Dual-Self Model
The Basic Idea
Smoking is the leading preventable cause of premature death in the United States.1 While approximately 70% of smokers indicate a desire to quit smoking, only 2% to 3% actually do so. This internal conflict between the desire and ability to stop smoking comes from the difficulty of prioritizing long-term benefits (i.e. improved health) over short-term benefits (i.e. the rush of dopamine from nicotine).2 If you’ve ever felt like your long-term and short-term goals are at war, you’ve experienced the concept driving dual-self models.3
Dual-self models in behavioral science refer to the conflict that we feel when trying to balance our immediate desires with options that we know are more beneficial in the long-run.3 While classic economic theory predicts humans to be rational decision makers who prioritize maximum utility (also known as homo economicus), this assumption doesn’t correspond to reality. Smokers, for example, choose the momentary dopamine hit from a cigarette over the long-term health benefits of avoiding cigarettes, even if this behavior is not rational. Dual-self models thus address the paradox created by classic economic views of decision utility, by considering many different decision criteria.
The individual at any point in time is assumed to be both a farsighted planner and a myopic doer. The resulting conflict is seen to be fundamentally similar to the agency conflict between the owners and managers of a firm.
– Richard Thaler and Hersh Shefrin, pioneers of the first dual-self model
