Deepsimar Kaur*
The Global Consumer Intelligence Review
Volume 1, Issue 1
Published: 23 March 2026
This study examines the economic costs of excess choice through a controlled behavioural experiment designed to evaluate consumer decision-making under varying levels of option complexity. Conventional microeconomic theory models consumers as rational utility maximisers, positing that an expanded choice set weakly increases welfare by enlarging the feasible consumption frontier. Behavioural economics, however, contends that bounded rationality, rising marginal search costs, and cognitive constraints lead to suboptimal outcomes in overloaded environments. The present analysis tests whether increasing the number of alternatives reduces preference consistency, defined as repeated selections in identical trials and elevates the incidence of dominated choices, wherein participants select objectively inferior options despite superior alternatives available, thereby manifesting clear inefficiencies. The experimental design employed anonymous online tasks involving selections from visually homogeneous, unbranded chocolates. Choice sets were incrementally scaled from 2 to 6 to 12 options, with product attributes held constant to isolate complexity as the primary independent variable. Participants completed multiple trials per condition, yielding measures of two key performance indicators. Preference consistency served as a gauge of stable revealed preferences. The frequency of dominated choices captured direct violations of rational choice axioms. Results indicate a marked decline in performance. Consistency rates fell from approximately 80% in the 2-option condition to 65% at 6 options and 45% at 12 options. This pattern reflects escalating cognitive load, prompting reliance on satisficing heuristics rather than exhaustive utility maximization. Economically, additional options impose unaccounted marginal costs including opportunity costs of evaluation time and decision fatigue that partially negate the welfare enhancements anticipated by standard theory, resulting in diminished net consumer surplus. Dominated choices occurred persistently at 5-10% across all conditions, exhibiting modest variability attributable to sampling error and perceptual ambiguities inherent in pilot data. Their prevalence underscores systematic deviations from rationality, even in low-stakes settings, consistent with behavioural models incorporating loss aversion and status quo effects. These findings challenge the presumption that choice proliferation unambiguously elevates welfare. Cognitive frictions engender decision paralysis, unstable preferences, and deadweight losses, as evidenced in prior field studies of retail overload. At the micro level, the experiment demonstrates bounded optimization over frictionless rationality. As a pilot investigation, limitations include a modest sample size, absence of monetary incentives, and an online format, constraining external validity. Nevertheless, the results provide exploratory evidence of the variety-cognition trade-off. Future research incorporating larger samples, incentive compatibility, temporal pressures, pricing, or diverse stimuli could delineate thresholds and inform welfare-enhancing designs for markets, digital interfaces, and regulatory frameworks.
Excess Choice, Choice Overload, Behavioural Economics, Preference Consistency, Dominated Choices, Bounded Rationality, Decision Fatigue, Consumer Welfare
Deepsimar Kaur*, Independent Researcher.
Kaur, D. (2026). The Economic Cost of Excess Choice: A Pilot Study on Decision Consistency and Dominated Preferences. The Global Consumer Intelligence Review, 1(1), 01-04.