Brief Commentary: A Reexamination of the Effect of Forced Choice on Choice
Journal of Consumer Research · 2026 · Volume 53 · Issue 2
Abstract
When conducting studies in which the dependent variable is choice, researchers must decide whether to require participants to select one of the available alternatives or to provide a no-choice option. Prior research published in theJournal of Marketing Researchproposed that no-choice options can disproportionately reduce the share of certain alternatives, particularly all-average or compromise options. In this commentary, I reexamine these propositions. I report the results of nine well-powered, preregistered replications of the original studies, which support only a subset of these hypotheses. Importantly, across these replication studies, no-choice options do not systematically draw share from specific alternatives. These findings suggest that no-choice effects may be more nuanced than previously thought and that the conditions under which previously documented effects occur reliably remain unclear. I discuss the implications of these results for theories of decision-making, context effects, and choice deferral. This work aims to update the literature and inform marketing researchers about the consequences of forcing choice versus allowing a no-choice option in experimental design.
Keywords
choice, forced choice, no-choice options, choice deferral, context effects
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