Buy Baits and Consumer Sophistication: Field Evidence from Instant Rebates
通过大型在线零售商的现场实验，研究消费者是否意识到自身认知局限，发现消费者能正确应对返利提醒，但严重低估返利兑现的麻烦程度。
Are consumers in the marketplace aware of their cognitive limitations? I answer this question in the context of a ubiquitous form of price discrimination: instant rebates that require active redemption. In a large-scale field experiment with a major online retailer, I find that consumers correctly increase demand when the firm offers a redemption reminder, but they fail to reduce demand when the firm increases the hassle required to redeem. Structural estimates reveal that, while consumers are sophisticated about the probability of forgetting to redeem the rebate, they vastly underestimate the hassle of redeeming it by €20 per consumer.