Prospect Theory

Kahneman & Tversky's (1979) descriptive model of decision-making under risk: outcomes are evaluated relative to a reference point rather than in absolute terms, and the value function is steeper for losses than for equivalent gains — "the kink," in Berger & Pope's own phrase. It is the theoretical engine this vault keeps finding underneath separately-discovered effects rather than a claim in its own right: the halftime-deficit reversal, the goals-as-reference-points motivation literature, and (more loosely) the Fresh Start Effect and Gersick's midpoint transitions all read as one mechanism wearing different domain costumes. It earns a hub rather than living inside any single claim-note because the engine is what several notes point back to, and the vault had never given it its own page despite naming it twice.

References

• claim-goals-as-reference-points-below-goal-work-harder
• claim-berger-pope-nba-halftime-deficit-raises-win-probability
• claim-berger-pope-lab-experiment-isolates-loss-aversion-from-winning-team-complacency
• claim-losing-leads-to-winning-fails-to-replicate-across-four-sports
• Captures: 10-inbox/raw/2026-07-11-hop-losing-leads-to-winning-fragile.md, 10-inbox/raw/2026-07-24-does-berger-pope-2011-itself-carry-the-5880.md