Psychologist logo
A representation of Psyche, taken from the BPS logo
BPS updates

Paul Rozin: Time management

Paul Rozin is Professor of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania where he also acts as co-director of the school’s Solomon Asch Center for the Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict.

04 October 2009

By Guest

I generally believe that we learn from experience. However, a recent study I did with Karlene Hanko repeats a finding from Kahneman and Snell, that people are very poor at predicting how their liking will change for a new product (in our case, two new foods and two new body products) after using it for a week.

We predicted that the parents of our college undergraduates would be better than their children at predicting their hedonic trajectory, but 25 more years of self-experience did nothing for them. Nor for me. Every night, I bring home a pile of work to do in the evening and early morning.

I have been doing this for over 50 years. I always think I will actually get through all or most of it, and I almost never get even half done. But I keep expecting to accomplish it all. What a fool I am.

Paul Rozin is Professor of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania where he also acts as co-director of the school’s Solomon Asch Center for the Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict.