The next time a friend asks where you want to grab lunch or which movie you鈥檇 rather see, resist the urge to say, 鈥淚 have no preference鈥攜ou choose.鈥澨�
According to a recent study co-authored by Alix Barasch, an associate professor of marketing at the听Leeds School of Business, if you claim indifference, your friend believes you actually do have a preference, you鈥檙e just not disclosing it. Further, your perceived caginess makes the decision harder for your friend鈥攚ho may end up liking you less as a result.
Alix Barasch听(Credit: Cody Johnston/兔子先生传媒文化作品)
That鈥檚 a lot to unpack, but think about a time when you were forced to be the decision-maker in this scenario. Did you take your friend鈥檚 鈥渘o preference鈥� statement at face value?
Generally, 鈥渨e don鈥檛 believe them,鈥� Barasch said. 鈥淧eople have very well-established preference structures. It鈥檚 rare that people don鈥檛 have opinions on things and as a result, we assume that when someone says 鈥榥o preference,鈥� they do have a preference.鈥�
The motivations behind not stating a preference are generally positive, the researchers found, but this form of decision-delegating can have a negative effect on the relationship.听
鈥淲e want to be nice or we really don鈥檛 care that much, and we think it will make the other person鈥檚 life easier,鈥� Barash said. 鈥淏ut even though we鈥檝e all been on both sides, when we think about somebody who has said this to us, we immediately know that鈥檚 annoying.鈥�
The paper, 鈥淵ou Must Have a Preference: The Impact of No Preference Communication on Joint Decision Making,鈥� was published in June 2022 in the and involved six studies using real-life and hypothetical decisions.
The researchers, who also included Nicole You Jeung Kim of The Faculty of Business at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University; Yonat Zwebner of the Arison School of Business at Reichman University in Israel; and Rom Y. Schrift of the Kelley School of Business at Indiana University, highlighted three consequences of no-preference communication.
鈥淔irst, we find very consistently that it makes the decision harder for the person who has to choose,鈥� Barasch said. 鈥淭his is counterintuitive because if someone says they don鈥檛 have a preference and you really believe them, then it should become an individual decision-making process鈥攋ust choose what you prefer. But if you don鈥檛 believe the person, then you鈥檙e trying to guess what they want and the choice becomes more difficult.鈥�
Barasch said the second consequence of showing indifference when asked to state a preference has to do with 鈥渟ocial utility.鈥澨�
鈥淚t really just means that you鈥檙e liked less. People don鈥檛 like people who aren鈥檛 honest and don鈥檛 share what they really feel. If it鈥檚 your partner, do you really love them less? No.This is a tiny difference on the margin, but it matters because being annoyed with people has consequences over time,鈥� she said.
Finally, the third consequence is a 鈥渓ose-lose scenario,鈥� Barasch said, where the decision-maker concludes that the other person鈥檚 preference is likely dissimilar to their own and chooses an option that they themselves like less.
But what if you truly don鈥檛 have a preference?
鈥淲hat I鈥檇 recommend is to express something even if it鈥檚 not making the final decision. I think there鈥檚 kind of a middle ground where you can narrow it down to a category or rule out one of three options,鈥� Barasch said. 鈥淭he goal here is expressing something鈥攇ive some signal value that you鈥檙e not totally flaky or unable to take any action. You are willing to state an opinion.鈥�
Barasch acknowledged that it can be difficult when there is a power imbalance in the relationship鈥攆or example, when your boss asks where you鈥檇 like to go to lunch鈥攂ut she advises offering up something. In her own life, Barasch said she鈥檚 increasingly using the 鈥渘arrowing-down tactic.鈥�
Beyond interpersonal relationships, the study鈥檚 implications in the corporate realm could include managers exploring new ways of prompting people to speak up or to do so anonymously. Streaming services could incorporate a feature that facilitates joint decision-making 鈥渨ithout having to force this awkward exchange,鈥� Barasch said. She added that for companies, the challenge is 鈥渉ow to get people to express real preferences and real opinions.鈥�
Still hung up on the finding that you鈥檒l be liked less for refusing to state a preference? The researchers tested whether the feelings of dislike come from the decision difficulty or the disbelief.听
鈥淚t comes from the disbelief,鈥� Barasch said. 鈥淚t comes from the suspicion that you鈥檙e not revealing your true preferences, not from the difficulty of making the decision. What鈥檚 good about that is if you express no preference and it comes across genuinely, then yes, the person鈥檚 decision is still more difficult but it doesn鈥檛 make them like you less.鈥�
