Multi-Unit Consumption Structure and its Influence on Hedonic Decline

The unfortunate fact of consumption is that enjoyment decreases with repeated consumption, a phenomenon known as hedonic decline. This work investigates how the structure of repeated consumption influences such hedonic decline. Repeated consumption may occur across a series of consumption units, such as individual songs within a playlist or a series of posts on a social media feed. This work examines how two specific consumption structures, increasing and decreasing, can influence hedonic decline for such multi-unit consumption episodes. Increasing (vs. decreasing) structures refer to circumstances where consumption quantity grows (vs. declines) with repetition (e.g., the duration of songs: 3-minutes, 4-minutes, 5-minutes (or the reverse); or the number of images in successive social media posts: 1 photo followed by 3 photos (or the reverse)). Five experiments and one archival study show that, holding the total consumption quantity constant, decreasing structures attenuate hedonic decline relative to increasing structures. This structure effect is driven by changes in beliefs about subjective quantity consumed and is mitigated by providing an external reference about consumption quantity. Further, this structure effect has significant impacts on consumer choices. These findings speak to how consumers and firms can structure consumption episodes to minimize hedonic decline and, thus, maximize utility.