THRIFTY SPENDING AS A (PARADOXICALLY) COSTLY SIGNAL: PERCEPTIONS OF OTHERS' TRAITS AND MATING PATTERNS AS A FUNCTION OF THEIR SPENDING STYLE Lynzee J. Murray A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate College of Bowling Green State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS August 2018 Committee: Anne K. Gordon, Advisor Vern P. Bingman William H. O'Brien THRIFTY SPENDING ii ABSTRACT Anne K. Gordon, Advisor According to the bargain hunting hypothesis, thriftiness requires a host of personality characteristics and psychological traits, namely contentiousness, intelligence, and self-control. Another part of the bargain hunting hypothesis attempts to explain why people, especially women, are often excited by the great deals they get and are motivated to tell others about them. According to this hypothesis, signaling thriftiness may signal to others a host of desirable traits, including the aforementioned traits as well as a good moral character, a long-term mating orientation, and a disinclination toward infidelity. In the current study, participants were asked to think of someone they know whose is thrifty or who engages in conspicuous consumption and to evaluate this person on a variety of personality and mating-related dimensions. We predicted that in comparison to conspicuous-consumption targets, thrifty targets would be perceived as more intelligent (including creativity and problem solving), conscientious, higher in self-control, more likeable, emotionally closer with participants, more agreeable, higher in moral character/virtue, lower in their degree of perceived vanity and in their valuation of wealth in others, and cheaper. We also predicted that thrifty targets would be perceived/rated as lower in short-term mating effort and infidelity probability, and higher in parenting effort and desirability as a long-term mate. The finding of our study supported the predictions that thrifty targets would be perceived as more intelligent, higher in self-control, more likeable, emotionally closer to participants, lower in perceived vanity, lower in valuation of wealth in other, cheaper, and lower in short-term mating effort. Our findings also provided partial support for our predictions that thrifty targets would be perceived as more agreeable, higher in moral character, lower in infidelity probability, and higher in parenting effort and desirability as a long-term mate. THRIFTY SPENDING iii To my father, Zane: For giving me your love of science and encouraging my interests. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank my advisor, Anne K. Gordon, for her support and dedication to this project. I would also like to thank Vern P. Bingman and William O’Brien for their advice and guidance. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Page CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................... 1 Sexual Selection and Costly Signals .......................................................................... 1 Economic Decision Making as Sexual Signaling ..................................................... 3 The Links Between Mating and Money..................................................................... 4 Female Spending as a Signal ..................................................................................... 7 The Bargain-Hunting Hypothesis .............................................................................. 9 Overview of Current Research................................................................................... 14 CHAPTER II. METHOD...................................................................................................... 16 Participants and Design.............................................................................................. 16 Target Characteristics as a Function of Shopping Style ............................................ 19 Target Ethnicity ............................................................................................. 20 Target Age ..................................................................................................... 20 Target Sexual Orientation .............................................................................. 20 Target Relationship Status ............................................................................. 20 Number of Children ....................................................................................... 20 Duration of Relationship with Target ............................................................ 21 Similarity to Target ........................................................................................ 21 Relationship to Target .................................................................................... 21 Concern for Quality of Items ......................................................................... 22 Target Employment and Income .................................................................... 22 Covariates/Control Variables; Order of Dependent Measures, and Effect Size ........ 23 vi CHAPTER III. PRIMARY MEASURES AND RESULTS ................................................. 25 Manipulation Checks ................................................................................................. 25 Predictions and Results .............................................................................................. 26 Prediction 1 .................................................................................................... 26 Prediction 2 .................................................................................................... 27 Prediction 3 .................................................................................................... 31 Prediction 4 .................................................................................................... 31 Prediction 5 .................................................................................................... 37 Prediction 6 .................................................................................................... 39 Exploratory Analyses ..................................................................................... 40 Summary of Results ................................................................................................... 41 CHAPTER IV. DISCUSSION.............................................................................................. 43 Contributions/Strengths ............................................................................................. 46 Replicated Results ...................................................................................................... 48 Limitations and Direction for Future Research ........................................................ 48 Concluding Remarks .................................................................................................. 50 REFERENCES ...................................................................................................................... 52 APPENDIX A. INFORMED CONSENT............................................................................. 57 APPENDIX B. CONDITION I INSTRUCTIONS ............................................................... 59 APPENDIX C. CONDITION II INSTRUCTIONS ............................................................. 61 APPENDIX D. MEASURES................................................................................................ 63 APPENDIX E. CONTROL/EXPLORATORY ITEMS ....................................................... 70 vii APPENDIX F. MANIPULATION CHECK ITEMS ........................................................... 72 APPENDIX G. ATTENTION CHECK ITEMS ................................................................... 76 APPENDIX H. TARGET DEMOGRAPHICS..................................................................... 77 APPENDIX I. PARTICIPANT DEMOGRAPHICS ............................................................ 81 APPENDIX J. DEBRIEFING .............................................................................................. 84 APPENDIX K. MTURK ADVERTISEMENT .................................................................... 85 APPENDIX L. TABLES ...................................................................................................... 86 viii LIST OF TABLES Table Page 1 Most to Least Commonly-Endorsed Shopping Behaviors Engaged in by Thrifty Targets, as Perceived by Participants....................................................................................... 86 2 Most to Least Commonly-Endorsed Shopping Behaviors Engaged in by Conspicuous Consumption Targets, as Perceived by Participants .................................................. 87 3 Two Versions of Dependent Variable Presentation ................................................... 88 4 Main Effects of Shopping Style on Manipulation Check Items ................................ 89 5 Effect Sizes that Accompany Main effects of Shopping Style on all Major Dependent Measure, by Prediction, as a Function of Method of Calculation ............................. 90 6 Results of Hierarchical Regression Analysis of Predictors of Likeability ................ 91 Running head: THRIFTY SPENDING 1 CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION According to a recent survey, 83% of women consider themselves bargain shoppers, with 80% reporting that they would bargain shop even if money were not an object. Fifty nine percent of women also report that they wait for a sale to purchase items that they want.