Michelle Smytheman and Maria Raciti, University of Sunshine Coast.
The BEST 2023 Conference held in February provided a platform for some intriguing presentations on human behaviour. It was a delightful opportunity to present our early work on anticipated regret and the role it plays when people face significant life choices, such as choosing a life partner, starting a business, buying a home, relocating, quitting a harmful habit, or pursuing higher education.
Each of us varies in how we make significant life choices. Some of us are more conscious of the risks, likely implications, and window of opportunity for radical change than others. Indeed, in making a significant life choice, we experience either momentary or prolonged periods of hesitation when we fear making the wrong decision, making a decision too fast or not being able to predict with accuracy what will happen and the full consequences of our success or failure. It is crucial that behaviour change scholars and practitioners understand the role of anticipated regret when people make significant life choices so we can help them better navigate these milestones in their lives.
Regret is a complex emotional experience. Regret can occur before and after a decision is made. Regret before a decision is made is referred to as anticipated regret and involves the imagining of potential future scenarios and weighing up the risks, costs and benefits of these different scenarios[1]. Anticipated regret involves cognitive components where people reflect on past actions, decisions and situations, comparing what they thought would happen with what did happen, often identifying instances where a micro-decision led to a good outcome or where it did not.
Anticipated regret is part of the larger, multidisciplinary body of work on Regret Theory, which dates back to the 1970s. Seminal work by psychologists Janis and Mann (1977)[2] found that anticipated regret led to more rational choices because the fear underpinning the anticipated regret would prompt the person to engage in greater cognitive (logical) deliberation. Some two decades later, Zeelenberg’s (1999)[3] research found two critical linkages being that a) stronger negative emotions and outcomes tend to elicit stronger decision avoidance behaviours, and b) anticipated regret is different to other negative emotions because it is specific to decision-making.
The decision context matters as the greater the magnitude of a decision, particularly one closely tied to an individual’s sense of self or identity, the more probable it is for people to experience anticipated regret. Research by Roese and Summerville (2005)[4] and Morrison and Roese (2011)[5] explored people’s fundamental life regrets by asking participants to identify retrospectively the areas of their lives where they experienced the most regret. Both studies found that education, career, and finance were key sources of fundamental regrets. All three are services that have transformative properties, thus, suggesting a connection between anticipated regret and transformative services marketing.
When faced with significant life choices that are best described as complex, high-involvement and transformative, people typically respond in one of two ways. Some people respond by taking action while others do nothing. The latter is particularly interesting as it results in no behaviour change. It is known as ‘inaction inertia’. Inaction inertia occurs when the anticipated outcome of a decision leads the decision-maker to refrain from making a choice either temporarily or indefinitely[6]. One of the reasons for inaction inertia is the consideration of opportunity costs, being opportunities that would be foregone from the act of making a choice[7].
Despite an early interest in anticipated regret and its impact on behaviour, the field has not progressed in the last decade. Our research aims to explore how anticipated regret impacts the decision to consume transformative services and to develop a model that can assist in understanding this phenomenon. We aim to generate insights that help people to better navigate their decision-making process when faced with significant life choices.
While we are unable to provide evidence-informed tips for practitioners at this early stage of our project, we have identified three areas of future research in anticipated regret that would be worthwhile exploring, being:
- To what extent does anticipated regret predict post-consumption satisfaction with transformative services?
- How does the level of experience a person has with a transformative service influence the relationship between anticipated regret and their behaviour?
- How can service providers use knowledge of anticipated regret to enhance the adoption and usage of transformative services?
Michelle Smytheman is a professional communicator, working with small and medium sized businesses to develop and execute strategic public relations and marketing plans. As a Masters by Research Candidate at the University of the Sunshine Coast, her research explores the role of anticipated regret in transformative service consumption.
Professor Maria Raciti is a passionate social marketer whose research interests are at the intersection of educational equality and Indigenous peoples. Maria is a BEST Fellow, Co-Director of the UniSC Indigenous and Transcultural Research Centre and Co-Leader of the Education and Economies Theme in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Indigenous Futures.
[1] Zeelenberg, M, 1999, ‘Anticipated regret, expected feedback and behavioral decision making’, Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 93–106, https://doi.org/10.1002%2F%28sici%291099-0771%28199906%2912%3A2%3C93%3A%3Aaid-bdm311%3E3.0.co%3B2-s
[2] Janis, IL & Mann, L, 1977, Decision Making, The Free Press, New York.
[3] Zeelenberg, M, 1999, ‘Anticipated regret, expected feedback and behavioral decision making’, Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 93–106, https://doi.org/10.1002%2F%28sici%291099-0771%28199906%2912%3A2%3C93%3A%3Aaid-bdm311%3E3.0.co%3B2-s
[4] Roese, NJ & Summerville, A, 2005, ‘What We Regret Most… and Why’, Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin, vol. 31, no. 9, pp. 1273–1285, https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167205274693
[5] Morrison, M & Roese, NJ, 2011, ‘Regrets of the Typical American: Findings from a Nationally Representative Sample’, Social Psychological and Personality Science, vol. 2, no. 6, pp. 576–583, https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550611401756
[6] Gabillon, 2020, ‘When choosing is painful: Anticipated regret and psychological opportunity cost’, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, vol. 178, pp. 644-659, doi: 10.1016/j.jebo.2020.08.010.
[7] Van Putten, M., Zeelenberg, M., van Dijk, E. and Tykocinski, O.E., 2013. Inaction inertia. European Review of Social Psychology, 24(1), pp.123-159. https://doi.org/10.1080/10463283.2013.841481