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The Psychology of Gift Giving

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The Psychology of Gift Exchange
Mayet, C. & Pine, K. J. University of Hertfordshire Internal Report 2010
Gift giving is a social, cultural and economic experience; a material and social communication exchange that is inherent across human societies and instrumental in maintaining social relationships and expressing feelings (Camerer, 1988, Joy 2001). Research within different disciplines to gain insight of gift giving behaviour has continued for over forty years. Gifts are bestowed in celebration of key life events, a medium for nurturing personal relationships, to encourage economic exchange and to socialise children into appropriate behaviour patterns (Belk, 1979). Obligations within a community require that individuals are required to give, receive and to reciprocate (Mauss, 1954). In his essay the French anthropologist-sociologist Marcel Mauss (1954), presented a theoretical analysis of the gift-giving process, that was based on his examination of giftgiving amongst various primitive, secluded, or ancient societies. He concluded that giftgiving is a self-perpetuating system of reciprocity and summarised three types of obligations which preserve gift-giving: 1. The obligation to give. 2. The obligation to receive. 3. The obligation to repay. The requirement to give may be ingrained in religious or moral necessities, with a strong need to recognise and maintain a status hierarchy and to establish or maintain peaceful relations, or merely the expectation of reciprocal giving. These motives, which do not acknowledge purely selfless giving, become embedded into the fabric of a society so that under appropriate conditions an individual is socially obligated to give. Receiving gifts is seen as equally mandatory and evading or refusing gifts is interpreted as an unsociable or even hostile act. Tensions are created in receiving a gift and Mauss attributed this

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