YT: Westworld is one of the best TV shows of the 21st century and its appeal lies in its core question: do I have free will? In this video we analyze the power of choice and if it exists in Westworld.

Probably all of you have wondered at some point: how much choice do I really have? Whether you’re working or studying, it often feels like you’re just jumping from one obligation to the next. There are appointments you have to go to, deadlines you’ve been given, people you must deal with: most of this is out of your hands.

If you strip everything away, the reason choices are important to us are because we want to feel in control of our own lives. We want to feel we are the guests in the park, although we sometimes suspect we are the hosts; programmed and obedient.

Today we’re going to look at two sides of choices; how everyone makes them and how we offer them to customers.

The first step is working out; what is the goal of this choice?

And it’s never as simple as it appears. Let’s say you’re trying to decide what to eat, a choice you make numerous times every day. There are a huge number of factors here, such as; hunger, cost, time of day, body image, health issues, availability, culture, and on and on. It’s too simple to say “we eat so we stop being hungry”, it’s much more complex than that.

American psychologist Barry Schwartz released a book in 2004 called The Paradox of Choice. The core concept is that happiness… (and for our purposes we can call this customer satisfaction)…is affected most strongly by the success or failure of achieving your goal.

So how do you help customers set their goals?

“Choices hanging in the air like ghosts. And if you could just see them, you could change your whole life.” - Dolores, Westworld