What Causes Us to Regret Key Decisions?

Source: Getty Images

Do you find yourself often regretting the path not taken? What's causing those feelings?  Is it affecting your job satisfaction, or your commitment to a key plan of action at work?  Scholars Daniel Feiler and Johannes Müller-Trede have published a fascinating study about regret in the context of decision making.  Prior research had shown that "decision-makers both anticipate and experience greater regret when they can observe the consequences of unchosen options."   However, these two scholars found something slightly different in their study.  They discovered that, "Participants in our studies were more likely to experience regret when they did not observe the outcome of the forgone alternative than when it was revealed."  How could that be?  

Feiler and Müller-Trede discovered that the explanation as to do with our beliefs.  What do we believe is the value of a foregone alternative vs. what is the actual value of that option we dismissed?  They found that, "When there are many alternatives to choose from under uncertainty, the perceived attractiveness of the almost-chosen alternative tends to exceed its reality."  In short, we exhibit over-inflated beliefs about options we rejected.  This misguided beliefs cause feelings of regret.