n.
Terminology | opportunity costs

when choosing, you "pay the price" of losing out on opportunities provided by other options.

1

Benefits you lose by choosing one option over another. In other words, this puts the focus of our choices on the alternative options available when making a decision. For example, when choosing an ice cream flavor between Strawberry Swirl and Orange Sorbet you decide to choose the Sorbet, so the cost you pay is the enjoyment of Strawberry Swirl. But acknowledging this too often can be detrimental to our well being because it creates added stress and fear of regret, continually questioning “what could have been.”

Opportunity Costs

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Designed & built by: Zohar Pomerantz |  Special thanks to: Assaf Dov Cohen and Polar Team

The belief that more choice, and so more freedom, is a good thing is actually incorrect —

Choice is a real struggle when there's so much of it. The more options to choose from simply leaves us feeling overwhelmed, while having direct consequences on our mental wellbeing. This can lead to an increase in anxiety and depression, in decreased satisfaction, and regret over the choices we have already made. This issue is most commonly known as choice overload or “The Burden of Choice.”

The Project:

This project was born from personal experience, of wanting to learn more about my own decision anxiety and the reasons for why I suffer from it. Off the start, while researching the subject, I began to realize just how many other people are influenced by this same anxiety, yet feel alone in it, unaware of the existence of 'choice overload.' More so than that, while educating myself on the subject I began to feel disorientated - all the information available was scattered among different platforms, hidden in tiresome textual formats that would cause the average person to abandon the effort of learning altogether. “The Burden of Choice” was designed as a solution to these problems, creating a visual platform to expose users to the issue— providing a place to experience and learn more about it, while giving the issue the proper acknowledgment and recognition that it deserves.