Present Tense
The Today Show's Jean Chatzsky reported yesterday on differences in men's and women's holiday shopping habits, based on BizRate Research's 2006 report. Men apparently feel more pressure to get the "right" gift than women, which Chatzsky suggests is a result of putting off shopping until the last minute. This is consistent with findings by Fischer and Arnold (1990) that men typically put off shopping until later than women, although their study found that men felt less pressure to find "the right gift" and were instead likely to spend more money per recipient. Fischer and Arnold also suggest that men shop for fewer gift recipients than women, and that the process of gift-buying is stereotyped as "women's work."
Genevieve Vaughn, author of For-Giving: A Feminist Criticism of Exchange frames the entire concept of gift-giving as a maternal enterprise, drawing a distinction between "giving in order to receive" (ego-oriented) and "giving in order to satisfy another's need" (other-oriented). However, while Vaughn pays a great deal of attention to the "delightful" nature of gift-giving, she does not seem to explore how this delight may be ego-oriented.
[edit 22DEC2006: Lacher et al (1995, pdf) notes that men tend to prefer buying gifts that are practical, while women prefer buying sentimental gifts.]
I think Chatzsky's wrong. While timing may play a part in men's holiday stresses, I think gender interactions play a bigger role. Men feel more pressure to get "the right gift" -- and spend more to find something impressive -- because women will punish the men in their lives for inappropriate gifting for months. I have never (that I recall) seen a man over the age of 13 express disappointment with a gift, but women in my family tell stories about "wrong gifts" for decades. I have noticed that I feel little or no remorse about expressing disappointment with a gift to my significant other, but will expend massive effort attempting not to reveal disappointment in gifts from other people. I've even attempted to do away with gifting in relationships on a couple of occasions because I start fights about the inappropriateness of presents, but I always find the disappointment of not doing gifts overrules my better judgement. This particular bit of socialization bothers the hell out of me.
Genevieve Vaughn, author of For-Giving: A Feminist Criticism of Exchange frames the entire concept of gift-giving as a maternal enterprise, drawing a distinction between "giving in order to receive" (ego-oriented) and "giving in order to satisfy another's need" (other-oriented). However, while Vaughn pays a great deal of attention to the "delightful" nature of gift-giving, she does not seem to explore how this delight may be ego-oriented.
[edit 22DEC2006: Lacher et al (1995, pdf) notes that men tend to prefer buying gifts that are practical, while women prefer buying sentimental gifts.]
I think Chatzsky's wrong. While timing may play a part in men's holiday stresses, I think gender interactions play a bigger role. Men feel more pressure to get "the right gift" -- and spend more to find something impressive -- because women will punish the men in their lives for inappropriate gifting for months. I have never (that I recall) seen a man over the age of 13 express disappointment with a gift, but women in my family tell stories about "wrong gifts" for decades. I have noticed that I feel little or no remorse about expressing disappointment with a gift to my significant other, but will expend massive effort attempting not to reveal disappointment in gifts from other people. I've even attempted to do away with gifting in relationships on a couple of occasions because I start fights about the inappropriateness of presents, but I always find the disappointment of not doing gifts overrules my better judgement. This particular bit of socialization bothers the hell out of me.