A lot of people wonder how Lego, selling a now un-patented product, can command both massive market share and sell at twice the price of the nearest competitor: Megablocks. Rhett Allain, in his WIRED article addressing why lego sets are so expensive, unsatisfyingly concludes “Honestly, I don’t know much about plastic manufacturing – but the [...]
Association bias
Assume that when people think of you, they will store your name, a mental picture of you, a few words they associate with you and a few stories about your behavior. From this they will make all the decisions they have to make about you. Name association is a good start for promoting yourself because [...]
There’s a lot of psychology at play here. Lauren Rivera, examined hiring processes in three types of elite professional service firms: investment banks, law firms, and management consulting firms. “These types of firms share important similarities, allowing for a robust comparison.” Her results are fascinating. You have 10 seconds to make an impression – most [...]
Is addiction about the reward of dopamine or the anticipation of that reward? Neurologist Robert Sapolsky explains that it’s the uncertainty of the reward that drives behaviour. “Dopamine” Sapolsky argues, “is about the pursuit of happiness not the happiness itself.” Interestingly, we are able to keep our dopamine levels up for decades and decades waiting [...]
There is a ton of psychology at work in Apple’s new virtual assistant Siri and if they succeed, it will be much harder to change phones. This : The Siri group, one of the largest software teams at Apple, fine-tuned Siri’s responses in an attempt to forge an emotional tie with its customers. To that [...]
