(AP)
Wednesday, March 26, 2008

BOSTON—If you’re sad and shopping, watch your wallet.
A new study shows people’s spending judgment goes out the window when they’re down, especially if they’re a bit self-absorbed.

Study participants who watched a sadness-inducing video clip offered to pay nearly four times as much money to buy a water bottle than a group that watched an emotionally neutral clip.
The so-called “misery is not miserly” phenomenon is well-known to psychologists, advertisers, and personal shoppers alike, and has been documented in a similar study in 2004.
The new study by researchers from four universities goes further—trying to answer whether temporary sadness alone can trigger spendthrift tendencies.
The study found a willingness to spend freely by sad people occurs mainly when their sadness triggers greater “self-focus.”
That response was measured by counting how frequently study participants used references to “I,” “me,” “my,” and “myself” in writing an essay about how a sad situation such as the one portrayed in the video would affect them personally.
The brief video was about the death of a boy’s mentor. Another group watched an emotionally neutral clip about the Great Barrier Reef—the vast coral reef system off Australia’s coast.
On average, the group watching the sad video offered to pay nearly four times as much for a sporty-looking, insulated water bottle than the group watching the nature video, according to the study by researchers from Harvard, Carnegie Mellon, Stanford, and Pittsburgh universities.
Thirty-three study subjects—young adults who responded to an advertisement offering $10 for participation—were offered the chance to trade some of the $10 to buy the bottle.
The sad group offered to trade an average of $2.11, compared with 56 cents for the neutral group.
The researchers concluded sadness can trigger a chain of emotions leading to extravagant tendencies. Sadness leads people to become more focused on themselves, causing the person to feel they and their possessions are worth little.
That feeling increases willingness to pay more—presumably to feel better about themselves.
“Because the study used real commodities and real money, results hold implications for everyday decisions,” according to the authors of the study, published in the journal Psychological Science.
Edward Charlesworth, a Houston-based clinical psychologist not involved in the study, suggested the misery-is-not-miserly phenomenon is rooted in a culture that encourages people to buy to feel better.
“Certainly, the advertising industry knows that,” Charlesworth, citing as an example a 1970s McDonald’s fast-food jingle, “You deserve a break today.”