The research behind Giftsnatch

Recipients judge a gift by living with it

Reviewing the research on gift-giving, the authors found that givers mostly judge a gift by the moment it is given, while recipients mostly judge it by how valuable it is once they own it.

On Giftsnatch: Every match starts from the person you are buying for, and gifts are described in their terms, such as more from the heart or more practical.

Galak, J., Givi, J., & Williams, E. F. (2016). Why certain gifts are great to give but not to get: A framework for understanding errors in gift giving. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 25(6), 380-385. https://doi.org/10.1177/0963721416656937

Sentimental gifts are given less often than they are wanted

Givers choose a gift that matches the recipient's tastes over one with sentimental value far more often than recipients would like, because they feel surer the first kind will be liked.

On Giftsnatch: The first dial in Tune, the panel that steers your matches, runs from "From the heart" to "Practical", so the sentimental choice is one drag away.

Givi, J., & Galak, J. (2017). Sentimental value and gift giving: Givers' fears of getting it wrong prevents them from getting it right. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 27(4), 473-479. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcps.2017.06.002

Recipients care how easy a gift is to use

Givers weigh how appealing a gift is more heavily than how easy it is to use, while recipients weigh ease of use more.

On Giftsnatch: "Practical" is the other end of that first dial, for a gift they will pick up and use.

Baskin, E., Wakslak, C. J., Trope, Y., & Novemsky, N. (2014). Why feasibility matters more to gift receivers than to givers: A construal-level approach to gift giving. Journal of Consumer Research, 41(1), 169-182. https://doi.org/10.1086/675737

A higher price impresses givers more than recipients

Across three studies, givers rated a high-priced gift as better because they took the price to signal quality, while recipients rated a low-priced gift as better, and only when it was the practical kind.

On Giftsnatch: Price on Giftsnatch is a budget you set, and a gift is never ranked higher for costing more.

Liu, N., Lou, Y., Wang, X., & Li, S. (2022). More expensive, more attractive? The effect of pricing on gift evaluation: Differences between giver and receiver. Frontiers in Psychology, 13, Article 790434. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.790434

A gift says something about the relationship

An economic model of gift exchange showed that a gift works as a signal of how much the giver means to invest in the relationship.

On Giftsnatch: The first thing we ask is who they are to you, and from then on a romantic gift only appears if they are your partner, since for anyone else it sends the wrong signal.

Camerer, C. (1988). Gifts as economic signals and social symbols. American Journal of Sociology, 94, S180-S214. https://doi.org/10.1086/228946

The gap holds across 114 studies

Combining 114 studies, a meta-analysis confirmed that givers and recipients judge gifts differently, and that the gap grows when a gift is sentimental, used in private or given between friends.

On Giftsnatch: It is why we treat the gap as settled enough to build the matching on, from the first question about who they are to the dials in Tune.

Freling, R. E., Moore Koskie, M., Freling, T. H., Moulard, J. G., & Crosno, J. L. (2024). Exploring gift gaps: A meta-analysis of giver-recipient asymmetries. Psychology & Marketing, 41(6), 1318-1332. https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.21981

What the studies don't tell us