Self-Regulatory Strength and Consumers’ Relinquishment of Decision Control: When Less Effortful Decisions Are More Resource Depleting

Using the self-regulatory strength model and prior research on self-esteem threats, the authors predict and show that delegating decisions to surrogates (e.g., financial advisors, physicians) depletes consumers’ limited self-regulatory resources more than making the same decisions independently, thus impairing their subsequent ability to exercise self-control. This is the case even though decision delegation actually requires less decision-making effort than independent decision making (Study 1). However, the resource-depleting effect of decision delegation vanishes when consumers have an opportunity to affirm their belief in free will (Study 2). Moreover, when people remember a past decision that they delegated, their self-control is impaired more than when they remember a decision made independently (Studies 3 and 4). The authors conclude with a discussion of the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.