Ask HN: what influence your purchase?

Honestly, it's hard to say. I don't think I'm driven much by obvious and immediate peer influence, since I can't remember the last time I bought anything... mp3 player, car, clothes, etc. based on any influence from a close friend. I have pretty specific tastes in each of those things, and I tend to buy what I want based on my own criteria.

Now how much my tastes - in general - where shaped by the influence of others in an indirect sense, is hard to say. For example, the last portable music player I bought was chosen specifically because it was the biggest device the local Best Buy had in stock that supports Ogg Vorbis. I favor patent unencumbered formats like Ogg, and am trying to get away from using mp3s in general. So, how much did my friends, colleagues, etc. influence my stance as a free software, open standards, open source, etc. ideologue? I have no idea.

Same for my last car... I bought a Mazda RX-8 because I like fast, sporty little cars; not because any of my friends have RX-8's (ok, one friend has one, but I didn't know it when I bought mine.) But who's to say why I like fast, black, sports cars? I look at it more as a matter of accretion, over the course of decades, and the influence of many sources... not something I can pin on any specific (small) set of immediate influencers.

Clothes? Hmmm.. I don't dress like anybody I know, since I like to wear waist-coats and cravats with jeans. It's an eclectic taste I glommed together from bits & pieces of various influences.... being a Doctor Who fan, liking the Steampunk genre, Victorian era fiction, etc.

Now is any of that purely rational? Hell no. There's definitely a peer influence, "glommed together from bits over time" aesthetic. But there is (sometimes) a rational aspect mixed in. Like choosing a certain music player because of it's format support and storage capacity, or choosing Mazda because they have a good quality reputation, etc.

I guess that was a lot of words to say "I don't know," but that's kinda it. It's hard to isolate the different factors that go into these decisions.

Coming from a psychology background myself, I would say yes, we definitely underestimate how external factors affect our decision-makings. Peer pressure is one obvious influence, but I would personally say the biggest influences come from factors we're not even aware of. Some I can think of at the top of my head are the way we're influenced by:

- our fear of loss - our first impressions (which usually influence all subsequent decisions/habits) - our sense of ownership of an idea/opinion/product - our self-fulfilling expectations (something you expect to be great will usually be great) - and so much more we're usually not aware of

For more on the topic, a very readable and engaging book on behavioral-economic influences is Predictably Irrational. At his blog, he shares some of the book's interesting ideas and findings about different factors: http://danariely.com/the-books/

Agree that peers being something is powerful -- not so much for peer pressure (although that's important for some), but more for the sense that if 10 of your friends bought something, it must not be a total disaster. Peer protection.

That is the really far out view of a world where you have redlaser/blippy/amazon all tied together with a social network. "10 of your friends bought Red 5 Lime Flavored gum" etc on the low end, or "10 of your friends get their car serviced here" on the higher risk end.

If it looks like it was from the future, I must have it.