Openness and Gifts: What Research Shows and How We Use It
Openness is the Big Five trait that describes how drawn a person is to new ideas, art and experiences compared with familiar routines and favorites. In shopping research it is the trait most clearly tied to variety seeking.[1] We did not find a study showing that high-openness people prefer more novel gifts, so iGiftFinder uses it only to prompt one practical question: would this person enjoy something new, or a better version of something they already love?
What openness means
Openness (called Open-Mindedness in one widely used inventory) is one of the five broad Big Five personality traits. That inventory splits it into three facets: aesthetic sensitivity (interest in art, music and literature), intellectual curiosity, and creative imagination.[2]
People higher in openness tend to enjoy novelty, ideas and unusual experiences. People lower in openness tend to prefer the practical, familiar and proven. Neither end is better. Someone lower in openness often knows exactly what they like and why, and a well-chosen version of a favorite can mean more to them than a surprise.
What the research says
- Variety seeking. In a nationally representative sample of 1,644 Norwegian adults, openness was a strong predictor of variety seeking in shopping and was unrelated to impulse buying.[1]
- Shopping motives. In a survey of 216 people, openness was associated with shopping for adventure and ideas online. We read only the abstract.[3]
- Tailored messages. In field experiments on Facebook that reached more than 3.5 million people, messages matched to a person's openness or extraversion produced up to 40% more clicks and up to 50% more purchases than mismatched or untailored ones. In the openness experiment (an app promotion), the benefit showed up among people low in openness. There was no significant difference among people high in openness.[4]
Where the evidence is thin
- Almost all of it is about what people buy for themselves, or how they react to advertising. It is not about gifts they receive.
- The studies describe averages across large groups. They say little about any one person.
- Self-reported shopping habits are not the same as how someone feels about a gift. The no-difference result among high-openness people is inconclusive, not a sign that openness does not matter.
- In an older study of shoppers at two Italian shopping centers, openness correlated with enjoying shopping for its own sake. Its design was weak, so we treat it as background only.[5]
How it can inform a gift
These are our reasoning, not tested findings:
- If the person usually tries new things (new restaurants, unusual hobbies, unfamiliar genres), a gift that adds something fresh to an interest they already have is a reasonable bet.
- If they stick with favorites, a better, nicer or more comfortable version of something they already use is a safer and often warmer choice.
- Do not let the trait override direct information. Studies of gift exchange find recipients appreciate gifts they asked for more than givers expect.[6] If they have said what they want, start there.
How iGiftFinder's quiz uses it
The quiz asks two short questions about how the person approaches new things. Each can be answered on a five-point scale or skipped with "Not sure." The answers are combined into one of four rough levels for openness, which helps choose the pre-written description of the person and the style of ideas shown, always within the interests and budget you gave us. If you answer "Not sure" to both questions, the quiz does not guess from your answers; it falls back to a mild default description for this trait, which you can disregard.
The quiz is not a validated personality test. Our questions are our own short wording about someone else, not a standard inventory, and we have not tested whether they predict which gifts people like. Ideas are a starting point, not a promise of a perfect gift. See how the quiz works and how personality affects gift preferences.
Related
The quiz also asks about Conscientiousness and Extraversion. We deliberately leave out Agreeableness and Neuroticism. Browse all gift ideas based on personality or take the quiz.
Sources
- Olsen, S. O., Tudoran, A. A., Honkanen, P. & Verplanken, B. (2016). Differences and similarities between impulse buying and variety seeking: A personality-based perspective. Psychology & Marketing, 33(1), 36-47. Full text read (accepted manuscript): https://purehost.bath.ac.uk/ws/files/147240500/Olsen_Tudoran_Honkanen_Verplanken_2015_.pdf; publisher DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.20853
- Soto, C. J. & John, O. P. Big Five Inventory-2 Short Form (BFI-2-S), form and scoring key with the 15 facet scales (Berkeley John Lab). Read in full; used only for the names of the domains and facets, not for any research finding: https://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~johnlab/docs.php?file=bfis.pdf
- Huang, J. H. & Yang, Y. C. (2010). The relationship between personality traits and online shopping motivations. Social Behavior and Personality, 38(5), 673-679. Abstract only (full text not read): https://doi.org/10.2224/sbp.2010.38.5.673
- Matz, S. C., Kosinski, M., Nave, G. & Stillwell, D. J. (2017). Psychological targeting as an effective approach to digital mass persuasion. PNAS, 114(48). Full text read: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5715760/
- Guido, G. (2006). Shopping motives, Big Five factors, and the hedonic/utilitarian shopping value. Innovative Marketing, 2(2), 57-67. Full text read: https://businessperspectives.org/images/pdf/applications/publishing/templates/article/assets/1714/im_en_2006_02_Guido.pdf
- Gino, F. & Flynn, F. J. (2011). Give them what they want: The benefits of explicitness in gift exchange. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology. Abstract only (no open-access full text found): https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2011.03.015
Evidence note: sources marked "full text read" were read in full by our research team; sources marked "abstract only" were not, so claims from them rest on the abstract alone. Almost all of this research concerns what people buy for themselves or how they react to advertising. We did not locate a study that tests a Big Five trait against how recipients rate gifts they receive. That is a gap in what we found, not proof that no such study exists.
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