Choice overload.
In plain English
Choice overload is the finding that beyond a point, more options make deciding harder, not better. Iyengar and Lepper showed it in 2000: shoppers offered 24 jams were far less likely to buy than shoppers offered 6, and people given fewer options were more satisfied afterward. In money it means a plan with dozens of funds, or a market with endless products, can push people to freeze, pick poorly, or put the decision off entirely, which for something like retirement saving carries a real cost in delay.
01Why it matters
A decision delayed or dodged because there are too many options can cost years of saving or investing, so recognizing choice overload helps people narrow a field deliberately instead of stalling in front of it.
02The math, step by step
A new 401(k) offers thirty funds. Faced with the wall of choices, someone keeps meaning to enroll and never does, or picks almost at random and never revisits it. In the Iyengar and Lepper pattern, the smaller menu would have made a real decision more likely.
03What this is NOT
It is not that choice is bad. Some options clearly beat none. Choice overload is the specific point where the number of options starts to lower the odds of deciding well or at all, which is a different claim from more is always worse.
04Receipts
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