tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-132520298120231193.post426161246790181411..comments2023-12-23T02:10:09.875-05:00Comments on howl at pluto: The price-placebo effectLFChttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13551197682770555147noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-132520298120231193.post-83536442284543386202008-06-13T09:07:00.000-04:002008-06-13T09:07:00.000-04:00bro,good points. the effect may work differently a...bro,<BR/>good points. the effect may work differently across products. the discount-drinkers of the energy drink did know they had gotten a bargain, by the way.<BR/>In case anyone out there is interested, the studies were published in Proceedings of the Natl Academy of Sciences (wine) and Journal of Marketing Research (energy drink). The principal author referenced in the WP article is Baba Shiv (Stanford).LFChttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13551197682770555147noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-132520298120231193.post-36785314987402059872008-06-13T07:19:00.000-04:002008-06-13T07:19:00.000-04:00Fascinating. Not clear whether the discount-drink...Fascinating. Not clear whether the discount-drinkers of energy drink in the "earlier study" knew they had gotten a bargain. If so, that would argue against the discount-placebo effect you propose (if the study was sound). In any case, the issues of a) whether the subject pays for the item and b) whether the subject thinks it's a bargain are crucial. I can imagine the price-placebo effect working hand-in-hand with a discount placebo effect, to wit: the subject's added pleasure from consuming a presumed luxury product is magnified by the knowledge that s/he paid less. But I wonder whether the discount-placebo effect would activate quite the same pleasure center, since the fact of a discount is not as directly identified with the presumed quality of a product as the fact of a high price. I can also imagine that these effects would work VERY differently across ethnic, religious, class, SES, and generational lines. I know of one person who suffered through the depression and afterwards would drink only cream, never milk. I know of others who had the opposite reaction (so do you!). And then (thinking of Spitzer, who kindly triggered this whole thing) there's the question of whether the effect works the same way across products. Energy drinks and wine are one thing, and, well, I'll stop there.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com