Transcript

Derek Smith:

Hello, and welcome to Baylor Connections, a conversation series with the people shaping our future. Each week, we go in depth with Baylor leaders, professors, and more discussing important topics in higher education, research and student life. I'm Derek Smith and our guest today is Dr. Ashley Otto. Dr. Otto serves as Assistant Professor of Marketing at Baylor's Hankamer School of Business. She joined the Baylor faculty in 2016 and has released highly regarded research in areas like decision-making, customer satisfaction, willpower, political ideology, workplace performance, and more. Dr. Ashley Otto, she is with us here today on the program. Thanks so much for joining us. It's great to have you here on Baylor Connections.

Ashley Otto:

Hi Derek. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here today.

Derek Smith:

Well, when we talk about decision making, that's a topic that everyone can relate to. Probably, especially over these last few months, people have had to make a lot of decisions. If they have kids, if they've got a business, if they're in charge of anything, a lot of decisions to be made. You've described yourself in an article talking about your research as someone who doesn't like making decisions. Can this time of year be exhausting? Or for people who don't like decisions, can they always be exhausting?

Ashley Otto:

Yeah. So I strongly identify as an individual who doesn't like decision making and the decision making process. And my research shows there's many other people out there like me. And I think you bring up a really good point that in this time of a pandemic we're seeing people probably be able to identify that much more strongly than they might have otherwise or might be used to. So we see all this uncertainty and complexity really adding to this overall burden that decision making can really bring to our lives. Even though it's a blessing and it's something we definitely don't want to give up as a freedom, it can be a pretty big burden for people in their everyday lives.

Derek Smith:

Well, obviously as a marketing researcher, there's tie-ins for businesses, for organizations who want to know how people make decisions. But I'm curious, what sparked your interest in really researching decision-making?

Ashley Otto:

Yeah, so I think the way I might have learned to cope with my own decision aversion is to spend the past decade studying how people who are averse to making decisions end up making decisions. So we're confronted with tens of thousands of decisions a day. And despite the fact that we might not really like making them, we have to make them. So I think early in my PhD studies, when I was trying to figure out a research topic that was really sticking to me, one that kept coming back was my own behavior and my own oddities in terms of how I make decisions and how I resolve decisions, how I approach decision making. And it ended up naturally segueing into what I ended up studying. So I'm my own big case study, if you will.

Derek Smith:

That's good, that's good. Channel it in a very positive direction for people, for sure.

Ashley Otto:

Right.

Derek Smith:

As you talk about not liking decisions, you can't speak for everyone who doesn't like making decisions, but for you, what does that feel like? When you talk about not liking it, I know that can bring about emotions for people who don't like them. For you personally, what's that like? Because maybe others can relate.

Ashley Otto:

Yeah. I think that's a great question. For me personally, and I know it might sound a little silly, there's a little bit of an anxiousness that comes with setting or stepping into a decision. I know I need to make a decision, I know a decision is eminent and I need to resolve it and I need to come to some sort of conclusion. And so that pressing urge of needing to go through that process is particularly aversive to me. And a lot of research shows that it's aversive to other individuals. And this can be from a very simple decisions like, "What do I want to eat for breakfast?" Or, "What do I want to wear today?" To really complex decisions like, "What house do I want to buy? What doctor should I choose?" As a probably pretty silly example, yesterday I needed to buy a gift for a friend that's expecting a baby. And this should be pretty easy decision. All I needed to do was go online, go to the wedding registry... Excuse me, the baby registry, and pick an option from these choice options that are available to me. Somebody did the hard work, they laid out all the options. But I found this context particularly aversive thinking about having to go do this, then sitting there with the options and having to ponder over these options and figure out which one I want to select the purchase for this baby gift was something that was not enjoyable. And it is probably arguably a decision context that is pretty simplified. So for me, and what I've seen in research, pretty basic simple decisions can be a pretty aversive experience. Something that people don't look forward to and they don't want to spend time doing.

Derek Smith:

Talking with Dr. Ashley Otto, from Baylor's Hankamer School of Business. And Dr. Otto, you used the phrase "aversive" talking about people being decision averse. And you just kind of described that, laid that out, talking about the example with the baby registry. As far as your research, what are some key qualities of people who feel that way? Of people who could be described as decision averse?

Ashley Otto:

Yeah, so I think that's a wonderful question. And that's where I've spent the bulk of my research career so far. This, let me say, that this decision aversion is very real. There are some researchers who are at the University of Michigan and they have a paper that's published in NeuroImage, these psychology professors. And what they did is they wanted to see like how painful decision aversion really is for people. And what they found is that people who are adverse to decisions, the areas of the brain that light up when they're confronted with decision are the same areas of the brain that light up when they experience physical pain.

Derek Smith:

Wow.

Ashley Otto:

So we're able to see that this decision aversion can equate to what it's like to experience physical pain for some people. So it is truly something that's stressful and anxiety provoking. And in my research, what I've done is identified who these people are and then how they end up making decisions. And it turns out they're pretty easy to identify. So what we find is that people who have what we call a high need for cognitive closure are individuals who are most likely to be decision averse. And when we talk about a need for closure, we define it as an individual who's motivated to find an answer, really any answer that's going to give them more of a firm resolution on a topic, and that provides them a sense of closure.People who seek closure do not like uncertainty. They do not like ambiguity. They're really seeking out these firm answers. They're motivated to do that. And it really makes sense when we start to think about this need to achieve closure, this motivation to achieve closure, and why these individuals might be averse to making decisions. When we think about being presented with a decision, like if I were to ask you, "Where would you like to go to coffee?" I'm essentially presenting you with a open scenario that you then have to close out and resolve. So for a person that is motivated to achieve closure, anytime I'm presenting them with an open scenario and decision, I'm presenting them with something that's innately aversive to them. And unfortunately for these individuals, they're quite often presented with decisions in their everyday life, these open scenarios that they have to resolve and come to some sort of resolution.

Derek Smith:

What is it, when you talk about wanting closure, some people might say, "Well, you get to determine what that closure looks like when you make a decision." You know, in the coffee example, you could pick your favorite coffee shop or the closest coffee shop or what have you. So has your research, or have you found... Where is that, where the dissonance is between being able to determine what the closure looks like, but also there's a trip up along the way there somewhere, I guess?

Ashley Otto:

Yeah. So for these individuals seeking closure, they want to come to it quickly and they want it to be permanent. So they don't want to have to revisit the decisions. So they're very... And we can start chatting about essentially how they make decisions, but they're very, very strategic about trying to achieve that closure. So they're not necessarily just going to grab at the very first thing that they see and be done with a decision so that they can get out of it. Because one of the things that's so critical is they have this certainty, this confidence in the choice that they make, because to revisit a decision for people who are seeking closure would be a really aversive experience. And it's something that they would actively try to avoid. So they want certainty and they want confidence when coming to their decision. They do not want to have an experience where there's potential for regret or potential for them to really just kind of ponder over whether or not they made the right decision. So they want to find resolution quickly, but they also want to make sure that they're finding the right resolution.

Derek Smith:

If people are listening to this and hearing what you're saying and thinking that describes them perfectly, are they in good company? Do you know about how many people from your research, do you have an estimate of about how many people would be considered decision averse?

Ashley Otto:

I think that's a great question. When we talk about this decision aversion, and we relate it to this motivation to achieve closure, we're talking about relative differences amongst people. So when we talk about the need for closure, we're talking about an individual difference variable, a personality characteristic. So we're talking about something that we measure on a scale. And unfortunately, people don't walk around with a sign that says, "Hey, I'm decision diverse." Though, I would argue, they're probably pretty easy to pinpoint. So what we do is we have a personality scale that we give individuals and they respond to a series of items, which we average up. And what prior research has shown, the research that created the scale and has validated this scale, It's a five point scale with five being someone who's really high need for closure, so someone who's likely to be decision averse. One being someone who's low and low in decision aversiveness. People tend, on average, to be about a 3.6, a 3.7. So the scale midpoint would be about a 2.5. So what we can take from that is, on average, people tend to be higher in their desire for closure. And so we naturally can see that people are probably a little more likely to resonate with someone who's seeking closure, someone who really doesn't like decision making that much. For the sake of research, what we do, because we're trying to compare relative differences amongst two different groups of people where there's a continuum, is we study the top 16% of people. So the people who are most likely to be high need for closure, and from a statistical standpoint, we would call that one standard deviations above the mean. And we compare that to about the bottom 16% or one standard deviation below the mean. So we can start to see relative differences in what people are like or how they behave when they are more likely to be seeking closure or decision averse versus when that's not something they're motivated to do.

Derek Smith:

This is Baylor Connections. We are visiting with Dr. Ashley Otto, Assistant Professor of Marketing in Baylor's Hankamer School of Business, talking about decision making. And you talked about, you referenced earlier, how people who are decision averse make decisions. So let's talk about that. What are strategies or well worn paths for people who are decision averse that impact the decisions they make?

Ashley Otto:

Yeah, so this is probably the most fun part of the work I do is how people make decisions when they don't like to do it. And what we've found in our research is that these people are really strategic decision makers. These aren't people who get into this state of indecision and freeze up and don't know how to make a choice, despite not liking them. They're actually really good at making decisions and figuring out how to cope with or manage that aversion. And you actually earlier alluded to one of the strategies that these individuals engage in when trying to make decisions, when you had said earlier deciding where to get coffee, maybe you just go to your favorite place? And that's something that these individuals do. So in my research, I've coined a strategic nature behind how they make decisions as decision sidestepping. So people seeking closure who are averse to decision making are likely to sidestep or bypass that decision making process by relying on these pre-validated credible decision options. So to give you a couple examples of what sidestepping strategies look like, a person who's seeking closure might try to resolve a decision by relying on an expert's opinion. They might try to resolve a decision by going with some sort of status quo options. So something that's been deemed normative by a group of other individuals. They'll be more likely to rely on defaults. So you could think about signing up for new insurance, they're going to be more likely to go with the option that is given to them versus changing and looking over the different options. They're going to be more likely to repeat decisions they've made in the past. So they're going to be more likely to revisit their favorite coffee shop versus try a new coffee shop. As I've previously mentioned, it's all about resolving a decision in a way that allows them to do it quickly and confidently. And there exists these different, again I call, sidestepping options, which allow them to essentially get around that tedious process of decision making to make a decision quickly and confidently. So they're going to go with what the expert might say or they're going to do what they might've done in the past. And these are all really pretty credible solution that they can feel confident about when coming to a decision. So despite the fact that they don't like to make decisions, they found very strategic ways to be able to quickly and confidently resolve them.

Derek Smith:

Mm-hmm (affirmative) You used the term decision sidestepping, Dr. Otto. So would you consider that to be a positive term, a negative term or a neutral term? Or can it be any one of those things at different times?

Ashley Otto:

That's a great question. I've never had anybody ask me that. And probably I laugh because in my own personal world, sidestepping is an incredibly positive term. It's probably a saving grace in many instances. And I think if you're a person who's motivated to achieve closure, sidestepping is really quite positive. But I do see why this question is a question in the first place. And from an outsider's perspective, I think these individuals could be looked at in a negative light. "Are they lazy decision makers? Are they people who are not willing to put forth effort into making decision? Or just trying to get out of it?" And I can see that argument. Within my work, we've been able to rule out laziness. So it is not that they're lazy. It is truly that these individuals are strategic decision makers and arguably smart decision makers, because they're really only sidestepping decisions via credible means. If you could invalidate one of these means by saying this expert somehow failed, they shouldn't be likely to go with that expert's recommendation. So they're not just looking for any way out, but that right, strategic way out.

Derek Smith:

So in an organization, maybe you don't want every decision maker to be decision averse, but it might be nice to have some people who are, because they can keep things moving along with some tried and true manners methods?

Ashley Otto:

Yeah, absolutely. From a business perspective, having everybody decision averse would probably not be actually very interesting context to be working in, but some people being decision averse, some people being more likely to rely on recommendations does add to a little bit of the predictability in terms of sales, for sure.

Derek Smith:

How could a brand or a company that serves the public or offers a product or a good utilize this information as they look to reach their customers?

Ashley Otto:

Yeah, so I think that one of the fun parts about my job is that we say, "Okay, now we have all this information, what does the business do with this?" As I've alluded to, when we talk about decision aversion, we're talking about a personality characteristic, this motivation that people have to achieve closure. And again, as I alluded to, unfortunately, people don't walk around with a sign that says, "Hey, I have a high need for closure." And so it can be hard to identify people who are averse to decision making in terms of helping them right off the bat. But what can be particularly interesting about this area of study is that even though we often study decision aversion from a individual level, we see that different situations or contexts naturally promote in individuals a desire to achieve closure. And from that, we can see that they're going to be likely to be decision diverse and how can we help them make decisions. So there's been research that shows that when individuals are in noisy environments or environments where they're under time pressure, and you can imagine shopping with children, or running errands and going from one thing to the next, or even environments where they're crowded busy environments, individuals are likely to have a heightened desire to achieve closure. So they're going to be more likely to just be averse to making decisions in those contexts. So if you're a retailer, knowing the context that your consumer is shopping in is incredibly important in helping them make a decision. So if a consumer is going to be shopping in, let's say, an Apple store where it's probably going to be crowded, they're going to be waiting in some sort of a long line, we know that in those contexts, they're probably going to start to have a higher need for closure. That context naturally promotes that. So how can those salespeople help these people make decisions? Well, we know that people who are averse to decision making like to sidestep decisions, so it might be telling them what the majority of consumers are buying. "Majority of consumers tend to buy this type of iPhone or add on this benefit." It's going to help these people make decisions. So if you can start to pinpoint the environment, we can start to figure out how averse the consumer may or may not be and start to help facilitate that decision making process for them.

Derek Smith:

Talking with Dr. Ashley Otto. And Dr. Otto, as we head to the final couple of moments here on the program, maybe bringing it home for people in another way too, if you have a coworker or a spouse or a friend or a family member who is decision averse and sometimes there are just important decisions that have to be made and you really want their honest input, are there any strategies or any helpful thoughts you have on helping people make sure that they're decision averse friends or loved ones or coworkers' voices are heard?

Ashley Otto:

I love this question because I think it speaks to the severity of being with someone who is decision averse and how sensitive that context can be for individuals. And I think anybody who probably has a spouse, partner, or a really close friend who's decision averse, just probably feels their aversion at times. And so if I can digress for a second to talk about some new research, I'll come back to answer this question in a way that might be a little bit novel. So I have some new research that's in advanced round of review, and what do is we put individuals who are averse to decision making in a context that is void of all sorts of sidestepping options. So we put them in a novel context where they really don't have prior information and we want to see what they're going to do. So we know that they're strategic in making decisions, and they look for these sidestepping options, but what if none of them exist? So you could imagine an individual going to buy baby formula for the first time. That's probably a context where they don't know much about making a decision. One might expect that if you don't like to make decisions, maybe you just pick something at random and you get done with it. And what we find is, ironically, the opposite, that people who are adverse to making decisions, when they're in novel new contexts, they'll actually put forth more time, effort and energy to arrive at a decision that they feel comfortable with, with the intent that when they have to go back to that decision context in the future, they have their go to option and that decision will be simplified. So if I can go back to how do you let someone's voice be heard in decision making context when you know they don't like to make decisions, because they're probably going to often ask for your opinion, so how do you make their voice be heard? Well, when the decision context is new, so maybe you're picking a new coffee shop or shopping for baby formula, let them ponder over the options. So that in the future, when you revisit that context, you're going to be likely to revert back to their decision.

Derek Smith:

That's good. That's good. Well, that's a good info. And I know that's going to be helpful for people and hopefully helpful for people who are a decision averse to know how many others there are out there like them and that there's some legit strategy to what they're doing, if they didn't already know that.

Ashley Otto:

Right.

Derek Smith:

Dr. Ashley Otto, thanks so much. It's been great to have you on the program here, really appreciated it.

Ashley Otto:

I've enjoyed it. Thanks so much, Derek.

Derek Smith:

Thank you so much. Dr. Ashley Otto, Assistant Professor of Marketing in Baylor's Hankamer School of Business, our guest today here on Baylor Connections. I'm Derek Smith. A reminder you can hear this and other programs online at baylor.edu/connections. Thanks for joining us here on Baylor Connections.