightly less "generous" to people;

det adfærdsøkonomiske perspektiv,

er en smule mindre rosenrødt,

in fact, in medical terms,

faktisk, i medicinske termer, er det her vores synspunkt.

that's our view.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

But there is a silver lining.

Men der er en god side,

The silver lining is, I think,

den gode side er, synes jeg,

kind of the reason that behavioral economics is interesting and exciting.

en af grundene til at adfærdsøkonomi er spændende,

Are we Superman, or are we Homer Simpson?

er vi Superman? eller er vi Homer Simpson?

Når det handler om at lave vores fysiske verden,

When it comes to building the physical world,

we kind of understand our limitations.

forstår vi næsten vores grænser.

We build steps.

Vi bygger trapper, vi bygger alle de her ting,

And we build these things that not everybody can use, obviously.

som ikke alle kan bruge.

(Laughter)

(Latter)

We understand our limitations,

Vi forstår vores grænser,

and we build around them.

og vi bygger omkring dem.

But for some reason, when it comes to the mental world,

Men af en eller anden grund, når det kommer til det mentale,

when we design things like healthcare and retirement and stock markets,

når vi designer sygehusvæsenet, pensioner og aktiemarkeder,

we somehow forget the idea that we are limited.

glemmer vi at vi er begrænsede,

I think that if we understood our cognitive limitations

jeg tror, at hvis vi forstod vores mentale begrænsninger,

in the same way we understand our physical limitations,

på samme måde som vi forstår vores fysiske,

even though they don't stare us in the face the same way,

selvom de ikke er tydelige på samme måde,

kunne vi lave en bedre verden.

we could design a better world, and that, I think,

og det, tror jeg, er mit håb med det her.

is the hope of this thing.

Thank you very much.

Mange tak.

(Applause)

(Bifald)