Rational vs Irrational debate

So, it’s the first week of Dan Ariely’s Coursera course and I have yet to find the time to check out the lecture videos. But what did catch my eye though, was the special offer to buy Ariely’s three books on Kindle for a special bundle price of £12.99, an offer only just made available outside the US and Canada, available only for students on his course.

I was already planning to get Ariely’s first book Predictably Irrational as I felt it was the best of his three books, and this bundle of three books looked like a real bargain. But it is fast becoming a test to my rational vs irrational side; an apt beginning to my journey on this course.

So, £12.99 for 3 books makes for £4.33 per book.  This is 34p than the £3.99 I was going to pay for the Kindle copy of Predicably Irrational, but  £2.66 savings on the Kindle copy of The Upside of Irrationality and a whopping £5.66 discount on his latest book The (Honest) Truth of Dishonesty.  What can I say? It’s a no-brainer, this bargain of a bundle.

Except that I wasn’t planning to buy the other two books, having already read them. But hey, this would be my chance to get all three of Ariely’s book. But it also means I pay £9 more for two books that I wasn’t planning on buying in the first place. But won’t it be great to own them anyway, now that I have a chance to get them on discount?  But do I need them? I may one day, they make great reference material for this blog? So do I make Ariely richer by buying more books, or save the £9 for something else?  How?

So goes the debate between the rational and not-so-rational (and easily distracted) sides of my brain. I figure it’s a good chance to apply some behavioural economic theory to my dilemma.

How about Ariely’s cost of zero cost theory (as expounded in the first book)? Technically, the books are not free. Although for the total saving of £7.98 through the bundle offer, I would technically be getting The Upside of Irrationality (and a portion of another book) free. Perhaps Ariely should have employed the framing theory on promoting this bundle by selling the ‘free’ part – sales will jump for sure if his theory is correct. Certainly, the ‘discount’ is enough to distract me to almost forget that I did not intend to buy the other two books in the first place.

 Or perhaps it’s the kiasu effect (research must be done on this phenomenon one day) which could be seen as a form of loss aversion – bird in hand worth two in bush and all that you know…

So will the rational or irrational side of me win? Save £9 by not buying two books I wasn’t intending to get anyway, or buy two books and get one free?

 Isn’t shopping mentally tiring?