Buy me love?

We live in a consumer society, there is no doubt about it. We believe that we can purchase most things but do we believe that we can buy love? John Lennon and Paul McCartney had a public and conspicuous debate about this in the lyrics of their Beatles songs. Lennon wrote, “I work all day to get the money to buy you things. And it’s worth it just to hear you say, you’re gonna give me everything.” McCartney riposted, “I don’t care too much for money, money can’t buy me love.” Now in a new study some researchers have bought into the argument.

The theory side of the new research actually harks back to the early part of the twentieth century when there was a Nordically named American economist and sociologist; Thorstein Veblen. One of his claims to fame was coming up with the notion of “conspicuous consumption” which is the lavish acquiring of goods and services mainly for the purpose of displaying status and wealth. Old Thorstein believed that conspicuous consumption was the primary activity of the leisure classes and that their prime economic output was/is “waste”, or activity that contributes nothing to economic productivity.

However, just as peacocks may flaunt their plumage before potential mates, in humans conspicuous consumption like buying a Porsche might be an attempt to charm women.

Fast forward to the early 21st century and the researchers wanted to investigate if conspicuous consumption actually does make men more attractive to women. In this case they wanted to see if a man driving a Porsche was regarded as more attractive by women than a man driving a Honda Civic.

The results of the study showed that women did find the same man more attractive if he had purchased a more flashy product (a Porsche) than if he had purchased a more utilitarian car like a Honda. For the men, conspicuous spending was found to be driven by a desire for uncommitted sexual relationships. The bad news is that women knew this and although they found the flashy men more desirable for a date, those flash dudes were not preferred as a marriage partner.

Interestingly, while men may use conspicuous consumption as a short-term mating signal, women are not the same and do not spend in order to attract men.

All in all, it seems that our friend Thorstein may have been a touch harsh in describing the output of the leisure classes as mere economic waste but as far as men using their conspicuous consumption to find a long term mate, it does indeed appear that they are wasting their time.

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