The Psychology of Pricing Games

[jackwenzel]

To complement jlgarfield's math thread - What psychological phenomena have you observed that the producers use to deliberately "goose" the game in a certain direction? Here's what I've seen (may not be totally accurate, feel free to offer counterpoints):

5 Price Tags: I've heard it called "falsitis" here - contestants LOVE to say false, so more often than not, 3 of the 4 correct choices are true. Also, contestants tend to pick the higher car prices, so having a lower price be correct seems to make the game even harder to win.

Range Game: On the flip side, the prods seem to want this game to be consistently won. I can't remember the last time I've seen a "mean" price (one very far from the middle, where virtually all contestants stop).

Punch a Bunch: I'm convinced there are certain spots that contestants tend to avoid, and the $25k slip probably resides in those slots a lot of the time. That's the only way I could see this game being won so rarely.

Lucky 7: If you always pick numbers near the middle, like most contestants, you are probably going to lose. Unfortunately I don't see any sure-fire pattern of "low follows high" or whatever, so this game is a real crapshoot.

That's Too Much: This one seems to have changed over time. For a few seasons, the prods were making money hand over fist by putting the correct price in slot 3, where almost no one stopped. Then they got WRECKED in Season 47 (almost a 50% win rate in that slot!) and have been putting the price later, causing contestants to stop too soon.

Gas Money: The middle price is almost NEVER right, but it looks so good to contestants that they tend not to eliminate it. The last time the middle price was correct was in season 45. (Perhaps not surprisingly, it was won.)

Golden Road: The missing digit in the big prize is generally a low one...exactly what most contestants DON'T pick.

Temptation: This game is often lost on the very first pickable digit, which is usually the lower one. Back in the day, the first pick was a near-gimme. Not anymore. (I won't spoil anything, but the most recent playing of this game was rather...unique.)

What else?

[Josh444]

Card Game: In the range deck, now that they are simply spread out, I feel they have determined the best spot to hide the $5000 card.

Cover Up: When they want a loss, make the fourth number a 1.

Magic #: Impatience. Having to wait for the total to increase affects both the audience and the contestant.

Master Key: The Producers tend to make the Master Key/car key either key #1 or key #5. Contestants have what I call “middle syndrome”.

More or Less: It’s always Less. That contestants get More-itis.

Pass the Buck: Same deal here, I feel more often than not the car is behind #1 or #6.

Secret ‘X’: When played for a car, they place it at the bottom. Contestants tend to not go there.

[ThomHuge]

This is an interesting topic; there's one element I'd like to add (while fully admitting I'm not entirely sure how it could be leveraged as the OP describes).

Specifically--"stage fright."

I don't mean that people would necessarily be afraid--just that, between the unfamiliarity of being under those hot lights, the surreality of actually being onstage in Studio 33, Drew expecting an answer or a decision from the player, the audience shouting, adrenaline, and all the other things that necessarily go on at a taping, the contestant might not be able to think as clearly and rationally and as in-depth as they normally would.

Like I said, I'm not exactly sure how this element could be manipulated or exploited--but I do wonder if the producers do work to account for it in at least some way. Thoughts?

[jackwenzel]

Yeah, I think stage fright automatically comes into play with the nature of some games, like the time-limited games (Clock Game, Bonkers, Time is Money etc.), 3 Strikes (where you have to remember things) and Hole in 1-2 (where you might be putting with shaking hands). I think there was even one contestant in the "no second putt" days, who lost despite being at the closest line. Ouch.

One semi-related vignette: when they brought back Bob Barker to host Lucky 7 for April Fool's Day, first of all they made the car price as easy as could be, clearly wanting it won. In fact, the contestant played it SO well that she had $6 left on the last number, and she guessed 5, guaranteeing a win. But you could totally see the fear on her face before the reveal. Unless it was planned drama, I'd guess stage fright kicked in and made her think, "Did I miss something? Did I miss something?" It's easy for us to see at home that she won...not so easy when you're on stage and your nerves are going crazy.

Of course, there have been at least a couple of contestants (I think one was named Cathy?) who had $6 or even ALL $7 left on the last number...and STILL lost. I chalk that up less to stage fright and more to just failing simple math.

[StacksOfCash]

Gas Money: The middle price is almost NEVER right, but it looks so good to contestants that they tend not to eliminate it. The last time the middle price was correct was in season 45. (Perhaps not surprisingly, it was won.)

I remember one season where more often than not, the cheapest price ended up being the price of the car, but contestants regularly picked it possibly thinking "they wouldn't give me a car that cheap".

[Archviler]

Lucky 7: If you always pick numbers near the middle, like most contestants, you are probably going to lose. Unfortunately I don't see any sure-fire pattern of "low follows high" or whatever, so this game is a real crapshoot.

Yeah, even if you know how Lucky 7 is usually set up, the psychology of it is brutal. You also have to figure if it's a special or a situation where they want the car won, which indicates you should bid towards the middle instead. Not only is Lucky 7 often an all or nothing guessing game these days, you have to decide if it may be one of those times where it's set up to be won instead.

I don't get to watch Price much these days, but when I catch Lucky 7, I always find myself thinking about all of that.

[Grand_game2004]

I must admit, the psychology of pricing games is interesting. I wish one of us had thought about doing a topic like this in the earlier days of this wonderful site.

Anyway, Check-Out is a good one for discussing psychology. The prices of typical grocery items (not all of them) change, probably sometimes almost weekly or daily. But just think of how hard the game can be if a car (or some amount of cash, probably during Big Money Week) is at stake!!! I have to give honorable mention to Pauline here. I remember my reaction to her Check-Out win, and I can tell you that I was downright amazed, and I was also shocked!!! When I saw she won the way she did, I literally felt like my jaw had almost  dropped to the floor like Genie's did in Disney's Aladdin!! I never thought I'd see the day when someone would win Check-Out perfectly!!!!

[StacksOfCash]

I must admit, the psychology of pricing games is interesting. I wish one of us had thought about doing a topic like this in the earlier days of this wonderful site.

Anyway, Check-Out is a good one for discussing psychology. The prices of typical grocery items (not all of them) change, probably sometimes almost weekly or daily. But just think of how hard the game can be if a car (or some amount of cash, probably during Big Money Week) is at stake!!! I have to give honorable mention to Pauline here. I remember my reaction to her Check-Out win, and I can tell you that I was downright amazed, and I was also shocked!!! When I saw she won the way she did, I literally felt like my jaw had almost  dropped to the floor like Genie's did in Disney's Aladdin!! I never thought I'd see the day when someone would win Check-Out perfectly!!!!

Check out is an interesting case since there are pretty much two ways of playing the game.

1) Trying to guess the exact price of each individual item
2) Trying to guess the total price of all 5 items combined

In Pauline's case, she tried to play using strategy #1, and while she did ending up getting the TOTAL price exactly right, she was quite a bit off for the last 3 items (on youtube search: Check out Exacta) :

Item #1: 1.39 | ARP: 1.49 | DIFF: 0.10
Item #2: 2.69 | ARP: 2.39 | DIFF: -0.30
Item #3: 3.79 | ARP: 2.99 | DIFF: -0.80
Item #4: 3.99 | ARP: 3.49 | DIFF: -0.50
Item #5: 6.49 | ARP: 7.99 | DIFF: 1.50

Now contrast this with a contestant named Thomas who highballed the first 4 items, and bid a dollar for the final item (YT: Check out just squeeked by) :

Item #1: 3.00 | ARP: 0.99 | DIFF: -2.01
Item #2: 2.50 | ARP: 1.99 | DIFF: -0.51
Item #3: 4.00 | ARP: 2.99 | DIFF: -1.01
Item #4: 6.00 | ARP: 3.99 | DIFF: -2.01
Item #5: 1.00 | ARP: 4.56 | DIFF: 3.56

Thomas' case is interesting because he instinctively knew he had highballed, but never actually knew by how much since the grand total isn't displayed until a guess for all the items is shown, so his actual last bid was really a shot in the dark.

This makes it so that each individual guess isn't worth much as the total amount is. It may even be more taxing to try to exactly price each item, than it is to just think of a grand total number. Pauline missed the final item by $1.50 which in many situations could make or break a playing. It just happened to work in her favor.

Which is why I'm kind of waiting for a moment where a contestant bids: $0, $0, $0, $0, $20.

[Teddy]

Grocery Game, Bullseye and Vend-O-Price have the multiplication element, in which you try to guess how many of one product will help you win, but in various different ways.

In Grocery Game, you try a different combination of GPs in order to get a running total between $20 and $22; however, I've seen a few players go for the win on one pick, which often leads to them going over and wiping out. Also, I've seen a few GPs over $10 where picking two will also put you over and thus they tend to avoid.

Bullseye works the same way as Grocery Game, except you are asked to pick a GP, and then try to determine how many of it will get you to the $10-$12 winning range. Some players tend to overshoot the range, but the problem is not as bad as it is in Grocery Game. Also, in the second part (which comes after the player fails to hit the winning range, but has at least one marker/arrow on the board), the hidden bullseye is usually behind the most difficult GP, which may produce either a lucky win or unfortunate loss.

Vend-O-Price combines the Grocery Game/Bullseye multiplication aspect with the purpose of Most Expensive, in which the player must decide which of the three shelves is the most expensive. The top shelf is almost never right, so it's either the middle (which is picked more often than the other two) or bottom one.

[StacksOfCash]

After watching today's show I think Spelling Bee is a really good one considering they upped the value of the cards from $500 to $1000.

Winning all 5 cards nets the player a guaranteed $5000 which is close to the value of prizes that are often won in other game - also in cash nonetheless. If a contestant has no desire for a car and would prefer straight up money, then they may elect to bail.

If the chances of winning are low - i.e. they get C C C with 2 cards left, even a guaranteed 2K is more attractive than trying to dig for the rarer R and a remaining A.

That said if a contestant wins no extra pics, a guaranteed 2K is more favourable than a 2/28 shot at CAR. And 2K is more money than one would sometimes win in Punch-A-Bunch

Personally, I think that if the contestant spells CAR, then the value of the remaining unturned cards should also be awarded in addition to the car. Reason being I remember a playthrough in the Barker era where a contestant won 5 picks, and said something along the lines of "I'm going to turn over a single card, if it's not CAR i'm going to walk away with the 2K because I need the money". Low and behold the first card was indeed CAR.