The Trap of Past Investment

You've been watching a terrible movie for an hour. You're not enjoying it. But you think: "I've already put in an hour — I might as well finish." That impulse is the sunk cost fallacy, and it shapes decisions far bigger than movies.

The fallacy kicks in when you keep going because of what you've already spent — time, money, effort, emotion — instead of what you'll gain next. That investment is "sunk": it's gone no matter what you do now. Yet walking away feels like admitting the first decision was a mistake.