Research shows that giving a bad gift can hurt your relationships. So how can you be sure you pick something your recipient will love?
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It’s the season to examine your holiday gift list. You’ll have to figure out who gets a present – but also how much you’re actually going to spend and, most importantly, what to get.
In the UK, the average household spends around £500 on gifts during the traditional holiday season, equalling Americans who spend about $650. And although giving gifts can make you happy, communicate your feelings toward the receiver and even strengthen relationships, a less-than-stellar gift can have the opposite effect.
“Choosing the wrong gift can be kind of risky for relationships because it says you don’t have anything in common,” says Elizabeth Dunn, a psychology professor at the University of British Columbia in Canada and co-author of Happy Money: The Science of Happier Spending. Her research has also showed that undesirable gifts can sometimes negatively impact the receiver’s perception of a relationship’s future potential.
Spending more does not always guarantee a well-received gift
Since you don’t want your holiday gift for him to cause more harm than good, how can you be sure to choose a online gifts for her to India the receiver will love? Psychology may have the answer.
Don’t fret about the price
Should you just splurge to show how much you care?
Research has actually shown that spending more does not always guarantee a well-received gift. One study found that the more expensive a gift, the more givers expected recipients to appreciate it. But while givers thought spending more conveyed more thoughtfulness, receivers didn’t associate the price with their level of appreciation.
“It seems pretty intuitive that if you spend more, you’re going to get a better gift. It turns out that there’s no evidence that recipients are sensitive to the cost of a gift when they figure out how much they’re going to enjoy that gift,” says Jeff Galak, an associate professor of marketing at the Carnegie Mellon Tepper School of Business in the US city of Pittsburgh.
Galak, who studies consumer behaviour and decision making, acknowledges that you may have to hit a certain price threshold due to tradition or expectations. But once you meet that cost, “it doesn’t matter if you buy something more valuable”, he says. The gift itself is what matters most.
Think longer term
Galak says the trick for giving a great birthday gifts online from best gift sites India is to think past the fleeting moment of actually handing it over, a concept he and colleagues Julian Givi and Elanor Williams found to be a common theme in studies on gift giving, including a paper they authored.
“When givers give online gifts to India, they’re trying to optimise on the moment they send gifts to India online and see the smile on the recipient’s face right in that moment,” says Galak. “But what recipients care about is how much value they’re going to derive from that over a longer time period.”
If you have something in common with somebody, get something that shares the same affinity – Elizabeth Dunn
In other words, it might not be exciting to watch a friend or family member open the gift online delivery of a movie-streaming subscription, so you might be less likely to give one. But a recipient may actually love it, since it’s a gift online to India that can be enjoyed often over time.
Forget about uniqueness
Galak also suggests not getting hung up on giving the most unique gift delivery in India out there. Sometimes something that many people desire or many others have can be exactly what someone wants.
One study showed that we tend to focus on a recipient’s unique traits and personality as we shop for them. But this hyper-specificity leads us to ignore other aspects of their wants and needs, which may make us buy them an send gifts online same day delivery in India. We also tend to want to buy different gifts for multiple people, even if they might all be happier with the same thing – and might never compare gifts at all.
