Page No 143-154 Utkarsh Shukla and Shalini Sharma,
Ramanujan College, University of Delhi.
Ashwini Kumar,
Indira Gandhi National Open University, New Delhi
.
T
As humans, we make thousands of decisions daily, which are predisposed to becoming
error-prone without any deliberate knowledge. The current study reports insights into
the age-old phenomenon of sunk cost effect that is known to influence decision-makers
to “throw good money after bad,” but in the temporal domain. The study aimed to study
the effect of sunk time on economic decision-making using a delay discounting paradigm.
The study also aimed to understand the effect of generation and gender on sunk-time
decision-making. The participants in the study included 105 individuals from across
three generations from both genders (Female=58, Male= 47). The findings of the study
revealed a significant main effect of sunk time, with longer time having greater
discounting. The main effect of generation and gender were also significant, with
millennials and males having greater discounting. These results provide robust evidence
in favor of sunk cost for time with a new paradigm and some additional insights into the
role of age and gender.