Disappointment is the feeling of dissatisfaction that follows the failure of expectations or hopes[1] to manifest. Similar to regret, it differs in that a person who feels regret focuses primarily on the personal choices that contributed to a poor outcome, while a person feeling disappointment focuses on the outcome itself.[2] It is a source of psychological stress.[3] The study of disappointment—its causes, impact, and the degree to which individual decisions are motivated by a desire to avoid it—is a focus in the field of decision analysis,[2][4] as disappointment is, along with regret, one of two primary emotions involved in decision-making.[5]
Disappoint is traced to the Middle Englishdisappointen by way of the Old Frenchdesapointer. In literal meaning, it is to remove from office.[6] Its use in the sense of general frustration traces to the late 15th century, and it first appears recorded in English as an emotional state of dejection in the middle 18th century.[7]
Psychology
Disappointment is a subjective response related to anticipated rewards.[8] Disappointment recovery time depends on the intensity of the disappointment, as well as the person experiencing the disappointment. For some it can take a few minutes while for others the same disappointment can take a few days.
Disappointment, and an inability to prepare for it, has also been hypothesized as the source of occasional immune system compromise in optimists.[9] While optimists by and large exhibit better health,[10] they may alternatively exhibit less immunity when under prolonged or uncontrollable stress, a phenomenon which researchers have attributed to the "disappointment effect".[9] The "disappointment effect" posits that optimists do not utilize "emotional cushioning" to prepare for disappointment and hence are less able to deal with it when they experience it.[10][11] This disappointment effect has been challenged since the mid-1990s by researcher Suzanne Segerstrom, who has published, alone and in accord, several articles evaluating its plausibility. Her findings suggest that, rather than being unable to deal with disappointment, optimists are more likely to actively tackle their problems and experience some immunity compromise as a result.[12]
In 1994, psychotherapistIan Craib published the book The Importance of Disappointment, in which he drew on the works of Melanie Klein and Sigmund Freud in advancing the theory that disappointment-avoidant culture—particularly therapy culture—provides false expectations of perfection in life and prevents people from achieving a healthy self-identity.[13] Craib offered as two examples litigious victims of medical mistakes, who once would have accepted accidents as a course of life, and grieving people following the death of a loved one who, he said, are provided a false stage model of recovery that is more designed to comfort bereavement therapists than the bereaved.[14]
Lacanians considered childhood disappointment essential to entry into the symbolic world of culture;[15] disappointment in adulthood - the frustration of our demands by the world - as key to discovering who in fact we are.[16]
Law
Where goods or services have been purchased in the hope of some enjoyment and the delivery of the goods or services fails to generate the anticipated result, customers have at times sought damages for breach of contract on the grounds of disappointment and distress. Such damages are not generally allowed by the courts, but there are cases where an award for damages has been considered and agreed. English law cases include Jarvis v Swans Tours Ltd (1972) and Farley v Skinner (2001).
Milner v Carnival (2010) is another example where customers, in this case Mr and Mrs Milner, who took an extended cruise on the Cunard ship Queen Victoria, had expectations of a benefit which did not materialise and for which damages were sought both for "diminution of value" (the quantifiable difference between the payment made and the value derived) and for "distress and disappointment". Judge Simon Tuckey gave permission for an appeal against the trial ruling on damages, noting that this case "may provide the opportunity to give authoritative guidance on the appropriate measure of damages in 'holiday' cases" where disappointment is an issue.[17]
Disappointment theory, pioneered in the mid-1980s by David E. Bell with further development by Graham Loomes and Robert Sugden,[18] revolves around the notion that people contemplating risks are disappointed when the outcome of the risk is not evaluated as positively as the expected outcome.[18] Disappointment theory has been utilized in examining such diverse decision-making processes as return migration, taxpayer compliance and customer willingness to pay.[19] David Gill and Victoria Prowse have provided experimental evidence that people are disappointment averse when they compete.[20]
Disappointed individuals focus on "upward counterfactuals"—alternative outcomes that would have been better than the one actually experienced—to the point that even positive outcomes may result in disappointment.[21] One example, supplied by Bell, concerns a lottery win of $10,000.00, an event which will theoretically be perceived more positively if that amount represents the highest possible win in the lottery than if it represents the lowest.[22] Decision analysts operate on the assumption that individuals will anticipate the potential for disappointment and make decisions that are less likely to lead to the experience of this feeling.[18] Disappointment aversion has been posited as one explanation for the Allais paradox, a problematic response in expected utility theory wherein people prove more likely to choose a certain reward than to risk a greater reward while at the same time being willing to attempt a greater reward with lower probability when both options include some risk.[23]
While earlier developers of disappointment theory focused on anticipated outcomes, more recent examinations by Philippe Delquié and Alessandra Cillo of INSEAD have focused on the impact of later disappointment resulting when an actual outcome comes to be regarded negatively based on further development; for example, if a person receives higher than expected gains in the stock market, they may be elated until they discover a week later that they could have gained much more profit if they had waited a few more days to sell.[18] This experience of disappointment may influence subsequent behavior, and, the analysts state, an incorporation of such variables into disappointment theory may enhance the study of behavioral finance.[18] Disappointment is, along with regret, measured by direct questioning of respondents.[24]
↑ Kennett, White (1715). "A Seasonable Discourse of the Rise, Progress, Discovery, and Utter Disappointment of the Gun-powder Treason and Rebellion Plotted by the Papists in 1605 3 Jam. 1. As Delivered in a Sermon Preach'd in the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, London, on the 5th of November, 1715. ...". A Seasonable Discourse of the Rise, Progress, Discovery, and Utter Disappointment of the Gun-powder Treason and Rebellion Plotted by the Papists in 1605. T. Wood, and T. Sharpe: 24.
↑ Waelhens, Alphonse de; Eecke, Wilfried Ver (2001). Phenomenology and Lacan on Schizophrenia. Leuven: Leuven University Press. p.181. ISBN978-90-5867-160-8.
↑ Hill, Philip (2009-08-25). Lacan For Beginners. Red Wheel/Weiser. p.68. ISBN978-1-939994-13-4.
↑ Bell, David E. (Jan–Feb 1985). "Disappointment in Decision Making under Uncertainty". Operations Research. 33 (1): 1–27. doi:10.1287/opre.33.1.1. JSTOR170863.
↑ Jianmin Jia; James S. Dyer; John C. Butler (January 2001). "Generalized disappointment models". Journal of Risk and Uncertainty. 59 (1): 59–78. and Gul, Faruk (May 1991). "A Theory of Disappointment Aversion". Econometrica. 59 (3): 667–86. doi:10.2307/2938223. JSTOR2938223. For an alternate model of the Allais paradox, see The Allais Paradox at overcomingbias.com.
Craib, Ian (22 Sep 1994). The Importance of Disappointment. Routledge. p.216. ISBN978-0-415-09383-5.
Loomes, Graham (February 1988). "Further Evidence of the Impact of Regret and Disappointment in Choice under Uncertainty". Economica. 55 (217): 47–62. doi:10.2307/2554246. JSTOR2554246.
Behavioral economics is the study of the psychological factors involved in the decisions of individuals or institutions, and how these decisions deviate from those implied by traditional economic theory.
In economics and finance, risk aversion is the tendency of people to prefer outcomes with low uncertainty to those outcomes with high uncertainty, even if the average outcome of the latter is equal to or higher in monetary value than the more certain outcome.
Prospect theory is a theory of behavioral economics, judgment and decision making that was developed by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky in 1979. The theory was cited in the decision to award Kahneman the 2002 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics.
Decision theory or the theory of rational choice is a branch of probability, economics, and analytic philosophy that uses the tools of expected utility and probability to model how individuals should behave rationally under uncertainty. It differs from the cognitive and behavioral sciences in that it is prescriptive and concerned with identifying optimal decisions for a rational agent, rather than describing how people really do make decisions. Despite this, the field is important to the study of real human behavior by social scientists, as it lays the foundations for the rational agent models used to mathematically model and analyze individuals in fields such as sociology, economics, criminology, cognitive science, and political science.
In cognitive science and behavioral economics, loss aversion refers to a cognitive bias in which the same situation is perceived as worse if it is framed as a loss, rather than a gain. It should not be confused with risk aversion, which describes the rational behavior of valuing an uncertain outcome at less than its expected value.
The expected utility hypothesis is a foundational assumption in mathematical economics concerning decision making under uncertainty. It postulates that rational agents maximize utility, meaning the subjective desirability of their actions. Rational choice theory, a cornerstone of microeconomics, builds this postulate to model aggregate social behaviour.
A status quo bias or default bias is a cognitive bias which results from a preference for the maintenance of one's existing state of affairs. The current baseline is taken as a reference point, and any change from that baseline is perceived as a loss or gain. Corresponding to different alternatives, this current baseline or default option is perceived and evaluated by individuals as a positive.
In prospect theory, the pseudocertainty effect is the tendency for people to perceive an outcome as certain while it is actually uncertain in multi-stage decision making. The evaluation of the certainty of the outcome in a previous stage of decisions is disregarded when selecting an option in subsequent stages. Not to be confused with certainty effect, the pseudocertainty effect was discovered from an attempt at providing a normative use of decision theory for the certainty effect by relaxing the cancellation rule.
In decision theory, the Ellsberg paradox is a paradox in which people's decisions are inconsistent with subjective expected utility theory. John Maynard Keynes published a version of the paradox in 1921. Daniel Ellsberg popularized the paradox in his 1961 paper, "Risk, Ambiguity, and the Savage Axioms". It is generally taken to be evidence of ambiguity aversion, in which a person tends to prefer choices with quantifiable risks over those with unknown, incalculable risks.
The Allais paradox is a choice problem designed by Maurice Allais to show an inconsistency of actual observed choices with the predictions of expected utility theory. The Allais paradox demonstrates that individuals rarely make rational decisions consistently when required to do so immediately. The independence axiom of expected utility theory, which requires that the preferences of an individual should not change when altering two lotteries by equal proportions, was proven to be violated by the paradox.
Regret is the emotion of wishing one had made a different decision in the past, because the consequences of the decision one did make were unfavorable.
In decision theory and economics, ambiguity aversion is a preference for known risks over unknown risks. An ambiguity-averse individual would rather choose an alternative where the probability distribution of the outcomes is known over one where the probabilities are unknown. This behavior was first introduced through the Ellsberg paradox.
The rank-dependent expected utility model is a generalized expected utility model of choice under uncertainty, designed to explain the behaviour observed in the Allais paradox, as well as for the observation that many people both purchase lottery tickets and insure against losses.
One way of thinking holds that the mental process of decision-making is rational: a formal process based on optimizing utility. Rational thinking and decision-making does not leave much room for strong emotions. In fact, emotions are often considered irrational occurrences that may distort reasoning.
In decision theory, on making decisions under uncertainty—should information about the best course of action arrive after taking a fixed decision—the human emotional response of regret is often experienced, and can be measured as the value of difference between a made decision and the optimal decision.
In simple terms, risk is the possibility of something bad happening. Risk involves uncertainty about the effects/implications of an activity with respect to something that humans value, often focusing on negative, undesirable consequences. Many different definitions have been proposed. One international standard definition of risk is the "effect of uncertainty on objectives".
The certainty effect is the psychological effect resulting from the reduction of probability from certain to probable. It is an idea introduced in prospect theory.
Risk aversion is a preference for a sure outcome over a gamble with higher or equal expected value. Conversely, rejection of a sure thing in favor of a gamble of lower or equal expected value is known as risk-seeking behavior.
Suzanne C. Segerstrom is a professor of Psychology and biostatistician at the University of Kentucky. She is known for her clinical research on optimism and pessimism in relation to health, stress, and general well-being.
The uncertainty effect, also known as direct risk aversion, is a phenomenon from economics and psychology which suggests that individuals may be prone to expressing such an extreme distaste for risk that they ascribe a lower value to a risky prospect than its worst possible realization.
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