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Comment by kramerger | Hacker News Reader

That is not correct either. Who considers finishing an IKEA build an achievement?

It's really not that it's necessarily an achievement, it's a subconscious bias to value the same product higher than if you don't invest time in building it.

It's a kind of "you're rewarded for your effort" idea.

I like the cake mix example where letting the consumer add eggs made house wives happier with the cake from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-shaping-us/20191...

This article about IKEA boxes sounds a lot like the cake mix marketing story. But apparently, that story is a legend: https://gobraithwaite.com/thinking/cake-mixes-fresh-eggs-and...

And maybe this study should be taken with a grain of salt too.

I love building Ikea furniture. It gives me a feeling of completing something that I rarely get building software, where everything is a work in progress. I'm not very good at DIY or craft stuff in general.

Read about Betty Crocker's "just add egg" campaign.

I feel way more pride in a Betty Crocker cake than I do about all the Ikea furniture I've built. My Ikea furniture is just cheap but functional furniture. I feel no attachment whatsoever. Anymore than I do taking a toilet paper roll out of the bag and "assembling it into the TP holder"

I feel a sense of accomplishment for few hours after having completed assembly but it's not really much more if any more than the sense of accomplishment I feel when I've finished vacuuming and dusting my apartment.

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