Abstract
There are two important discussions of commitment in economic literature: one is commitment à la Elster and Schelling, which is related to self-binding choices and means that the person has the desire to restrict the future set of options. The other is commitment à la Sen, which implies a different rationality from the standard maximization rationality and means that the person can choose an option which is not necessarily best for her. In this paper, we set out to show that these two discussions of commitment are related. We do so by presenting a theory of choice under motivation conflict , followed by a discussion of the consequences that the reading of commitment through motivation conflict has on well-being.
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Notes
- 1.
This consistency condition is described in more detail in Sect. 5.2.
- 2.
In what follows, the words welfare and well-being are used interchangeably.
- 3.
For a formal treatment of such decision problems see Arlegi and Teschl (2012).
- 4.
The formal treatment of these questions is again based on Arlegi and Teschl (2012).
- 5.
Sometimes this definition may cause confusion. In fact, commitment, we think, is most commonly understood as “sticking to” or “being dedicated to” a cause, action, activity etc. and one way of doing this would be by imposing self-binding constraints. The definition by Elster cited above reads as if commitment was meant to be the desire to create obstacles with a view to sticking to a certain action or cause etc. The effect at the end is the same, but in the former case commitment is the result, while in the latter case it is the means to achieve a particular behavior. We think that commitment should not be restricted to be self-binding constraints (or the desire thereof) but to the fact that if a person is committed, she is engaged with carrying out a particular action, activity, etc.
- 6.
Elster also discusses time-discounting for strategic reasons. For this latter phenomenon, interaction with others is necessary. We do not discuss this aspect here because we are only concerned with non-strategic individual decision-making.
- 7.
For a formal treatment of these questions see Arlegi and Teschl (2013).
- 8.
Given that the current action has become more pleasant through reinforcement, the importance of an action that at first seemed to be less pleasant increases. In some sense, the person who commits to pleasure accepts that an action becomes as enjoyable tomorrow as the action she had chosen today and this is what she prioritizes when she “commits to pleasure”. Therefore reinforcement as we discuss it here can be said to have the opposite effect to the “hedonic treadmill”.
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Arlegi, R., Teschl, M. (2015). Conflict, Commitment and Well-Being. In: Søraker, J., Van der Rijt, JW., de Boer, J., Wong, PH., Brey, P. (eds) Well-Being in Contemporary Society. Happiness Studies Book Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-06459-8_5
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