IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/soceco/v36y2007i1p1-14.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Relative thinking theory

Author

Listed:
  • Azar, Ofer H.

Abstract

The article presents a theory that I denote “Relative Thinking Theory,” which claims that people consider relative differences and not only absolute differences when making various economics decisions, even in those cases where the rational model dictates that people should consider only absolute differences. The article reviews experimental evidence for this behavior, summarizing briefly several experiments I conducted, as well as some earlier related literature. It then discusses how we can think about relative thinking and formalize this behavior. Later, the article addresses several related questions: why do people exhibit relative thinking, whether it is beneficial to do so, and whether experience and education can change relative thinking. Finally, the article explains why firms seem to respond to relative thinking of consumers, and raises additional implications of relative thinking for economics and management.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Azar, Ofer H., 2007. "Relative thinking theory," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 1-14, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:36:y:2007:i:1:p:1-14
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6W5H-4J2TVNN-1/2/409083b1804a696aebf8371ed838137d
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. John W. Pratt & David A. Wise & Richard Zeckhauser, 1979. "Price Differences in almost Competitive Markets," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 93(2), pages 189-211.
    2. Amos Tversky & Daniel Kahneman, 1991. "Loss Aversion in Riskless Choice: A Reference-Dependent Model," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 106(4), pages 1039-1061.
    3. Azar, Ofer H., 2007. "Relative thinking theory," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 1-14, February.
    4. Richard H. Thaler, 2008. "Mental Accounting and Consumer Choice," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(1), pages 15-25, 01-02.
    5. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    6. Moon, Philip & Keasey, Kevin & Duxbury, Darren, 1999. "Mental accounting and decision making:: The relationship between relative and absolute savings," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 145-153, February.
    7. Frisch, Deborah, 1993. "Reasons for Framing Effects," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 399-429, April.
    8. Azar, Ofer H., 2009. "Do consumers make too much effort to save on cheap items and too little to save on expensive items? experimental results and implications for business strategy," MPRA Paper 20962, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Alan T. Sorensen, 2000. "Equilibrium Price Dispersion in Retail Markets for Prescription Drugs," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(4), pages 833-862, August.
    10. Thaler, Richard, 1980. "Toward a positive theory of consumer choice," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 39-60, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Azar, Ofer H., 2009. "Do consumers make too much effort to save on cheap items and too little to save on expensive items? experimental results and implications for business strategy," MPRA Paper 20962, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Levin, Irwin P. & Schneider, Sandra L. & Gaeth, Gary J., 1998. "All Frames Are Not Created Equal: A Typology and Critical Analysis of Framing Effects," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 76(2), pages 149-188, November.
    3. Lembregts, Christophe & Pandelaere, Mario, 2014. ""A 20% income increase for everyone?": The effect of relative increases in income on perceived income inequality," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 43(C), pages 37-47.
    4. Azar, Ofer H., 2008. "The effect of relative thinking on firm strategy and market outcomes: A location differentiation model with endogenous transportation costs," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 29(5), pages 684-697, November.
    5. Mandel, David R., 2002. "Beyond mere ownership: transaction demand as a moderator of the endowment effect," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 88(2), pages 737-747, July.
    6. Nagengast, Liane & Evanschitzky, Heiner & Blut, Markus & Rudolph, Thomas, 2014. "New Insights in the Moderating Effect of Switching Costs on the Satisfaction–Repurchase Behavior Link," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 90(3), pages 408-427.
    7. Chu, Hsunchi & Liao, Shuling, 2010. "Buying while expecting to sell: The economic psychology of online resale," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 63(9-10), pages 1073-1078, September.
    8. Eduard Marinov, 2017. "The 2017 Nobel Prize in Economics," Economic Thought journal, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences - Economic Research Institute, issue 6, pages 117-159.
    9. Kogler, Christoph & Kühberger, Anton & Gilhofer, Rainer, 2013. "Real and hypothetical endowment effects when exchanging lottery tickets: Is regret a better explanation than loss aversion?," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 37(C), pages 42-53.
    10. Arkes, Hal R. & Hirshleifer, David & Jiang, Danling & Lim, Sonya, 2008. "Reference point adaptation: Tests in the domain of security trading," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 105(1), pages 67-81, January.
    11. Lakomaa, Erik, 2009. "The Municipal Takeover of the School System," SSE/EFI Working Paper Series in Business Administration 2011:2, Stockholm School of Economics, revised 08 May 2011.
    12. Dertwinkel-Kalt, Markus & Köhler, Katrin, 2016. "Exchange asymmetries for bads? Experimental evidence," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 231-241.
    13. Kalyanaram, Gurumurthy & Winer, Russell S., 2022. "Behavioral response to price: Data-based insights and future research for retailing," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 98(1), pages 46-70.
    14. Mathies, Christine & Gudergan, Siegfried P., 2011. "The role of fairness in modelling customer choice," Australasian marketing journal, Elsevier, vol. 19(1), pages 22-29.
    15. Pedro Bordalo & Nicola Gennaioli & Andrei Shleifer, 2013. "Salience and Consumer Choice," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 121(5), pages 803-843.
    16. Rudy Douven & Ron van der Heijden & Thomas McGuire & Erik Schut, 2017. "Premium levels and demand response in health insurance: relative thinking and zero-price effects," CPB Discussion Paper 366, CPB Netherlands Bureau for Economic Policy Analysis.
    17. Bowman, David & Minehart, Deborah & Rabin, Matthew, 1999. "Loss aversion in a consumption-savings model," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 155-178, February.
    18. Anbarci, Nejat & Arin, K. Peren & Kuhlenkasper, Torben & Zenker, Christina, 2018. "Revisiting loss aversion: Evidence from professional tennis," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 1-18.
    19. Bockweg, Christian & Ponds, Eduard & Steenbeek, Onno & Vonken, Joyce, 2018. "Framing and the annuitization decision – Experimental evidence from a Dutch pension fund," Journal of Pension Economics and Finance, Cambridge University Press, vol. 17(3), pages 385-417, July.
    20. Francisco Gomes & Michael Haliassos & Tarun Ramadorai, 2021. "Household Finance," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 59(3), pages 919-1000, September.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D10 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - General
    • M30 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Marketing and Advertising - - - General
    • L10 - Industrial Organization - - Market Structure, Firm Strategy, and Market Performance - - - General
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • A12 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Relation of Economics to Other Disciplines

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:36:y:2007:i:1:p:1-14. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620175 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.