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Peak-end Rule

Define​

A psychological heuristic that gauges judgment of experiences by evaluating users' feelings at their peak Intensity and final moments

The peak-end rule is a heuristic evaluation where a person judges their experience based on their feelings at two key moments - the most extreme (peak) and the end, These two moments are proven to have more influence on a person's final judgement than the sum (or average) of their feelings overall. This rule holds for positive or negative experiences, and believes other reactions are not used to form a judgment (but are not forgotten).

In their 1993 study "When More Pain Is Preferred to Less: Adding a Better End", Kahneman, Fredrickson, Schreiber and Redelmeier provided evidence that test-subjects would be more willing to have a long unpleasant experience with a more favourable end, rather than a shorter, consistently unpleasant one. Kahneman and Fredrickson consequently theorised that emotions of peak intensity or the final moments provided a reliable average of the experience as a whole. They reasoned that the memory bias connected to emotional or recent events have a stronger impact over other events.

Using the peak-end rule means designers aim to create moments of user clarity within an experience, which would be found during user research. These important moments are to be emphasised so users recall the experience as enjoyable and valuable, even if the net unpleasantness/pleasantness could be improved.

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