The Hot–Cold Decision Triangle: A framework for healthier choices

People often behave in ways that are clearly detrimental to their health. We review representative research on unhealthy behaviors within a parsimonious framework, the Hot-Cold Decision Triangle. Through this framework, we describe how when people embrace colder state reasoning??instead of risking the pitfalls of heuristics and visceral reactions??they are more likely to behave healthily. We also illustrate how some heuristics and visceral urges can be leveraged to encourage healthier choices. We conclude by discussing unexplored research directions, as well as substantive implications for individuals, marketers, and policymakers.     

Consumer Control and Empowerment: A Primer

This paper introduces consumer empowerment as a promising research area. Going beyond lay wisdom that more control is always better, we outline several hypotheses concerning (a) the factors that influence the perception of empowerment, and (b) the consequences of greater control and the subjective experience of empowerment on consumer satisfaction and confidence.     

Integrated evaluation: A synthesis of approaches to the evaluation of broad-aim social programs

Integrated evaluation is intended to serve decision makers who are responsible for broad-aim social programs by providing information based on evaluation which can aid both ongoing decisions and long-term strategic decisions. It integrates elements of diverse evaluation traditions in a complementary manner: monitoring—in order to inform what has been done by the program; implementation analysis—in order to understand how decisions are being made and carried out; economic evaluation—including both cost-effectiveness and assessment of distributional effects; and goal achievement evaluation—in order to present the program outcomes from the point of view of the various parties who produced the program and/or were affected by it. The article presents these four components of integrated evaluation and discusses its advantages as well as its difficulties and pitfalls.     

How behavioral decision research can enhance consumer welfare: From freedom of choice to paternalistic intervention

Decision-making researchers have largely focused on showing errors and biases in consumers' decision-making processes without paying much attention to the social welfare and policy implications of these systematic behaviors. In this paper, we explore how findings and methods in behavioral decision research can be used to help consumers improve their decision making and enhance their well-being. We first review select findings in behavioral decision research to explain why consumers need help in decisions, and based on these findings, suggest various interventions that could be effective within the scope of libertarian paternalism. Ethics and effectiveness of the interventions are also discussed.