When you shop for a gift, your recipient observes only what you bought, and not what alternatives you considered.
Why would price matter more to givers than receivers? Dr. Flynn and his Stanford colleague, Gabrielle Adams, attribute it to the “egocentric bias” of givers who focus on their own experience in shopping. When they economize by giving a book, they compare it with the bracelet that they passed up.
But the recipients have a different frame of reference. They don’t know anything about the bracelet, so they’re not using it for comparison. The salient alternative in their minds may be the possibility of no gift at all, in which case the book looks wonderfully thoughtful.
Click through for an excellent article on giving, touching on the potlatch, the gift registry, and re-gifting.
Cheap Talk 
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December 15, 2011 at 11:49 pm
twicker
An interesting article (two, really: the NYTimes one and yours), but I’ll note that neither the price of a gift nor its presence/absence on a gift registry indicate how much thought went into getting the gift.
For example: you may have set A of thing on your registry (the things you were thinking of when you created the registry). However, being your good and dear friend, I happen to know that there’s this jazz record that you’ve been dying to have – one that’s been out of print for ages, and, if found, would only be on vinyl. Turns out, I find it at a yard sale, and buy it for $0.50.
Now – am I going to feel good about giving you the gift? You bet – because I actually put *thought* into it (more thought than if I’d gone and bought a $50 something-or-other for you). Are you going to feel appreciative? Dude: it’s a record that (a) you really, really want and that (b) you can’t get any other way. It wouldn’t show up on your gift list because, well, no one has a registry that would include it, and you wouldn’t’ve necessarily been thinking about it when you created (or updated) the registry (which, instead, has various wines, wine implements, and gardening tools).
Alternately, maybe I spend a small fortune – and buy you lunch at (and transportation to) di Fara Pizza, after the health inspectors allow it to open back up. Again: not a chance it’d be on your registry, and I’d bet it’d be a gift you’d remember more than what was on your registry (especially if we have a good time, have our SigO’s along, etc.; remember, we remember and appreciate experiences more than things; note that experiences also require more actual thought).
So sure: the price might not matter, and buying something good off the registry would be better than buying something meh that’s not on the registry, but something awesome off-registry (something that really says that I know you better than you do) will even trump the registry – or straight up money. That there thought? Yep, it counts – if it’s real.
(by the way: your link to the Straight, No Chaser video is broken — or, rather, removed by the user)
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