Decision Paralysis as Choice-Architecture Wrong Attractor: The Paradox of Choice, Maximizing Trap, and the Return to Satisficing Agency

Decision paralysis — the inability to choose among available options, producing procrastination, rumination, and action failure — is a wrong attractor W_paralysis in which the decision-making system is captured in perpetual evaluation without resolution. We apply the Displacement Framework to formalize decision paralysis. The satisficing agency ground state S0_decide is defined via Simon's satisficing: the ability to choose an option that is good enough relative to one's goals without exhaustive search.

W_paralysis arises through three interlocking mechanisms: the maximizing trap (Schwartz et al. 2002 — the strategy of finding the best option is self-undermining in large choice sets, producing more paralysis and less satisfaction), counterfactual amplification (Kahneman & Tversky — anticipated regret poisons each choice, escalating paralysis across time), and loss aversion (prospect theory — unchosen options are experienced as losses, weighing approximately twice as heavily as the chosen gain).

Nine formal propositions cover: S0_decide as satisficing agency with System 1/2 balance (P1), W_paralysis as active non-resolving evaluation distinct from procrastination (P2), the maximizing trap (P3), counterfactual amplification cycle with Gilovich-Medvec temporal asymmetry (P4), loss aversion as basin-deepening force and status quo bias (P5), identity stakes amplification and compound attractor with perfectionism (P6), environmental over-choice as population-level basin-deepening (P7), cumulative Phi_paralysis across decisional, behavioral, relational, and identity domains (P8), and return paths including satisficing retraining, pre-commitment, regret minimization framing, and ACT values clarification (P9).