Comment by shubhamjain
3 years ago
> Having a trainer has a better set of incentives. Firstly there's the loss-aversion of having already paid for the session. Humans are irrationally motivated by loss-aversion and regualrly succumb to the sunk-cost fallacy.
I disagree. "Having paid for it" is a bad motivation and sparingly works. I know several folks who bought expensive cameras, bicycles, and guitars which only gather dust. The bicycle I rode almost daily for a year was one of the cheapest I had ever bought. Yes, there's a regret if when not utilizing something expensive, but the regret is more like, "I shouldn't have bought it" vs "I have already paid for it so better utilize it".
In fact, I would advice quite the opposite. Get something no-so-expensive. See if you can build a habit around it. Buy the premium thing only if you see yourself plateuing or seriously needing it.
> > Having a trainer has a better set of incentives. Firstly there's the loss-aversion of having already paid for the session. Humans are irrationally motivated by loss-aversion and regualrly succumb to the sunk-cost fallacy.
> I disagree. "Having paid for it" is a bad motivation and sparingly works. I know several folks who bought expensive cameras, bicycles, and guitars which only gather dust.
Yup, I’ve seen the same behavior in myself and others for years. Paying a sum of money, however large it is, doesn’t motivate people to get some value out of it. And gyms thrive on this. What I’ve seen happen is people swearing off gyms after losing money once and probably going back to almost no exercise.
Gyms finance themselves by the people who are paying and not coming.
My advice on building a sports habbit is: Get enough stuff to get yourself motivated. If you are running, getting good (!= expensive) shoes and some sports clothes is a good starter. If it helps to have one of those fitness watches go for it, but there are free phone apps that can do basic things as well. Gear is never an excuse in running. There are people who run marathons barefoot.
Having good shoes and clothes helps you not to stop because of some excuse tho. Clothes are important, because with good clothes you can run also when it is raining, windy and it has single digit Celsius temperatures. Shoes the same: with good shoes the pain point will come later.
I think having a personal trainer creates incentive more around anxiety, rather than sunken cost. It's different than gear.