As to the "Chocolate or Vanilla" choice, it was presented somewhat differently in my forum.
In the first round, the participant chooses between the two flavors, and the reason he gives is allowed to stand.
In the second round, the flavor of preference is taken away, and the participant is offered only the flavor they like the least, and again told to choose. They are then asked again about their reason, and no actual reason is accepted.
The point was supposedly to get the participant to answer in a way that did not communicate resignation, ("it's the only flavor available"), but, to me it seemed more as if they were trying to get people to smilingly accept whatever was handed to them, no matter how they dislike it.
L.E. tries to get people to drop their preferences and aversions, and in this example, it's an easy thing to do. It's a minor "choice" of no consequence.
Of course, anyone can do that with ice cream, but after the demonstration, we had to divide up and talk about distressing situations in our own lives, and declare to our partner that we chose them.
I had a problem with their insistence that it was actually a choice. The participant is not given the option of declining, (I did ask), so it's actually an illusion of choice, as opposed to a "take it or leave it" Hobson's choice.
I did not get that I don't have to justify my choices. It felt more to me that I was being asked to "own" having made a choice when there was no actual choice involved.
In the first round, the participant chooses between the two flavors, and the reason he gives is allowed to stand.
In the second round, the flavor of preference is taken away, and the participant is offered only the flavor they like the least, and again told to choose. They are then asked again about their reason, and no actual reason is accepted.
The point was supposedly to get the participant to answer in a way that did not communicate resignation, ("it's the only flavor available"), but, to me it seemed more as if they were trying to get people to smilingly accept whatever was handed to them, no matter how they dislike it.
L.E. tries to get people to drop their preferences and aversions, and in this example, it's an easy thing to do. It's a minor "choice" of no consequence.
Of course, anyone can do that with ice cream, but after the demonstration, we had to divide up and talk about distressing situations in our own lives, and declare to our partner that we chose them.
I had a problem with their insistence that it was actually a choice. The participant is not given the option of declining, (I did ask), so it's actually an illusion of choice, as opposed to a "take it or leave it" Hobson's choice.
I did not get that I don't have to justify my choices. It felt more to me that I was being asked to "own" having made a choice when there was no actual choice involved.
