Why don’t we do what we Want?
“Why don’t…” is the first article I co-authored with Pau Rausell back in 1999 for the FOKUS/ACEI Joint Symposium in Viena (2000). It was an original idea from Pau regarding consumers’ preferences and why they were biased. I explain, why the hell everybody says YES when s/he is asked if reads?, whether if asked about porn everyone says NO!?. This situation he said was due to the fact of reputable vs embarrassing preferences. Well, in 2004 after some years we decided to retake the theme, and this (unpublished) article was born.
This thesis has some implications for marketing purposes, since some marketers think “customers don’t actually know what they want. In fact, when asked what they want they don’t say what they really want!!!” (most recently heard by me from Malcom Gladwell on Expomanagement 2006 here in Brazil). But my feelings are “is it just they don’t want to say what they really want because of this preferences duality???”. We’ll carry on our research.
