### abstract ###
 waste not want not  expresses our culture's aversion to waste
 i could have gotten the same thing for less  is a sentiment that can diminish pleasure in a transaction
we study people's willingness to  pay  to avoid this spoiler
in one scenario  participants imagined they were looking for a rental apartment  and had bought a subscription to an apartment listing
if a cheaper subscription had been declined  respondents preferred not to discover post hoc that it would have sufficed
specifically  they preferred ending their quest for the ideal apartment after seeing more  rather than fewer  apartments  so that the length of the search exceeds that available within the cheaper subscription
other scenarios produced similar results
we conclude that people may sometimes prefer to be wasteful in order to avoid feeling wasteful
### introduction ###
recently  one of our friends was upset
she had just rented a perfect little apartment  advertised on a campus bulletin board
 but   she said   i had just paid a non-refundable fee for an apartments listing
now i feel like a freier  a yiddish word  roughly meaning patsy  sucker  or pushover
spending more money than necessary is regarded as wasteful
when not intentional  and easily avoidable  it can make one feel like a freier
admittedly  sometimes people overspend deliberately
people show off their wealth by shopping in wildly expensive places
others flaunt their disregard for money by lighting up cigars with   NUMBER  bills
people also choose to be generous  giving expensive gifts  throwing elaborate parties  tipping ostentatiously  etc
extravagance is not to be equated with waste
but when actions are self-defined as wasteful  the feeling of wastefulness can be as aversive  if not more  than the waste itself
mental accounting  CITATION  provides a useful framework for understanding waste
if you want a new pair of jeans    NUMBER  is wasteful
but if you want prada jeans    NUMBER  may be a bargain
to please your hosts  a   NUMBER  wine may be adequate
but to impress them  you should lay out more
when you open a mental account  and enter a debit  you can judge for yourself whether the resulting outcome was  worth it 
but mental accounting does not explain why the feeling of waste is so aversive
arkes  an expert on the psychology of waste  CITATION   has defined waste in two ways
first  as mentioned above  a person is said to be wasteful if she  spends more money on an item than is necessary 
second  the other side of waste is to  utilize the item that has been purchased  insufficiently  CITATION
arkes identified several behaviors driven by waste aversion
waste is contrary to one's economic self-interest  and oftimes even considered immoral  so trying to avoid it is natural
arkes showed  moreover  that even  to avoid the appearance of wastefulness  italics ours  people may be motivated to make choices that compromise their own self-interest  CITATION  
spending too much hurts the pocket
appearing to have spent too much hurts the ego
people may willingly overpay in economic currencies to reduce psychological costs
however  losses that are not one's  own fault  due  e g   to theft  accident  or market behavior are not accompanied by this second-order pain
thus  people may also prefer to tolerate additional expenditures of time  effort  pain  discomfort  etc
  if only to avoid the psychological costs of feeling that they wasted their money
the present study extends waste aversion to scenarios where not only self-interest is violated  but dominance is violated as well - provided that can save one from feeling like a freier
study  NUMBER  establishes the phenomenon  namely that  in order to avoid feeling that money was wasted people prefer an outcome that delivers the same result  but requires greater expenditure of effort  time or discomfort  and is therefore dominated
study  NUMBER  extends the results by introducing new dependent variables and manipulating the proximity of the protagonist
