Radiolab: "Choice" (November 17, 2008)
Hosted by Jad Abumrad & Robert Krulwich
A detailed summary by podcast timestamp

Episode Overview

This episode of Radiolab explores the paradoxical relationship humans have with choice: How does having too many options impact our happiness? How do our brains cope with complex decisions? Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, joined by leading psychologists, neuroscientists, and writers, guide listeners through the science of choice—from the overwhelming aisles of a grocery store to the subtleties of gut feelings, rationality, and unconscious biases. They examine the limits and consequences of free will, the ways in which emotions are necessary for decision-making, and how even physical sensations (like a hot cup of coffee) can unconsciously influence our judgments.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Paradox of Choice in Modern Life

Featuring: Barry Schwartz (Swarthmore College psychologist, author of "The Paradox of Choice")

• Scene: Supermarket in Berkeley Bowl, renowned for its enormous produce selection.
• Key Theme: The abundance of choice leads to anxiety and paralysis rather than happiness.
• Notable moment: Schwartz points to how college students, given every opportunity, are paralyzed by options and terrified of making wrong choices that close off other doors.
  • “People don’t know what to do. They don’t know how to choose. They can’t face a world in which everything is available.” — Barry Schwartz (04:00)
• Insight: The ‘disease of modernity’ is an anxiety over making choices—especially for the privileged, which manifests as “choice angst.”

2. Cognitive Limits and The Magic Number Seven

Guests: Jonah Lehrer (author)

• Psychological Principle: George Miller's 1956 "Magic Number Seven” — humans can hold about 7±2 pieces of information in working memory. (06:01)
  • “The average human could hold about seven digits, plus or minus two, at any given moment in working memory.” — Jonah Lehrer (06:30)
• Implication: Cognitive overload directly hampers our rational decision-making capacity.

3. The Cake vs. Fruit Experiment: Overloading Reason

Featuring: Baba Shiv, Stanford behavioral psychologist

• Experiment: Subjects trying to keep either a 2-digit or 7-digit number in mind are offered cake or fruit.
  • Those with 2 digits typically chose the healthy fruit; those with 7 digits overwhelmingly chose the cake.
    (08:00–09:40)
• Insight: Slightly overloading the working memory suppresses rational, deliberative brain functions and gives the emotional brain control ("Team Reason is pretty feeble").
  • “Seven numbers is all it takes to screw up reason.” — Jonah Lehrer (11:46)

4. Regret and Post-Choice Lament

• Anecdote: Jad deliberates endlessly over apples and ends up less satisfied than Robert, who chooses quickly and is happier.
• Point: The more you deliberate, the greater the potential regret.
  “You can only hold so much data at once… so you can fixate on seven apples, but only one piece of information for each apple.” — Jonah Lehrer (14:09)
• Barry Schwartz: The plague of “what could have been” haunts those confronted with too many choices.

5. Escape from Indecision: Routine and Rule-Making

Featuring: Oliver Sacks, neurologist & author

• Approach: Sacks self-regulates by creating routines (e.g., seven apples a week: one per day) to escape endless decision-making.
  • “If I had 70 apples, I would eat them all.” — Oliver Sacks (16:06)
• Story: Over-ordering kidneys and being unable to waste them, leading to self-inflicted suffering—a metaphor for the potential downside of unbounded choices.

6. Could We Be Purely Rational Choosers?

Featuring: Dr. Antoine Bechara (USC neurologist), Jonah Lehrer
Case Study: "Elliot"—the Unemotional Accountant

• Details:
  • After the removal of a brain tumor in the orbital frontal cortex, Elliot loses his ability to feel emotions but retains his IQ.
  • Becomes pathologically indecisive, unable to make even minor choices.
  • Neurological tests show an absence of emotional response to disturbing images.
    • “Here was this guy who couldn’t experience emotions, and he was pathologically indecisive.” — Jonah Lehrer (30:04)
• Conclusion: Emotions are essential to navigate and abbreviate choices. Pure logic leads to paralysis and ruin.
  • “Without feeling, you’re stuck.” — Antoine Bechara (30:36)

7. The Power and Source of Gut Feelings

Featured Story: Steven Johnson (author) recounts a near-accident with a storm window.

• Point: The emotional brain stores pattern snapshots of danger or reward and triggers feelings as summary signals—essential for survival. Gut feelings are our subconscious drawing on all lived experience to guide us when options blur together. (36:04)
• Jad's explanation: "A gut feeling is… a kind of shorthand average of all of this past wisdom.” (37:24)

8. Loss Aversion — Why Losses Hurt More

Experiment: Mike Pesca surveys people’s willingness to gamble; most refuse unless the potential gain is at least twice the potential loss.
(38:06–39:33)

• Key Fact: Losses loom twice as large as gains; a $2 win is required to risk $1.

  • “Everybody seems to converge around two bucks… loss hurts twice as much as gain feels good.” — Mike Pesca (39:29)

• Application: In casinos, Harrah’s uses ‘loyalty cards’ to track individual pain points and manage loss aversion, rewarding guests just as they’re reaching their own limits to keep them playing. (41:00–44:00)

9. The Illusion of Conscious Will: Who’s Really Choosing?

Discussion with: Malcolm Gladwell (author, "Blink", "Outliers")

• Poster Study Story: When people must explain their choices, they prefer easy-to-explain, less sophisticated options (cat posters over impressionist art)—and later regret the choice.
  • “The act of making you explain your preferences not only biased you in favor of something that you didn’t actually want, it also made you change your preference…” — Malcolm Gladwell (50:29)
• Capitalism’s Saving Grace: Many of the biggest cultural successes only make it through because someone ignores focus group data and “goes with their gut.” (51:20)
• Priming Experiments:
  • People primed with elderly words ("wrinkle", "Florida") literally walk slower.
  • Thinking of professors improves trivia results; thinking of soccer hooligans worsens them. (53:36–54:12)
• Coffee Temperature Study (John Bargh, Yale):
  • Holding a warm cup of coffee unconsciously makes people rate others as “warmer”; cold coffee does the reverse (56:32–56:42).

10. Unconscious Bias & The Limits of Self-Knowledge

• Gladwell shares: Even he, though biracial, shows an unconscious preference for whites when taking the IAT (Implicit Association Test), showing how culture programs our subconscious (60:06).
  • “My unconscious is just basically collecting impressions… from the world I live in, amassing this massive database in a very kind of unfiltered way.” — Malcolm Gladwell (60:14)
• Big Question: If so much choice is driven by “mysterious” motivations, priming, and biases, how much control do we really have?
  • “The notion of conscious will is an illusion… we make up stories that make us feel good about the decisions we make, but in fact, we’re not really as nearly as in charge as we think we are.” — Malcolm Gladwell (62:04)

Notable Quotes

• “People don’t know what to do. They don’t know how to choose. They can’t face a world in which everything is available.” — Barry Schwartz (04:00)
• “Seven numbers is all it takes to screw up reason.” — Jonah Lehrer (11:46)
• “Without feeling, you’re stuck.” — Antoine Bechara (30:36)
• “A gut feeling is… a kind of shorthand average of all of this past wisdom.” — Jad Abumrad (37:24)
• “Loss hurts twice as much as gain feels good.” — Mike Pesca (39:29)
• “The act of making you explain your preferences not only biased you in favor of something that you didn’t actually want, it also made you change your preference…” — Malcolm Gladwell (50:29)
• “My unconscious is just basically collecting impressions and thoughts and biases… amassing this massive database in a very kind of unfiltered way.” — Malcolm Gladwell (60:14)
• “The notion of conscious will is an illusion.” — Malcolm Gladwell (62:04)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• [01:42] Introduction to the problem of choice (Berkeley Bowl scene)
• [03:09] Barry Schwartz on the modern crisis of too much choice
• [06:01] "Magic Number Seven" and cognitive limits
• [08:00] Baba Shiv’s cake vs. fruit memory-load experiment
• [12:16] Apple aisle anecdote: more choice leading to regret
• [15:27] Oliver Sacks on his routines and self-regulation
• [26:06] Case study: Elliot, the emotionless decision maker
• [36:04] Steven Johnson – how brains process feelings and danger
• [38:06] Loss aversion experiment with coin flips
• [41:00] Harrah’s casino: loyalty cards and data-driven loss management
• [48:00] Malcolm Gladwell on the perils of introspection, unconscious influences
• [53:36] Priming experiments (walking speed, trivia performance)
• [56:32] Coffee-temperature “warmth” experiment
• [60:06] Implicit bias and the illusion of conscious will

Overall Tone & Takeaways

The episode, marked by wit and curiosity, echoes Radiolab’s signature blend of storytelling, science, and sound design. It playfully (but seriously) probes the tenuous line between rational choice and emotional impulse, our powerful urges to avoid regret and loss, and—unsettlingly—the realization that our decisions may be guided more by subconscious scripts than conscious deliberation. The hosts and guests maintain a conversational, often humorous tone, even as they explore some of the most profound, and at times troubling, dimensions of human psychology.

For further exploration or to listen again, visit Radiolab.org.