Desire and pleasure in choice

Abstract

This article considers how desire leads to pleasure through choice. A typical assumption of rational choice models is that decision makers experience pleasure or utility primarily when their desires are satisfied by decision outcomes. This article proposes that, in addition to desire yielding pleasure through its satisfaction, desiring can also yield pleasure directly during choice. Beyond the pleasures of getting what we want, there may be pleasures in the wanting. In particular, four psychological and behavioral mechanisms through which desire can yield pleasure during choosing are identified: imagining the desired object, learning about the desired object, constructing one’s self while clarifying the desired object, and pursuing the desired object. This said, although desire may, through these mechanisms, offer considerable immediate pleasure, this article posits that indulging these pleasures tends to foster subsequent disappointment with decision outcomes. The article concludes by considering the implications for decision making of this expanded view of desire’s relationship to pleasure in choice.