Endowment Effect: A Query Theory

I will just continue from my last blog were i started to write about endowment effect .

My group, we read a paper called Aspects of endowment: A Query theory of value construction.

I found this paper very interesting because authors showed in 3 experiments how they can create or eliminate endowment effect by simply reversing the order of two questions about the possible exchange. I will briefly describe those experiments later, let me first mention the theory they proposed as an explanation of endowment effect.
The theory is called A Query theory of the endowment effect. It says that process which account for endowment effect is based on the idea that valuations depend on memory retrieval processes.
A Query Theory four premises ( that explain endowment effect) are: First, decision maker decompose valuation questions ( e.g. What would be my selling price?). Second, is that these queries are executed serially, one after the other. Third, because of output interference , query order matters ( first query is more represented than the second) and Fourth premise suggests different response modes produce different query order ( Choosers first consider why they might not enter the transaction and after why they might do it, sellers do it in reverse order).

In experiments participants were randomly assigned to be either sellers ( endowed) they were given a mug that was theirs to keep and they could later sell it to experimenter for some amount of money and choosers ( not endowed) they could later choose between receiving the mug or some amount of money.

In First experiment they wanted to know if endowment can change the considered aspects.
Before indicating valuation of the mug participants we asked to list the aspects (reasons) why would they personally want the mug or have the money. As suggested by query account sellers produced more value-increasing aspects ( positive thoughts about the mug and negative thoughts about the money) and choosers produced more value-decreasing aspects ( positive thoughts about the money and negative thoughts about the mug).

In Second experiment they wanted to see if they can eliminate endowment effect.
They used two aspect-listings conditions. First, all aspects participants considered in making decisions. Second, it was reversed. Sellers were asked to first produce value-decreasing and after value-increasing aspects and choosers were first asked to produce value-increasing and after value-decreasing aspects. Second scenario showed that by simply altering the order in which participants reported the aspects they were considering was successful in completely eliminating the endowment effect.

In third experiment they wanted to see if they could create endowment effect.
Participants were informed that they were going to choose between any amount of money and the mug and nobody was endowed with the mug, after they completed two aspect-listing tasks the order of which was manipulated. Even though, participants were not endowed with the mug and answered same set of aspects questions, by manipulating the order of sets of aspects resulted in endowment effect.

In those three experiments the authors demonstrated that : 1) endowment influences the aspects that individuals consider 2) endowment changes the order in which aspects are recalled 3) these aspects are related to decision maker`s valuation of objects 4) by changing the order of aspect queries we can eliminate the endowment effect as well as we can produce endowment effect in absence of ownership.