What’s funny is that it works even when people know the initial price is bullshit.
A study at MIT had people participate in a silent auction. They were asked to list the last two digits of their social security number and then asked if they would be willing to pay that many dollars for each item before placing their bid.
On average, people with higher SSN digits bid more.
No, everyone wrote the last two digits of their SSN at the top of their papers. Then they were either asked “how much would you bid for this” or “would you pay x amount for this” and those with higher SSN values overwhelmingly were willing to pay more than their counterparts with lower SSN values.
What’s funny is that it works even when people know the initial price is bullshit.
A study at MIT had people participate in a silent auction. They were asked to list the last two digits of their social security number and then asked if they would be willing to pay that many dollars for each item before placing their bid.
On average, people with higher SSN digits bid more.
For anyone who wants to know more, Dan Ariely’s book Predictably Irrational goes into great detail about this, and many other experiments.
Libraries carry it, so you could read it for FREE!
^ that bit is a reference to one of the chapters, which talks about how our purchasing decisions are skewed heavily when we’re offered something FREE!
I’m sorry It sounds they were asked to bid using the last 2 digits of their ssn. Of course people with higher numbers bid more
No, everyone wrote the last two digits of their SSN at the top of their papers. Then they were either asked “how much would you bid for this” or “would you pay x amount for this” and those with higher SSN values overwhelmingly were willing to pay more than their counterparts with lower SSN values.