Medvec, V. H., Madey, S., & Gilovich, T. (1995). "When less is more: Counterfactual thinking and satisfaction among Olympic medal winners". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69, 603-610.
The authors discuss why bronze medalists tend to be happier than silver medalists. They attribute these results to the fact that "the most compelling counterfactual alternative for the silver medalist is winning the gold, whereas for the bronze medalist it is finishing without a medal. Support for this interpretation was obtained
from the 1992 Olympics and the 1994 Empire State Games".
It would be interesting to consider where the thresholds lie for compelling counterfactual alternatives, in relation to individuals pursuing labour market outcomes. We can even think of this in the context of a linear OLS model where job satisfaction is rated on a scale fom 0-100. The higher up the scale one rates onself, the closer one gets to reaching the limit in possibilities for a counterfactual alternative.
This relates somewhat to research being conducted in the Centre on the use of anchoring vignettes to enhance inter-personal comparability in self-evaluation. But the issue of reference-dependency also seems to be inevitable for many instances of counterfactual thinking - certainly in the contexts of Olympic contests and labour market outcomes.
Here's a video clip of Jerry Seinfeld outlining the example related to Olympic medal winners:
http://info.ruppin.ac.il/yassour/misc/silver.wmv
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