from the tell-me-lies-tell-me-sweet-little-lies dept.
Hiding chocolate stashes or Amazon purchases from a partner? 'Guilty' purchases may have benefits:
Do you have a secret stash of chocolates that you keep from your partner, or do you intentionally keep your spouse from knowing about something you bought on Amazon? New research indicates that small but commonly hidden actions such as these may be good for the relationship.
[...] "In our study, we found that 90% of people have recently kept everyday consumer behaviors a secret from a close other -- like a friend or spouse -- even though they also report that they don't think their partner would care if they knew about it," said Kelley Gullo Wight, an assistant professor of marketing at the Kelley School and one of two lead authors on the study. "Even though most of these secret acts are quite ordinary, they can still -- positively -- impact the relationship. The positive impact is an important piece."
Most previous research on secrets has focused on those that hide significant and negative information, such as trauma or extramarital affairs. That research has generally found negative outcomes of secrets.
[...] "One of my favorite findings is that partners often keep the same secrets from each other," said Brick, the study's co-lead author. "In one couple, both partners reported secretly eating meat when they were both supposed to be vegetarian."
Wight said their findings offer companies insights into ways to help consumers use their products in secret. For example, marketers should ask their consumers about when and from whom they use their products so they can better support the secret usage.
"We find that people generally keep consumption a secret from a specific person, not necessarily everyone, which means that encouraging secret consumption shouldn't inhibit other marketing strategies, such as word of mouth," Wight said.
Marketing research papers start with interesting observations on human behavior before revealing their evil underbelly when they point out how to manipulate people using that information.
Journal Reference:
Danielle J. Brick, Kelley Gullo Wight, and Gavan J. Fitzsimons, Secret consumer behaviors in close relationships, J Consumer Psych, 2022. DOI: 10.1002/jcpy.1315
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Snotnose on Monday August 29 2022, @07:12PM (1 child)
Before my wife became my ex I did lots of stuff without telling her. Not because I was ashamed, embarrassed, or setting up an affair. No, I figured she wouldn't give a shit so it never came up. I assume she did the same.
Then again, I've now been divorced for longer than I was married (that's a sad milestone and I miss being married), so maybe I was wrong.
Then again, considering the reasons for our divorce I fucked up big time, it's all on me. And I'm not gonna say anything more than that.
I just passed a drug test. My dealer has some explaining to do.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Monday August 29 2022, @08:37PM
My starter wife stubbornly hid things that were obvious, like where 2/3 of her take-home pay was going. It did not positively impact the relationship.
If the mistakes are all on you, then you certainly have the power to learn from that and change... though I would consider if finding a partner who accepts you for who you are might be a better strategy.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 29 2022, @08:20PM
Any idea who funded this study? Pron sites are full of pitches like, "She'll never know you came here."
And, as we know, pron is first to take advantage of new capabilities on the internet.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday August 29 2022, @08:58PM
As long as the surprises are happy ones, keeping a few secrets keeps things a little more interesting. If you're keeping secrets that you would mind being discovered, you're doing it wrong (for positive impact on the relationship.)
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday August 30 2022, @06:13AM (3 children)
The S.O. put a lot of silly and extreme restrictions on me. I don't agree with many of them, and frequently break them. Sometimes I do it right in plain sight, which usually provokes an argument. More often, I prefer to avoid confrontation, to spare myself.
Interesting that they used vegetarianism as an example. The S.O. insisted I go fully vegetarian, and, yeah, I break that now and then. I am not allowed to use the toilet that happens to be closest to the bedroom I use as my home office. When no one else is home, I use it. Because the S.O. is allergic to peanuts, not only can't we have nuts in the house, I am not allowed to eat them, just in case. Didn't matter how many times the allergist said it was okay for me to eat them. So I keep a secret stash in the garage. Technically, the garage space can be considered not inside the house. The S.O. also has a lot of hangups about germs. Insists we wear masks whenever we are outside, even if only to walk from front door to the car parked in the driveway. That one I have openly flouted. I keep pointing out that the masks are needed only when around strangers. You're perfectly fine outdoors alone.
If you are wondering how I can mention this here, the S.O. totally ignores SoylentNews. But FaceBook now, that gets watched. Watches FB like a hawk. I wouldn't dare post this on FB.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 30 2022, @07:57PM (2 children)
> I wouldn't dare post this on FB.
For you sake, I hope that you don't post on FB as bzipitidoo!! Someone is about to re-post this for you...
Kidding aside, I'm sorry to hear that you and your S.O. have grown so far apart and/or intolerant of the other. While I sometimes have similar issues around the house, it sounds like yours are magnified by an order of magnitude, or more?
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Wednesday August 31 2022, @12:44AM (1 child)
Well, lots of similarities between employment and marriage, and I've had plenty of jobs that were worse. I've been slow at figuring out how to handle it. First, it's important to be able to discern which expectations and demands are unreasonable and/or counterproductive. Often quite hard to do, and embarrassing to get wrong. One thing that makes it so difficult is that you're not dealing with discrete, simple statements. You're dealing with false narratives. Yes, a lot of the tissue of lies is easy to see through, but there are so many lies woven together, including extremely subtle ones, that you can miss a few.
Next is dealing with the threats. It helps immensely to have the option to tell them to go to Hell, whether or not you actually do that. And to have that option, you should be prudent with your resources, that is, don't spend every last cent you have. You may well be pressured to do just that, by those who don't want you to have such an option, that their bullying will be more impactful. Many of the threats are more than half bull. I've been threatened with not just being fired, but having my career ruined. A year into a job, the boss told me that he was nearly resolved to fire me. I had no idea I was in such trouble, and that threw me off balance. I hadn't been warned, reprimanded, disciplined, told I was not measuring up, none of that. He said that if he did decide I should leave, he would be nice and allow me to resign, rather than inflict on my record the horrible awful black mark of being fired. You see what I mean about the lies? That's "nice"?? Black mark? Is being fired a career killer? I did not know, but I feared it could be. I fell for that one. And, in times past, being fired was about that bad. The employer was once one of only 2 big employers in a small city of about 25,000, and they had an informal, unwritten agreement not to hire one another's employees or former employees. Lose your job with either one, and you were almost guaranteed to have to move away. I therefore decided I needed to move, fast, and get the hell out before the axe fell. What if the boss changed his mind about what he called "nice", and fired me after all? To head that possibility off, I quit the next day. My fellow employees all assured me that the boss was bluffing, was only trying to scare me into working harder, and told their stories of most of them being threatened similarly. I could have stayed. However, I had other reasons for leaving. If I was a valuable employee, and the boss actually didn't want to lose me, then he was a fool to try that on me. Went too far with the scare tactics. In actuality, he was afraid of me. Afraid my hacking skills were so mad I could take over the entire computing resources of the company, lock them all out, take all their secrets, etc. Anyway, I've had many years to think that one over. I decided that maybe, I shouldn't have quit. Later, I changed my mind again, and now I believe that leaving was after all the best move.
I'm wiser now, better able to deal with bull. In the S.O.'s case, much of the bull arises from anxiety so extreme it borders on the pathological. You can't walk the streets in safety, because criminals are hiding behind every bush! So, no, the S.O. is not malicious or sadistic or in any other way sociopathic. Lot of good qualities. No, I am not going to exit. A more fitting course of action I believe would be therapy of some sort, to get those wild fears tamped down. I hope also that by being steady, I calm things down. One thing I've been practicing is to just keep working steadily, and ignore all the hysteria and shrieking for more, and to jump on this, then no, jump on that instead, no, you idiot, this 3rd thing is more important! Don't let them run you ragged trying to please them when they're flying apart like that and want half a dozen different somewhat contradictory things all done at once.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 31 2022, @02:16AM
Last paragraph sounds like you are well on the road to sainthood. (not sarcasm).