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  • 2025
  • Working Paper
  • HBS Working Paper Series

A Preference for Revision Absent Improvement

By: Ximena Garcia-Rada, Leslie K. John, Ed O’Brien and Michael I. Norton
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:47
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Abstract

People regularly encounter revised stimuli (e.g., revised versions of products, new editions of books, tweaked recipes, and technological updates). In principle, a world of constant revision should benefit people by affording them the most up-to-date offerings. In practice, however, the current research reveals a potential cost: People cannot easily tell the difference between genuine improvement from merely superficial change and instead appear to uniformly assume all revised stimuli are better stimuli—even when nothing has improved in reality. Six studies document this effect and its psychological underpinnings, suggesting people rely on revision labels as an overgeneralized heuristic into stimulus quality. For example, participants became more likely to choose a stimulus merely when it was labeled as revised—and even when the product was indeed revised but made worse. Accordingly, this effect was attenuated when it was easier for participants to evaluate stimulus quality.

Keywords

Product Change; Versioning; Expectancy Effects; Heuristics; Intuitive Processing; Product Marketing; Change; Perception; Consumer Behavior

Citation

Garcia-Rada, Ximena, Leslie K. John, Ed O’Brien, and Michael I. Norton. "A Preference for Revision Absent Improvement." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 19-087, February 2019. (Revised April 2025.)
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About The Authors

Leslie K. John

Negotiation, Organizations & Markets
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Michael I. Norton

Negotiation, Organizations & Markets
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More from the Authors
  • Measuring the Prevalence of Sensitive Behaviors By: Tamar Krishnamurti and Leslie John
  • The Agreeable Revealer: Personality Correlates of Self-Disclosure By: Elinora Pentcheva and Leslie John
  • Should I Stay or Should I Disclose? How Omission Bias Guides Our Disclosure Decisions By: Elinora Pentcheva and Leslie John
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