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Article courtesy of Emily Sohn, Discovery News
THE GIST:
- Handling money reduces the amount of pain people feel.
- In separate experiments, negative experiences, both physical and emotional, blunted by cash.
- If real-world poverty follows this principle, those with less money may feel pain more acutely.
In a series of experiments, people who counted money felt less pain
when their hands were dipped into scalding water. The soothing power of
cash also helped them shrug off the emotional pain of social exclusion. The findings might offer an easy way to ease life's stings and hurts,
from painful medical treatments to social ostracism: Simply flip
through a bulging wallet before enduring a painful experience.
"When people are reminded of money in a subtle manner by counting out
hard currency, they experience painful situations as being not very
painful," said lead author Kathleen Vohs, a consumer psychologist at the
University of Minnesota's Carleton School of Management in the Twin
Cities.
"You could think about being able charge yourself up before you
encounter pain," she said. "When I used to run marathons, I would've
maybe wanted to be reminded of money first."
Although scientists have been studying pain for years, they still
don't entirely understand why or how the perception of discomfort can
vary so much. On a scale from one to 10, for example, one person's four
might be another's eight. Even a single experience can feel more or less
painful to the same person under different circumstances.
In her own research, Vohs has found that thinking about money gives
people a sense of self-sufficiency, making them less likely to ask for
or offer help. Other studies have linked a strong sense of self-worth
with a greater ability to withstand pain. So, Vohs began to wonder
whether money might shift the balance on how much pain people feel.
Among other experiments, she and colleagues challenged college
students to a supposed finger-dexterity task in which they counted out
either 80 $100 bills or 80 slips of paper. Afterward, the cash-counters
reported less pain than the paper-counters when their fingers were
dipped briefly into 122-degree Fahrenheit water.
As bolstering as it can be to handle money, the study found that
being reminded of money you don't have makes pain worse. Reflecting on
your shrunken 401K, in other words, could make it more difficult to cope
with stubbing a toe or failing to connect with others at a party.
In an attempt to understand the source of money's power over pain,
the researchers asked study participants to rate their feelings of
self-esteem, attractiveness and mood, among other measures. The only
reliable link they found was that having money made people feel strong,
possibly providing a coping mechanism for whatever negative experiences
they encountered next. Likewise, thinking about money they had spent
made them feel weak, deflating their ability to cope.
"These findings are groundbreaking," said Eli Finkel, a social
psychologist at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill. "If real-world
poverty follows the principles of these laboratory demonstrations, then
confronting social rejection or physical pain should be experienced as
more painful for poor people than for wealthier people."
But you don't have to be rich to use money to your benefit, Vohs
said. Merely touching cash or even staring at a money-filled screensaver
could blunt the impact of hard or painful events.
"I always got a kick out of counting money," she said. "Now I know why."