The study about the Berkeley coffee cup

Heard this on NPR's Radiolab program over the weekend. Scientists did a study in which they gave half the experiment group a University of California-Berkeley coffee mug. The other half got nothing. Then they asked the group with the mugs to list how much they would be willing to part with the mug for. They asked the group without the mugs how much they would be willing to buy a mug for.

Here's the interesting thing: the group in possession of the mugs named a price much higher than the price named by those without a mug, even though the mugs had only been in their possession for a minute or so. Thus, taking ownership of something immediately invests it with irrational value.

This goes some way toward explaining the intransigence of Trump voters in sticking with him to the hilt, despite all evidence that he's rotten to the core.