Estimate Participative Consumption Durations

There are drivers who consider a GPS travel duration estimate as offering a stimulating challenge. It serves as a time to beat.
     Researchers at Boston College, University of Oregon, and University of Toronto find other sources of pleasure in duration estimates for participative consumption. In a world filled with options and obligations, we can feel starved for time. When making a consumption decision, we’ll attend to the monetary price, but also the expenditure in minutes or hours. People like to know how long they are in it for. How long will it take to bake the pie, assemble the furniture, or complete each training module?
     Contrary to what we might expect, a higher duration estimate, within reason, leads to greater enjoyment of the participation and greater willingness to recommend the activity to others. This seems inconsistent with feeling starved for time, but it really isn’t. Once a consumer agrees to take on the task, they can relax, not being concerned with the expenditure in minutes. This is true even when, or maybe especially when, the estimate becomes a time to beat. The researchers interpret their findings in a context of social norms. Consumers consider duration estimates as, “This is how long other people took.”
     A recommendation from the research is to provide consumers with accurate time estimates for their expected participation. The payoff in pleasure from a longer duration comes at the end, not the beginning. An earlier study at University of Toronto considered circumstances when a consumer is required to carry out some bothersome tasks: A carpet store requires the purchaser to prepare for the installation by moving items and then, after installation, moving items back into place. In applying for membership to a prestigious country club, the prospect must not only gather the funds for the dues, but also complete forms and coax references. To undergo a medical procedure, the patient might need to carry out a set of steps both before the procedure and afterwards.
     If a marketer tells the shopper the total expected duration, it makes the tasks seem less tolerable at the start, the studies found. The researchers went on, though, to suggest a way to ease the agony a bit: Encourage the consumer to unpack the time estimates, guessing on their own how long each step will take rather than accept a time for the total given by somebody else.

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Cojoin the Stages of Coproduction
Hand Off Intended Hands-Off Items
Unpack Unpleasant Experience Time Estimates
Round Up Benefits for the Shopper