Fun Is Better on Deadline

If you give your mother a gift card this Mother’s Day, make sure it expires soon; otherwise she might not enjoy it. That’s the suggestion of this Atlantic article (with a rather familiar headline), citing research by the economists Suzanne B. Shu and Ayelet Gneezy. They found that if you put a tight deadline on a fun activity, people are more likely to relax their self-control and enjoy it. Happy Hour just moved up a notch on the genius-idea scale. [%comments]