Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hey, brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren bogelbam here want to cultivate a sense of gratitude
Speaker 1: and thankfulness, spend your money on experiences, not material goods,
Speaker 1: say researchers. It isn't necessarily a groundbreaking idea, but a
Speaker 1: newly revealed connection may have implications that stretch far beyond
Speaker 1: individual attitudes. Researchers conducted six experiments to explore the impact
Speaker 1: of material consumption versus experience consumption on feelings of gratitude.
Speaker 1: In one experiment, for instance, they asked participants to selectively
Speaker 1: remember either a significant purchase or a significant experience. Those
Speaker 1: who chose to reflect on an experience were more grateful
Speaker 1: overall as expected. That's an idea borne out in previous research,
Speaker 1: including a study from San Francisco State University that found
Speaker 1: people who bought experiences were happier and more satisfied with
Speaker 1: how they spent their money than those who bought material items.
Speaker 1: And yet other studies show that engaging in new experiences
Speaker 1: not only makes you feel happier, but also leads to
Speaker 1: increased confidence and self esteem and can lead to improved health. However,
Speaker 1: the current research team and at Kumar, a postdoctoral research
Speaker 1: fellow at the University of Chicago's Booth School of Business,
Speaker 1: along with researchers Jesse Walker and Thomas Jilovich of Cornell University,
Speaker 1: took the concept one step farther by giving participants the
Speaker 1: power to allocate money to themselves and to someone they
Speaker 1: would never meet. The people who remembered spending money on
Speaker 1: experiences more than they did on things allocated a larger
Speaker 1: portion of the money to others. This altruistic attitude can
Speaker 1: ripple from individuals to entire communities, opening an entirely new
Speaker 1: way to consider the benefits of experiential behavior. Kumar study
Speaker 1: Cultivating Gratitude and Giving through Experiential Consumption was published in
Speaker 1: the journal Emotion and outlined findings that described the role
Speaker 1: of experiences in healthy communities. People become socially connected when
Speaker 1: they reflect on experiences, according to the research, but not
Speaker 1: when they think about possessions, Kumar said in a press
Speaker 1: release announcing the papers publication, if people feel closer to
Speaker 1: other humans, they end up treating others better. The sense
Speaker 1: of community and how to better achieve it could change
Speaker 1: the way policy makers and civic leaders bring people together.
Speaker 1: Public projects such as interactive parks and libraries could make
Speaker 1: people more likely to engage in experiences together and in
Speaker 1: turn treat others with greater care. Today's episode was written
Speaker 1: by Laurie L. Dov and produced by Tyler Klang. If
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