The sneezing, sniffling, achy, head fever so you can rest easier with your decision

There I am, again. Staring at the cold medicines at the drug store.

I can pay $12 bucks for NyQuil™. The generic is $5.99.

After 10 minutes of reading labels, shifting boxes and bottles around, re-reading labels and second and third guessing myself, I reach for the NyQuil. For good measure I also grab the $11 nighttime version (generic $6.99). A girl's got to sleep, right?

Here is the conundrum: I know that the branded medicine and the generic are the same thing. I re-read the label about 6 times every cold season. But I always buy the expensive one. There is something scary and risky about buying the cheaper cold cure... I'm just not confident it will work as well. Even though I understand rationally that the two medicines are identical.

Rationality Ready. Rationality Capable?

Careening down that irrational path, it is comforting to note that... I'm not alone.

Waber, Shiy, Carmon and Arely (2008) report a study showing that participants perceived that full-priced pain relievers work better than the same pills offered at a discount.

In this study, participants were recruited under the guise of testing a new pain relieving drug under investigation by the FDA.

In order to test the effectiveness of the 'new drug,' participants took it and then were given increasingly intense electric shocks. After each shock, they would report how much pain they experienced on a scale ranging from "no pain at all" to "the worst pain imaginable."

To determine whether cost influenced perceived effectiveness, half of the participants were told that the drug would cost $2.50 / pill. The other half of the participants were told that it had been discounted to 10 cents / pill.

Participants who believed that the drug cost $2.50 / pill reported that it worked significantly better than those that thought it cost only 10 cents / pill.

The best part of the whole study? The pills were placebos.

Users are Rationality Capable. But are they Rationality Ready?

There are two points to be taken from consumers' willingness to pay more for cold meds:

1. The difference is merely perceived.
2. The mere perception is absolutely real.

As user experience (UX) continues to evolve from evaluating whether a user can do a task, to describing how to engage consumers such that they will do it, it becomes increasingly important to explore beyond the visible situation to understand the emotions and beliefs that drive perceived value and facilitate or block relevant decisions.

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