American Economic Review
ISSN 0002-8282 (Print) | ISSN 1944-7981 (Online)
Search and Satisficing
American Economic Review
vol. 101,
no. 7, December 2011
(pp. 2899–2922)
Abstract
Many everyday decisions are made without full examination of all available options, and, as a result, the best available option may be missed. We develop a search-theoretic choice experiment to study the impact of incomplete consideration on the quality of choices. We find that many decisions can be understood using the satisficing model of Herbert Simon (1955): most subjects search sequentially, stopping when a "satisficing" level of reservation utility is realized. We find that reservation utilities and search order respond systematically to changes in the decision making environment. (JEL D03, D12, D83)Citation
Caplin, Andrew, Mark Dean, and Daniel Martin. 2011. "Search and Satisficing." American Economic Review 101 (7): 2899–2922. DOI: 10.1257/aer.101.7.2899Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D91 Micro-Based Behavioral Economics: Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
- D12 Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
- D83 Search; Learning; Information and Knowledge; Communication; Belief