The Peak-End Rule

Psychologist Daniel Kahneman’s research reveals that people don’t remember an experience based on the average of every second, but by the **“most painful moment” and the “ending.”** This is called the Peak-End Rule.

Classic experiment: Subjects immersed their hands in 14°C ice water for 60 seconds (very painful). A second group did the same, but after 60 seconds, the water was secretly warmed to 15°C and held for another 30 seconds (still painful, but slightly less so). Logically, the second group experienced more total pain, yet when asked which experience they’d repeat, most chose the second—because the ending was less painful.

This is why handoff is the “most dangerous 3 seconds”: **the transfer often marks the “end” of the customer service journey.** The customer’s final memory isn’t how well the AI performed for the first five minutes, but whether they were forced to repeat themselves during the handoff. Ninety-five minutes of effort can be erased by a five-minute bad ending.