If We Didn’t Give Gifts, We Wouldn’t Survive as a Species
The joy of giving isn’t just a cute by-product of humanity, but rather a fundamental ingredient of what makes us human
In the field of positive psychology, there is a widely known — and somewhat depressing — phenomenon known as hedonic adaptation. Simply put, it describes a human tendency to experience less joy from our favorite activities, events, and behaviors over time. It’s a concept that’s often directly linked to spending habits and the ways in which we receive. For example, eating the same lunch each day or buying yourself a new piece of clothing from a store you frequent can lose its thrill as time goes on.
The rush of happiness we feel from this kind of “repeated getting” may wane, but there is one type of consumption that appears to be immune to this condition. According to new research, the happiness we experience from gift-giving does not diminish over time.
In a 2018 study, 96 people were split into two groups. For five consecutive days, half the group used five dollars to buy themselves the same thing each day. The other half used the same amount to treat someone else to the same small gift each day. (Some from this group dropped their daily allowance in a tip jar. Others donated the money to charity or…
