Duration Neglect is we remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between. It sits in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-COG-0255, within the Decision family. The core principle: we remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
Scientific Definition
We remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between.
Plain-English Definition
We remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between.
Feynman Explanation
A great finale rewrites a mediocre middle.
Core Principle
We remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between.
Mechanisms
Pending editorial review.
We remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
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Peak-end shapes NPS more than average satisfaction does.
Inputs (Triggers)
Pending editorial review.
Outputs (Behaviors)
Pending editorial review.
Behavioral Signature
A great finale rewrites a mediocre middle.
Examples
- Customer experience design that invests in moments, not minutes.
- Peak-end shapes NPS more than average satisfaction does.
Pending editorial review.
Original analysis from The Incentives Lab — how this element behaves inside real payoff structures.
Why this element matters to incentive design
This element is common enough to feel like human nature and specific enough to be engineered around. The mechanism underneath it is straightforward: we remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between. You can recognize it in the field by its signature: a great finale rewrites a mediocre middle. Every element in the Cognition dimension changes the perceived payoff of an action before the action happens, which is exactly where incentive design has leverage.
How it gets exploited
Left undesigned, peak-end shapes NPS more than average satisfaction does. It is amplified whenever peak-end shapes NPS more than average satisfaction does. Inside organizations that shows up as peak-end shapes NPS more than average satisfaction does. The pattern is the same one Goodhart's Law describes: the measurable proxy attracts the effort, and the purpose behind it quietly loses funding.
How the Lab designs around it
The redesign move is to engineer the peak and the end. Defend them. The leverage is not in explaining the behavior to people. It is in changing what the behavior earns.
Famous Experiments
Pending editorial review.
Design Principles
- Engineer the peak and the end. Defend them.
Measurement Approaches
Pending editorial review.
Evidence
Pending editorial review.
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The Perverse Incentive Lens™
How this behavior is exploited — and how to redesign around it.
- Engineer the peak and the end. Defend them.
Pending editorial review.
Pending editorial review.
Interactive Mini Network
Click any neighbor to re-center the graph and follow the threads of connection.
Knowledge Graph Neighbors
Auto-linked to the rest of the Human Behavior Taxonomy by family, domain, dimension, and shared keywords.
How will I feel about this in 10 minutes / 10 months / 10 years?
Inattention or forgetfulness caused by low attention, hyperfocus, or distraction.
Forgetting to compare an offer with the next-best alternative.
Outcomes that could have happened but did not.
Overthinking a situation so that decision-making stalls.
The first number on the table silently sets the range for every number after it.
Tversky & Kahneman's classic: identical outcomes flip from 'risk averse' to 'risk seeking' when framed as lives saved vs. lives lost.
Our perception is shaped by what we selectively pay attention to.
Favoring suggestions from automated systems over conflicting human judgment.
A color appears different depending on adjacent colors.
Decisions are constrained by available information, cognitive limits, and time.
The ability to focus on one voice in a noisy environment.
Where Duration Neglect is cited in the corpus
Essays, field guides, and diagnostics from The Incentives Lab that apply this element.
- EssayGoodhart's Law in the Real World
How measurable proxies capture judgment.
- EssayThe Perverse Incentives Hiding in Your KPIs
Cognitive shortcuts turned into scorecards.
- EssayAI Agents Inherit Your Incentives
How this element propagates into automated systems.
- ReferenceThe Periodic Table of Human Behavior
The full 1,267-element map this page belongs to.
- ReferenceThe incentive glossary
Definitions for every mental model, bias, and fallacy in the corpus.
Questions about Duration Neglect
- What is Duration Neglect?
- Duration Neglect is we remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between. It sits in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™ as element HBT-COG-0255, within the Decision family. The core principle: we remember peaks and ends, not the duration in between. In incentive terms, it matters because it changes the payoff people perceive before they choose — which means it can be designed for, or exploited.
- What is an example of Duration Neglect?
- Peak-end shapes NPS more than average satisfaction does. The Incentives Lab catalogs everyday, organizational, and historical instances of this element on its Human Behavior Taxonomy™ page (HBT-COG-0255).
- How is Duration Neglect exploited?
- Peak-end shapes NPS more than average satisfaction does.
- How do you design around Duration Neglect?
- Engineer the peak and the end. Defend them.
- Which behavioral dimension does Duration Neglect belong to?
- Duration Neglect is classified in the Cognition dimension (COG) of the Human Behavior Taxonomy™, family "Decision", class "Mental Model". Its permanent identifier is HBT-COG-0255 and its evidence grade is B.