Simple yet complicated. The concept of gift giving!

The holidays just passed and with Christmas being one of the biggest occasions where gift-giving is a ritual, some of you must have experienced happy moments, sad moments, appreciative moments and so many other emotions as you tore down the gift wrapping paper.
Christmas aside, we as humans tend to get sentimental on other occasions like birthdays, weddings, baby showers and so on. Coming to think about it, those are so many gifts to give to the many people that we love who are part of our lives. Yikes! If only the phrase "it's the thought that counts" worked in this kind of scenario. (To those of you whom have received gifts from me, I promise I gifted you with a good heart!)

But seriously, it's funny how gifts are intended to let the recipient know how the gift giver feels but in the end, the recipient may end up emotionally unstable. When you receive a gift you'll either love the gift, not like it but appreciate it or hate it. Sometimes gifts wouldn't be exactly what you wanted but may come in handy at some point. The idea of gift giving is to strengthen a relationship between two or more people but -hey-, you all know you like to treat yourselves to something once in a while too. It's a natural thing.

When I feel I have accomplished something that is rare, I treat myself to a console game or something of my interest. You know, that feeling when you feel as though you just flunked the semester and you get grade that are way better than expected. Self gifting, I would say, comes on various levels. A friend of mine loses focus when studying and would therefore gift himself a cigarette break every time he is done studying a certain amount of chapters the he sets to accomplish. I know how dangerous that could be for him but the health talk just doesn't work with him. See, something as small as that can be considered as a gift.

I come from a very big family and this Christmas I received a hell lot of gift. I was more excited than a 5 year old waking up on Christmas morning to find presents under the christmas tree, I can tell ya that! But here's the sad reality. Not all the gifts you receive will be as exciting. The cliché "ugly sweater" from your grandmother is a good example. Ruth, Otnes and Brunel (1999) based their research on the relationship establishment by gift giving and the recipient's experience when opening a gift. Reading about the concepts of the theory made me think about how cultures can be distinguished through the gift concept.

The western culture has adapted to the idea of a gift receipt in the case that the recipient doesn't like the gift. From where I come from, it would be considered rude to exchange the gift and gift receipts were not a common thing. However, we would still establish a strong relationship with the gift giver to show appreciation that the gift giver had a good intention. This is known as the negligible effect outcome. The fact that the person still gets "points" for the effort they expend. Having a lot of people that we had a somewhat relationship with, gave us an opportunity to regift so that it wouldn't go in waste. There are other potential outcomes to the concept of gift giving. The Consumer Behaviour book by Solomon, White and Dahl in the 6th edition talks about the overkill outcome and this usually occurs in opposite sex relationships. I know guys don't feel comfortable with the idea of gift exchange because you know, men! It is difficult for us to express our emotions for the relationship we have with the other "guy" friend. Something like a dinner or buying booze is a way of expressing gift exchange. Might as well just be a teenage phase. When you give a gift that is beyond the status of the relationship you are performing what is known as overkill. You know, when you give a girl expensive jewellery when your relationship is purely platonic. This was the epitome of my younger years. Because I grew up with girls as my cousins from my father's side, I began to understand that they prefer the sensitive things like candles, chocolates, earrings and so on. And when I used to buy gifts for my girl friends, such gifts were considered too sentimental for our defined relationship. So communication may also be barrier to gift giving. That's why it would be best if you decide to give someone a gift, put some effort into learning something about them, that way you won't disappoint them and you strengthen the relationship positively. Is that so hard? In short, I believe there must be a positive linear function between the monetary value of the gift and the sentiment attached to it. Every time I purchase a gift for someone special, I would usually describe their personality. Knowing what a person is like would usually help me know what to get them. If you know me, I like competing with my social circle. So getting a gaming gift or something sporty would be the best bet! You could just purchase gift cards or give cash in an envelope. Or would you?

"smells irresistibly" might mean he likes colognes!

Bridal Registry

Define your relationship, define the occasion and see just how buying gifts would become easier. We all experience the lack of effort in buying a gift and taking the time to get the right thing would just not be an option. Interesting enough, businesses have innovated gift giving to allow consumers to spend less time looking for a gift that may or may not satisfy the recipient. Ever hear about bridal registry? Whoever thought of that is a genius! Never disappoint anyone ever again. It just makes shopping for gifts easier but that will have to compensate for the sentimental value of the gift. There's no effort in thinking about what the person will like. I guess I'm for and against the idea I guess. 

All in all, we all know how buying gifts can create so many implications. Finding the right gift, do you have to reciprocate the gesture? How do you react when you learn that someone has bought you a gift? 

Who would have thought that something so simple would become something so complicated?

Watch these comedic skits about how people react to receiving gifts.

Sources:
1. Solomon, White, Dahl. Consumer Behaviour. 2014 Pearson Canada
2. Ruth, J., Otnes, C., & Brunel, F. (1999). Gift Receipt and the Reformation of Interpersonal Relationships.Journal of Consumer Research, 

Make your mind up!

Ever have difficulties making a purchase decision?

Entertainment is something that has played a major role throughout my 21 years on planet earth. Coming from a family of boys, winning expresses your superiority and the best way to compete would be through gaming or playing sports. 

The testosterone levels would be overflowing through screaming at each other and putting each other down for losing a game. Nothing is better than a bunch of boys bonding over a session of games and ordering some food. But soon enough one thing came missing, the new PlayStation 4 Gaming System. We knew we had to get it but there was only one problem, a problem that electronic businesses usually undergo; competition! The Xbox 1 was just released earlier than that and both the systems delivered outstanding features, which made it an impossible decision to make. Which one to get? Making decisions is often difficult and there are various factors to consider. The idea of upbringing alternate gaming systems was something new to us and we didn't know how to approach the situation.

I realised that we had some sort of information about both systems but we had to perform an external search to help us decide what to get. Friends had different opinions, reviewers brought up solid point about the system of their preference and the more information we got, the more confusing it became. We went on searching for more information online and used the comparing platform to see the differences in the two gaming systems. 

We always purchased the Playstation rather than the Xbox and brand switching was questionable due to the competitive features the two brands delivered. Usually we would experience loss aversion where we would consider the loss over the gain but the upgrade created a whole other dilemma; both systems had good features. We approached a few people and they recommended extended problem solving by discussing the dilemma with the employee at the store who is much more educated about both systems. The worst we would face is functional risk and after evaluating the opportunity cost, the decision we were going to make because much clear.

The Playstation 4 was positioned according to our price range and delivered the quality of graphics we desired. The ability to play online was more viable in the Playstation as we already had a set account with a certain amount of points. Buying a whole other system would require the consumer to learn the new operations and be introduced to new features that were designed differently by the competitor brand. The rational decision to make was to continue using the Playstation and form a loyalty towards their operating system. I think because the decision to be made was not habitual, it required us as the consumer to perform a search about the two products. I learned about something known as consumer inertia. It just means to choose a specific brand out of mere habit as it requires less effort. Now I understand that consoles are not a product that is purchased based on habitual factors but since so many generations of consoles from the same brand are released, you tend to stick to the brand because it is the one you are adapted to. Would this decision of Playstation 4 over Xbox 1 be a factor of consumer inertia? To a certain extent, yes!

I understood that the level of involvement when making a decision increases as the price increases and because we are cautious when it comes to luxury products, we needed to ensure that we don’t regret the decision.

Consumers make decisions every day when buying a soft drink to buying lunch and even groceries. The fact that new brands are established every now and then, our ability to make a decision becomes more complex and we are required to perform extended search even if we have little information about the product.

The more something means to us, the longer it takes to make a decision after you have recognised a need for it and evaluating alternatives would impact our decision to buy the product. Buying a gaming system made me realise the amount of information we need and the factors we need to consider when making a purchase decision. Click on the video below to know how we are influenced by various decision attributes. Putting the idea of decision making processes in a real life situation might intrigue you how we make certain decisions. 

Lets run through this decision making process that I had to undergo:
Problem recognition: Two new gaming system was released with improved graphics, speed and new games would be launched with additional features.
Information search: Spoke to educated employees, friends, internet search and gaming reviewers.
Evaluation of alternatives: Playstation 4 or Xbox 1
Product choice: Playstation 4 because I recognise the operating system, I have been a loyal customer, cheaper online play than Xbox, existing purchased playstation 3 games would function on the next generation model.
Consumption and Learning: With the Xbox I could have used the additional camera feature to play multiplayer games while the Playstation cannot perform such function and this was a compensatory decision rule I had to make. The new gaming system was fun and easy to play with and I enjoyed it.

If you perform such a decision making process, it will definitely guide you towards something you desire but are not aware because of the alternatives available. Next time you purchase something significant, see how effective this procedure is in helping you decide what YOU want!

New Year, New You