Every day, we learn about others’ decisions from various sources. We perceive some of these decisions as choices of the more-preferred alternative and others as rejections of the less-preferred alternative. In which case are we more likely to follow another’s decision?

We find that people are more likely to conform to another’s decision if it is perceived as a rejection than if it is perceived as a choice. This is because people tend to perceive rejected alternatives as inferior and thus are more likely to avoid rejected alternatives.

Marketers, sales representatives, and influencers alike are interested in learning ways to nudge consumer choices: our findings show that we can increase our influence on others by characterizing our decisions as rejections rather than choices.