Confounding Issues in the Deadweight Loss of Gift-Giving

When a gift is given, someone other than the final consumer makes the consumption choice. Thus there is a possibility that the gift will not match the preferences of the receiver, i.e., the gift will represent a wise use of the money given the gift-giver's tastes but not necessarily a wise use of money given the recipient's tastes. In other words, gift giving can result in a deadweight loss. This paper addresses and clarifies the discrepancy between Waldfogel's (1993) finding of a deadweight loss from gift giving and Solnick and Hemenway's (1996) finding of a deadweight gain from gift giving. It also builds on some of the concerns raised by Ruffle and Tykocinski (2000).

Clients\u27 Experiences Giving Gifts to Therapists

Nine therapy clients were interviewed regarding their experiences of giving gifts to therapists. Data were analyzed using consensual qualitative research. In describing a specific event when they gave a gift that was accepted, participants described having a good relationship with the therapist and usually identified their therapy concerns as relationship or family struggles or both. Most bought a relatively inexpensive gift they thought their therapist would like and gave it during a nontermination session to express appreciation or mark an important life event. Most participants acknowledged mixed emotions when giving the gift and noted that any discussion of the gift was brief and did not explore its deeper meaning. Nevertheless, most participants perceived that gift events positively affected them and their therapists

Managerial Payoff and Gift Exchange in the Field

We conduct a field experiment where we vary both the presence of a gift exchange wage and the effect of the worker’s effort on the manager’s payoff. The results indicate a strong complementarity between the initial wage gift and the agent’s ability to “repay the gift”. We collect information on ability to control for differences and on reciprocal inclination to show that gift exchange is more effective with more reciprocal agents. We present a simple principal-agent model with reciprocal subjects that motivates our empirical findings. Our results offer an avenue to reconcile the recent conflicting evidence on the efficacy of gift exchange outside the lab; we suggest that the significance of gift exchange relations depends on details of the environment.incentives, reciprocity, gift exchange, field experiments

[Review of] Kathryn Simpson 'Gifts, Market and Economies of Desire in Virginia Woolf'

Inspired by Lewis Hyde’s groundbreaking study, The Gift: Imagination and the Erotic Life of Property (1999), Kathryn Simpson in Gifts, Market and Economies of Desire in Virginia Woolf, takes the notion of the market place and extends it to include gifts and gift economies, at the same time highlighting the homo-erotic importance accorded the gift in Woolf’s oeuvr

The efficacy of psychologically based interventions to improve anxiety, depression and quality of life in COPD: a systematic review and meta-analysis

This article comprises a systematic review and meta-analysis looking at the efficacy of psychological intervention in improving anxiety, depression and quality of life in respiratory disease.Objective: To systematically evaluate the efficacy of psychologically based interventions for addressing psychological outcomes in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Methods: Electronic databases, key journals and reference lists of included studies were scrutinised for inclusion; in addition authors were contacted for potential unpublished research. Nine studies were identified for inclusion. Data was extracted by two reviewers independently using a standardised extraction sheet and a series of meta-analyses completed for measures of anxiety, depression and quality of life. Results: Eight studies evaluated a cognitive behavioural- or psychotherapeutically based intervention and one study evaluated taped progressive muscle relaxation. The studies revealed some evidence for the interventions’ impact on anxiety, but, taken together interventions had limited effectiveness. The meta-analyses that were conducted revealed a small effect for anxiety only. Conclusion: The results are discussed considering the limitations of the research and previous work in this area. A systematic evaluation of psychological interventions on psychological co-morbidity in patients with COPD is recommended. Practice implications: There is some evidence that psychological interventions impact anxiety and this should be explored further and more interventions should target quality of life

Reciprocity in Gift-Exchange-Games

This paper presents an analysis of data from a gift-exchange-game experiment. The experiment was described in `The Impact of Social Comparisons on Reciprocity' by G\"achter et al. 2012. Since this paper uses state-of-art data science techniques, the results provide a different point of view on the problem. As already shown in relevant literature from experimental economics, human decisions deviate from rational payoff maximization. The average gift rate was $31$%. Gift rate was under no conditions zero. Further, we derive some special findings and calculate their significance.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, 5 table

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Gifts as Economic Signals and Social Symbols

Gift-giving has often puzzled economists, especially because efficient gifts-like cash or giving exactly what a person asks for-seem crass or inappropriate. It is shown in a formal game-theoretic model that gifts serve as "signals" of a person's intentions about future investment in a relationship, and inefficient gifts can be better signals. Other explanations for the inefficiency of gift giving are advanced, and some stylized facts about gift-giving practices are described (many of which are consistent with the signaling view of gifts)