Big Ideas

Hyperbolic Discounting

  1. We postpone important stuff – We choose even more pain …. if it is just slightly postponed. Like taxes.
  2. We switch to smaller but sooner reward when the reward is closer at hand
  3. It’s now or whatever
  4. When presented with immediate gratification we give up a much higher reward in the future
  5. We choose smaller but sooner as the time horizon declines

Commitment Types

  1. The commitments that would be the most effective are often not the ones we would want to commit to in the first place. Because the stakes are so high
  2. Experiment – 2 levels
    • 30$ on line – lost 23 pounds
      1. 38% success rate
    • 300$ on the line – lost 32 pounds
      1. 71% success rate
  3. Purpose of the commitment device is not to educate you but to make you commit. Hence we need to do it over and over again
  4. Loss aversion is much bigger motivator than a potential gain
  5. Commitment contracts should change your present self and your future behavior as well . These 2 requirements are in tension

Using our social Networks for commitments:

  1. Humiliation as a stick
  2. Using nagging as a stick
  3. Social contracts matter. Who learns of your failure or success matters. Who adjudicates or referees matters
  4. In terms of a commitment, To whom can be just as important as how much

Fortifying Willpower

  1. people with low internal motivation have higher ego depletion for a related task
  2. High internal motivation means we need less willpower
  3. Commitment contracts can lower the need for use of willpower
  4. A perfect commitment contract always involves a real and substantial threat. Otherwise it doesn’t work

Access the FREE Mindmap and Action Guide of “Carrots and Sticks” HERE


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