Duration abandonment is the psychological recognition that people’s judgments about unpleasant experiences are very little dependent on the duration of those experiences (Kahneman and Fredrickson, 1993). Impact research by Kahneman, Fredrickson, Schreiber, and Redelmeyers (1993) has also provided key evidence for the end-of-the-peak rule, especially with regard to our memories of painful experiences. A rational and impartial retrospective assessment will consist of additional pain assessments over time; instead, assessments of our hedonic past often do not take into account the duration of the experience and are more influenced by peak and end levels of discomfort (Fredrickson & Kahneman, 1993). When assessing our hedonic past, the duration of the experience is often overlooked and is more influenced by peak and terminal levels of discomfort (Fredrickson & Kahneman, 1993). [Sources: 0, 1]
Kahneman and Tversky studied the peak rule in 1999, and they concluded that people remember their experience mainly based on their feelings at the peak and the end, not their shared experience. The peak and end rules were explored for the first time in a study in which participants were shown short, undrawn shots (Fredrickson & Kahneman, 1993). Duration neglect is a psychological observation that people’s unpleasant judgments about painful experiences hardly depend on the duration of these experiences. Evidence from research on the usefulness of positive experiences in memory shows that the best way to end pleasant experiences is also important (Diener, Wirtz & Oishi, 2001; Do, Rupert & Wolford, 2008; Fredrickson and Kahneman, 1993). [Sources: 0, 1, 5]
But a preference for a more moderate final list may arise from people simply averaging subjective moments that occur throughout the experience (Fredrickson and Kahneman, 1993; Diener et al., 2001; see also Anderson, 1981; 1965 for the mean contrast with additive processing during impression formation). The Peak Rule is a psychological term coined by Barbara Fredrickson and Daniel Kahneman. When assessing past experiences, people focus on the peak and end, while other parts of the experience are ignored. [Sources: 0, 6]
In their study (1993), participants watched a series of videos of varying degrees of enjoyment and length. In one study, Daniel Kahneman and Barbara Fredrickson showed that subjects are filmed with pleasure or with trouble. [Sources: 1, 5]
This controversial finding stems from the fact that people tend to use the so-called peak rule instead of judging experience based on total or average pain over time. [Sources: 7]
Schreiber and Kahneman (2000) have shown that evaluating uncomfortably loud sounds demonstrates clear end-of-peak effects. The results of the cold water immersion study have also been confirmed in an experiment using unpleasant noises (Schreiber and Kahneman, 2000). Second, research has shown that the impact of the law of peaks on daytime experiences is small. Adding a good ending encourages people to relive the event a second time. [Sources: 1, 6]
This study argued that people rate the experience at the end of the event. In another demonstration, Kahneman and Fredrickson and others asked subjects to dip their hands in painfully cold water. Our feelings at the climax and at the end of an event determine how people usually think about the experience. [Sources: 1, 5, 6]
Conversely, the negative ending spoils the memory of the experience, even if everything was perfect before. If a person wants him or others to do less, adding negative ending to the experience helps. Consequently, the participants in Group B found the experience less unpleasant, although in terms of both the duration and the amount of unpleasantness, Group A <Group B. were used to evaluate the procedure. [Sources: 6]
Two experiments show that the structure of learning fragments affects students’ assessment of their learning experience. High-profile ending experiences tend to be remembered in a more positive way. There are many ways to actively focus on experiences with a good ending. [Sources: 0, 4]
Researchers at University College London have developed a sort of corollary to Kahneman’s Self-Recollection. They showed that positive expectations affect a person’s overall happiness in the same way as actual experience. It is therefore not surprising that numerous studies show that the emotional component of the customer experience (how customers feel) is a better indicator of loyalty than the cognitive component (functional aspects such as efficiency and ease). However, in 2013, only 8% of companies included in the Forrester Index received excellent customer service ratings. [Sources: 8]
— Slimane Zouggari
##### Sources #####
[0]: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2970645/
[1]: https://positivepsychology.com/what-is-peak-end-theory/
[2]: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Duration-neglect-in-retrospective-evaluations-of-Fredrickson-Kahneman/85c233d9075c32a1eafebb14360c320e74b7ef5b
[3]: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9280.1993.tb00589.x
[4]: https://thedecisionlab.com/biases/peak-end-rule/
[5]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duration_neglect
[6]: https://kids.kiddle.co/Peak-end_rule
[7]: https://debiasme.com/biases/duration-neglect/
[8]: https://lippincott.com/insight/happiness/