Ranking makes us focus only on those at the top of the hierarchy and disregard the rest, says new study
A new study published by the American Psychological Association suggests that landing first place on a “top 10” list can confer significant benefits on the top-ranked option, magnifying the differences between it and all other options and blinding people to important details that might otherwise influence their decision-making.
“We find that ranking helps only those in the top spot, and the rest suffer from it. The implications of this can be found in almost every corner of society, because ranking is practically everywhere — movies, novels, cars, vacuum cleaners, even academic institutions such as universities are typically ranked,” explained Jinseok Chun, study co-author from Sungkyunkwan University in the Republic of Korea.
Chun and Duke University co-author Richard P. Larrick, PhD, ran seven tests with historical sports data and over 3,600 total online participants.
In the first experiment, the researchers looked at 70 years of data on which NBA players were selected to the all-NBA squad each year by a vote of sports journalists. The researchers looked at players’ statistics, such as whether they were first in one of three categories (points, assists, and rebounds per game), as well as their “win shares,” a more comprehensive measure of overall performance. They discovered that players who ranked first in points, assists, or rebounds were more likely to be selected to the all-NBA squad than players who did not rank first in any of the categories but had a similar total performance record.
The scientists then looked at how ranking influenced online participants’ selections in a range of circumstances, such as hiring decisions and selecting restaurants, gyms, and plumbing goods.
In one trial, for example, participants were offered a list of six restaurants from the OpenTable website. The restaurants’ ratings (on a five-point scale) were presented to one group of participants in three categories: “food,” “service,” and “overall.” Another group of participants only received a ranked list of the restaurants (first through sixth), which was based on the restaurants’ total ratings. Both the ratings and the ranking were shown to the final group. The participants were all aware that the ranking list was solely based on the restaurants’ “overall” ratings.
Among the six restaurants, restaurant 5 had the highest “overall” rating (and the second highest “food” rating), while restaurant 4 had the highest “food” rating (and the second highest “overall” rating). The researchers discovered that in the ratings-and-ranking condition, participants were significantly more likely to choose restaurant 5 than in the ratings-only condition (42 percent vs. 30 percent), despite the fact that the ranking provided no actual additional information that was not available in the ratings-only condition.
In other trials conducted as part of the study, the researchers discovered that the ranking effect held true in decisions including selecting a gym, selecting a drain unclogging product, and making a hiring decision. It was also true when the options were labeled “#3” through “#8” – a top-ranked option did not have to be labeled “#1” to profit from the top ranking.
The researchers also discovered one possible reason for the ranking effect: individuals spent more time reading about and paying attention to the choice that was listed first on a list.
Because they invest a disproportionate amount of attention to the top-ranked option when given rank information, decision-makers tend to learn the strength of the top-ranked option, but ignore the strengths of the other options, according to the researchers.
“Ranking makes us focus only on those at the top of the hierarchy and disregard the rest,” Chun said.
According to the study, ranking has advantages and disadvantages. When faced with an overwhelming amount of data, ranking can help people make faster judgments, but it can also cause them to dismiss useful information and make less-than-optimal conclusions. According to the experts, more research can assist explain when ranking helps and when it hampers decision-making.
The results of the study were published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
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