Turns out it’s the guy who might care more.
By Regina Nuzzo
Special to the Times
Los Angeles Times – Health Section
December 15, 2008
It’s Christmas Eve. You’ve just exchanged presents with your special — or soon-to-be-special — someone, when you hear the lackluster response: “Uh, gee, thanks.”
Is a bombed gift the kiss of death for your future together? Or a funny story to share years hence?
Research published in August suggests the answer is different for men and women and, perhaps surprisingly, it’s the men who care more.
In a psychology experiment at the University of Virginia, when men got a rotten gift that was supposedly from their long-term girlfriend (in this case, a gift certificate from a store they hated), they were more likely to decide the girlfriend was very different from them, and they were more pessimistic about their chances of staying together and getting married.
