People have difficulty governing certain of their own behaviors, and employ strategies to constrain future choices. These efforts can be interpreted as rational attempts to cope with some foreseeable lapse from full rationality. The philosophy literature and a small amount of recent economics literature concentrate on temptations - addictions, eating problems, sexual incontinence. Just what occurs during a "lapse" is often hard to describe, and whether succumbing should be considered rational or not is in dispute. Here, a number of conditions and behaviors are introduced for which a judgment about "irrationality" will be less problematic. They are important in their own right, and also help to enlarge the class in which the more notorious addictive and compulsive behaviors can be fitted. The latter may then be seen as members of a family not all of whose members are so perplexing.
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Volume (Year): 22 (1996) Issue (Month): 3 (Summer) Pages: 251-269 Download reference. The following formats are available: HTML
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Find related papers by JEL classification: D11 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Theory D91 - Microeconomics - - Intertemporal Choice and Growth - - - Intertemporal Consumer Choice; Life Cycle Models and Saving
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Elodie Brahic & Valérie Clément & Nathalie Moureau & Marion Vidal, 2008.
"A la recherche des Merit Goods,"
Working Papers
08-08, LAMETA, Universtiy of Montpellier, revised Jun 2008.
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