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TIM KASSER and KENNON M. SHELDON
WHAT MAKES FOR A MERRY CHRISTMAS?
(Received 1 May 2002; Accepted 28 August 2002)
ABSTRACT. Despite the importance of Christmas within many cultures, research
has not examined the types of experiences and activities that are associated with
holiday well-being. Thus, we asked 117 individuals, ranging in age from 18 to 80,
to answer questions about their satisfaction, stress, and emotional state during the
Christmas season, as well as questions about their experiences, use of money, and
consumption behaviors. More happiness was reported when family and religious
experiences were especially salient, and lower well-being occurred when spending
money and receiving gifts predominated. Engaging in environmentally conscious
consumption practices also predicted a happier holiday, as did being older and male.
In sum, the materialistic aspects of modern Christmas celebrations may undermine
well-being, while family and spiritual activities may help people to feel more satisfied.
KEY WORDS: Happiness, consumption, Christmas festal days
“I get up early and with cash and credit cards
in hand go about the difficult and dirty task of
spreading Christmas cheer.”
Anonymous participant, Hirschman and
LaBarbera (1989), p. 140
The Christmas holiday has evolved from an event banned in some
American colonies to one that dominates the month of December.
According to a Gallup poll conducted in 2000, 96% of Americans
celebrate the holiday (Gallup Organization, 2000). Indeed, few other
holidays change the face of a nation and the behavior of its citi-
zens as does Christmas. Offices close down, people travel back home,
billions of dollars are spent on gifts, endless strings of lights are hung
in homes and city squares, and church pews fill.
Many themes intermingle during the holiday (Hirschman and
LaBarbera, 1989). Originally it began as a celebration of the birth of
the religious figure Jesus Christ, who preached a doctrine of love and
anti-materialism. Christmas also involves renewing ties with extended
family and engaging in traditions such as feasting, caroling, and deco-
rating an evergreen. Increasingly, however, the materialistic elements
of the Christmas holiday have become predominant, with the primary
figure of reverence being Santa Claus, a “secular version of Christ”
whose “realm is that of material abundance” (Belk, 1993, p. 83). Indeed,
Journal of Happiness Studies 3: 313–329, 2002.
© 2002 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
314 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
the Christmas season is a key element of the US economy, with an esti-
mated 1/6 of all retail sales occurring due to Christmas (Carrier, 1993).
Americans report spending about $800 on Christmas gifts, and many
consumers are still in debt 6 months later as a result of this spending
(Center for a New American Dream, n.d.).
Despite the prominent and recurring place that Christmas holds in
many people’s lives, there is surprisingly little empirical research about
the season. Consumer research has provided interesting analyses of its
myths, movies, and media messages (Belk, 1989; 1993), sociology
has examined gift-giving rituals (Caplow, 1982; 1984), and anthro-
pology has investigated meanings of the holiday in various cultures
(Miller, 1993). Within the field of psychology, what literature exists on
Christmas mostly concerns whether psychiatric admissions (Velamoor
et al., 1999) and suicide rates (Jessen and Jensen, 1999) increase dur-
ing the season. Surprisingly, we were unable to find any quantitative
empirical studies that have endeavored to understand the experiences
and qualities which are associated with happiness during Christmas.
The Current Study
We therefore set out to examine what makes for a merry Christmas
by examining how different types of experiences and activities predict
people’s satisfaction, stress, and emotional state during Christmas. Is
happiness during the holiday primarily a function of the religious and
family experiences that are historically central to the celebration? Or
are materialistic means the true path to Christmas joy, as implied by
the inundation of advertisements and the reign of Santa Claus?
Our primary interest in this study concerned the types of experi-
ences that individuals have during the holiday, and how these relate
to their well-being. Past literature (Hirschman and LaBarbera, 1989)
and pilot interviews suggested that seven main types of activities (and
hence experiences) occur during the holidays: (1) Spending time with
family; (2) Participating in religious activities; (3) Maintaining tradi-
tions (e.g., decorating a Christmas tree); (4) Spending money on others
via the purchase of gifts; (5) Receiving gifts from others; (6) Helping
others (e.g., Salvation Army bell-ringers); and (7) Enjoying the sensual
aspects of the holiday (e.g., good food).
Our theoretical perspective suggests that the relative frequency of
these experiences will bear differential relations to well-being. Past
research shows that people whose lives are focused on goals such as
A MERRY CHRISTMAS 315
intimacy and community feeling generally report greater well-being,
whereas those who are more concerned with money, possessions, and
image are less happy (Kasser, 2000; Kasser and Ryan, 1996). Similarly,
satisfying experiences are largely a function of feeling close to others,
while a strong focus on money and status can undermine feelings of
satisfaction (Sheldon et al., 2001). We thus predicted that people would
report more well-being at Christmas time when experiences of family
closeness and helping others were particularly salient. We also expected
that diminished well-being would be reported to the extent that people’s
experiences of the holiday were especially focused on the materialistic
aspects of the season (i.e., spending and receiving). Some recent work
suggests that religious experiences are powerful predictors of happiness
(Emmons et al., 1998; Myers, 2000), and so we also examined this type
of experience. Finally, in the spirit of comprehensiveness, we explored
tradition and sensual enjoyment, but made no predictions concerning
how they would relate to well-being.
The materialistic aspects of the season were also examined in this
study by obtaining estimates of how much subjects spent on others,
went into debt, and gave to church and charity, as well as the monetary
value of the gifts they received from others. Although many messages
in consumer society suggest that spending and receiving might bring
happiness during the holiday, we expected that such financial issues
would generally contribute little to nothing in terms of happiness during
the holiday. We were curious, however, whether donating money to
others might provide some boosts to well-being.
Holiday consumption practices were the third set of potential predic-
tors of holiday well-being that we explored. People often become even
larger consumers of natural resources during the holiday, using more
energy for light displays and more gasoline for trips out of town. In their
pursuit of Christmas joy, people also create massive amounts of trash
(one estimate is 5 million extra tons between Thanksgiving and New
year’s day in the US (Lilienfield, 2002)). Is the environmental degrada-
tion resulting from the materialistic aspect of the holiday a necessary
component of a merry Christmas? On the one hand, many calls for
healthier environmental behaviors suggest that they involve sacrifice,
and thus a decrement in well-being. On the other hand, the goals of pro-
tecting the environment can bring about well-being (Eigner, 2001; Sohr,
2001), and the same values that are associated with greater well-being
(i.e., personal growth, affiliation, and community feeling) also predict
316 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
better environmental stewardship (Sheldon and McGregor, 2000), sug-
gesting that positive consumption practices at Christmas might pro-
mote happiness. To explore this issue, we examined how well-being
relates to practices that decrease the ecological impact of one’s holiday
celebrations.
Lastly, we explored whether the demographic factors of age, gen-
der, and income might relate to people’s happiness at Christmas.
Recent work shows that older individuals typically report somewhat
higher general well-being (Argyle, 1999; Sheldon and Kasser, 2001);
we wondered whether this would generalize to their experience of
Christmas. Women report more negative affect (NA) than do men
(Costa et al., 2001) and seem to take on more of the responsibili-
ties for shopping (Fischer and Arnold, 1990), as well as for wrap-
ping, cooking, and cleaning during the holiday (Caplow, 1982); females
may therefore report lower well-being at Christmas. Income, in con-
trast, is generally not a very good predictor of well-being in devel-
oped nations such as the United States (Myers, 2000) and so we
expected to find that it was not associated with people’s happiness at
Christmas.
METHODS
Subjects
Subjects were recruited through two different means. On December 26,
2001, packets including a cover letter and a survey were mailed to 400
randomly selected individuals living in Knox County, IL. By January 5,
2002, 73 usable surveys had been returned, yielding an 18% response
rate. On January 7, 2002, 70 surveys were administered to undergradu-
ates at Knox College who were taking lower-level psychology courses.
Of these, 48 were returned by January 9, yielding a 69% response rate.
All respondents received a $5 honorarium.
Four subjects who reported that they did not celebrate Christmas
were removed from the sample, leaving a final sample size of 117. Of
those responding to demographic questions, 47 were male and 69 were
female; 102 were Caucasian, 3 were Asian, 3 were African-American,
and 1 was Hispanic. Age ranged between 18 and 80 (Mean =38), and
yearly family income ranged between $4800 and $800,000 (Median =
$54,000).
A MERRY CHRISTMAS 317
Measures and Procedures
All subjects received a cover letter explaining the study as well as a
series of questionnaires (some of which were not relevant to the present
study) concerning their experience of the Christmas season. Subjects
were asked to think of the Christmas season as the period between
about December 12 and December 27. Measures were administered in
the following order.
Well-being
We adapted the five item Satisfaction With Life Scale (Pavot and Diener,
1993), and asked subjects to report on a 1 (Strongly Disagree) to 5
(Strongly Agree) scale their agreement with items such as “I am sat-
isfied with this Christmas season.” A summary Christmas satisfaction
variable was computed by averaging these items. Next, subjects rated
on a 1 (not at all) to 5 (very much) scale the extent to which they
felt each of 21 moods (based on the PANAS (Watson et al., 1988)) on
average during Christmas. Ten of the moods (e.g., interested, enthu-
siastic) were averaged to form a Positive Affect (PA) measure, and
eleven (e.g., upset, sad) were averaged to form a Negative Affect (NA)
measure.1Finally, four items were written for this study to assess stress
levels at Christmas (“I felt stressed/relaxed/overwhelmed/rushed this
Christmas season”). These were administered on a 1 (Strongly dis-
agree) to 5 (Strongly agree) scale. A Christmas Stress variable was
computed by averaging the four items (alpha =0.84).
To obtain an aggregate measure of well-being, the four well-being
variables were each standardized and a Christmas Well-being (CWB)
variable was computed by adding subjects’ scores on Satisfaction and
PA and subtracting their NA and Stress scores. As we have found in
other studies (e.g., Sheldon and Elliott, 1999; Sheldon and Kasser,
2001) a higher order factor analysis of the well-being variables sup-
ported the computation of this aggregate; in this case, a one-factor
solution was discovered that accounted for 58.28% of the variance.
Occurrences
Subjects were next presented with 25 “experiences and activities” and
asked to rate “how much each experience actually occurred during
this Christmas season” on a 1 (completely absent) to 5 (occurred a
great deal) scale. These items tapped the seven a priori domains men-
tioned in the introduction and reported in Table I, with either three or
318 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
TABLE I
Christmas occurrence domains, sample items, Cronbach’s Alpha, and mean and
standard deviation in this sample
Domain Sample item Alpha Mean SD
Family Being close to my family and friends 0.83 4.05 0.90
Religion Practicing my religion 0.85 2.88 1.26
Tradition Carrying on holiday traditions 0.64 2.87 0.89
Spending Spending a lot of money on others 0.66 2.84 0.77
Receiving Receiving really nice gifts 0.48 2.40 0.74
Helping Helping others in need 0.78 2.44 0.86
Enjoying Eating and/or drinking well 0.50 3.22 0.75
four items each; the table reports sample items, Cronbach’s alphas, and
means and standard deviations for each domain. Alphas were generally
acceptable, but were rather low for receiving and sensual enjoyment.
In order to assess the salience of each type of occurrence for subjects
during the Christmas season, a relative occurrence score was com-
puted for each domain by subtracting the total occurrence of all events,
regardless of domain, from occurrence scores for each of the seven
domains. For example, to understand the relative salience of religion
in a person’s Christmas, we averaged the subject’s occurrence ratings
for the religion items, and then subtracted the subject’s average occur-
rence ratings for all items from his/her religion score. This procedure
corrects for subjects’ general tendency to endorse items as having had
occurred, regardless of their content, and thereby provides a measure of
the relative salience of different types of events that is uncontaminated
by this response tendency.
Use of Money
Subjects next reported their best estimates in dollars of how much they
spent on gifts for others, gave to church and charity, and went into
debt as a result of Christmas expenditures. They also estimated the
total worth of all the gifts and cash they personally received during
Christmas. Each estimate was divided by the subject’s reported family
income that year to equalize money usage as a percentage of one’s
income.
Positive Consumption Practices
Subjects were provided with a list of 13 “things people sometimes do
during the Christmas season” culled from suggestions about how to
A MERRY CHRISTMAS 319
change consumption practices during the holiday (Center for a New
American Dream, n.d.). Subjects were asked to circle “Yes” if they
had done the activity and “No” if they had not. A factor analysis
was conducted, yielding a scree plot that suggested the retention of
three factors. The first (Eigenvalue =2.20, % variance =16.90) was
labeled Environmentally Friendly practices, and consisted of five activ-
ities, including buying a live tree to replant, using organic or locally
grown foods, giving charitable donations as presents, and giving envi-
ronmentally friendly presents. The second factor (Eigenvalue =1.58,
% variance =12.13) was labeled Self-creations, and consisted of
four items such as giving presents one created, giving presents of
one’s time, and using alternatives to wrapping paper. The third fac-
tor (Eigenvalue =1.49, % variance =11.45) was labeled Limiting
spending, and consisted of two items including drawing names for gift
giving (rather than giving to everyone) and agreeing with family to set
limits on spending.
RESULTS
How Happy are People at Christmas?
Table II reports means and standard deviations of the four well-being
variables measured in this study, as well as the percentage of subjects
scoring within different ranges of the scale. As can be seen, subjects are
on the whole reasonably satisfied with their holiday experience, with
74.8% scoring above “neutral” in terms of their satisfaction. Subjects’
stress levels approach the midpoint of the scale, with 57.4% disagree-
ing that the holiday was stressful and 43.6% agreeing. The holiday
experience involved substantially more PA than NA for most individ-
uals, with 75.4% of the sample reporting more PA than “somewhat”,
and only 6.2% reporting more than “somewhat” NA. In sum, then,
TABLE II
Means, standard deviations, and percentages of sample scoring 1–2, 2–3, 3–4, and
4–5 on the four well-being variables during the Christmas season
Mean SD % 1–2 % 2–3 % 3–4 % 4–5
Satisfaction 3.49 0.85 2.6 22.6 41.8 33.0
Stress 2.77 1.00 17.4 40.0 27.8 14.8
PA 3.44 0.71 0.9 23.7 50.8 24.6
NA 1.84 0.75 61.9 31.9 4.4 1.8
320 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
most people are relatively satisfied with their holiday and experience
more PA than NA. However, a substantial number of subjects reported
significant stress during the holiday season.
In order to examine whether people were happier during Christmas
relative to other times of the year, we compared the means for satis-
faction, PA, and NA reported in Table II to data published elsewhere.
(The stress scale was developed for this study, so we could not compare
it to any norms.) First we compared the Christmas satisfaction scores
to those reported by Pavot and Diener (1993), who reported means of
23–25.2 for several samples of English-speaking college students, and
means of 23.9–25.1 for several samples of English-speaking adults. To
obtain a comparable score for the current sample’s report of Christmas
satisfaction, we multiplied the mean reported in Table II by five (the
number of items), in order to obtain a sum, and multiplied this sum by
7/5, in order to adjust for the fact that we used a five-point scale whereas
Pavot and Diener used a seven-point scale. This procedure resulted in a
mean Christmas satisfaction of 24.4, which is quite comparable to the
scores reported in Pavot and Diener’s samples.
Next we compared the affect means from this sample to those
reported by Watson et al. (1988) for a group of 586 individuals
who completed the PANAS with reference to the “past few weeks,”
which seemed the most comparable time frame to our study. Subjects
in the current study reported significantly more PA (3.44 vs. 3.20,
t(113) =3.54, p<0.001) than did the normative sample, but did
not differ in their experience of NA (1.84 vs. 1.95, t(112)=−0.83,
p=0.41).
Associations of Christmas Well-being with Predictors
We began by examining the associations between demographic fac-
tors and CWB. First, we conducted t-tests comparing males with
females and married with unmarried individuals. No significant differ-
ences were detected for marital status, but gender was associated with
differences in CWB, as reported in Table III. Females reported sig-
nificantly more stress, as well as marginally more NA and marginally
less overall CWB. The top portion of Table IV reports correlations
of the remaining demographic factors and CWB. Subjects’ income
and education bore no significant relations to well-being at Christmas
time; however age was associated with less NA, more PA, and
more CWB.
A MERRY CHRISTMAS 321
TABLE III
Means, standard deviations, and t-tests comparing gender differences in CWB
Males Females
Mean SD Mean SD t-test
Satis. 3.62 0.80 3.40 0.88 1.38
Stress 2.42 0.98 3.01 0.95 −3.23∗∗
PA 3.38 0.72 3.47 0.71 −0.66
NA 1.68 0.62 1.96 0.80 −1.98+
CWB 0.64 2.72 −0.49 3.19 1.94+
Note: +=p<0.10; ∗∗ =p<0.01. Satis. =Satisfaction; PA =Positive
affect; NA =Negative affect; CWB =Christmas well-being; degrees of
freedom vary between 110 and 112.
TABLE IV
Pearson correlations of CWB with demographics, relative occurrences, use of money,
and positive consumption practices
Satis. Stress PA NA CWB
Demographics
Education 0.15 0.10 0.10 −0.05 0.07
Income −0.07 −0.12 −0.06 −0.11 0.04
Age 0.15+−0.06 0.18∗−0.30∗∗ 0.23∗
Occurrences
Family 0.13 −0.16+0.15 −0.16+0.19∗
Helping −0.12 −0.06 0.02 −0.13 0.02
Religion 0.19∗−0.08 0.14 −0.27∗∗ 0.23∗
Tradition 0.10 0.12 0.11 0.01 0.03
Spending −0.14 0.29∗∗ −0.13 0.20∗−0.25∗∗
Receiving −0.22∗0.12 −0.30∗∗ 0.28∗∗ −0.30∗∗
Enjoying 0.05 −0.26∗∗ 0.05 0.12 0.08
Money use
% income spent −0.07 0.06 0.07 −0.11 0.02
on gifts
% income to −0.04 0.01 0.18+−0.04 0.05
char. & church
% income −0.03 0.00 −0.00 0.02 −0.01
in debt
Positive consumption
Environment 0.22∗−0.16+0.16 −0.11 0.21∗
Create 0.11 −0.05 0.08 0.08 0.06
Limit spending −0.14 0.19∗−0.08 0.14 −0.20∗
Note: +=p<0.10; ∗=p<0.05; ∗∗ =p<0.01. Satis. =Satisfaction;
PA =Positive affect; NA =Negative affect; CWB =Christmas well-being;
Environment =Environmentally friendly practices; Create =Self-creations.
322 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
We next examined the relative occurrence of the seven types of expe-
riences at Christmas time. As presented in Table IV, experiences with
family were associated with greater overall CWB. Religious activity
was also a strong predictor of higher well-being, as it was associated
with less NA, more satisfaction, and more CWB. In contrast, the materi-
alistic aspects of Christmas were negatively correlated with well-being,
as predicted. People for whom spending was a relatively salient expe-
rience reported more stress and NA, and lower CWB. People for whom
receiving gifts was a relatively salient experience reported more NA,
as well as less satisfaction, less PA, and less CWB. Finally, helping
others and engaging in traditions bore no relations to well-being, and
sensual enjoyment was associated only with less stress.
Next examined were the money usage factors. As we expected,
these were generally unrelated to well-being. Neither spending a rela-
tively large percentage of one’s income or going into substantial debt
related to having a merrier Christmas. Marginally more PA was reported
by those who gave money to church and charity. Finally, those who
received gifts whose monetary worth was high, relative to their yearly
income, actually reported more NA, conceptually replicating results
presented above.
Lastly we examined the relation of positive consumption practices to
CWB. People who reported engaging in many environmentally friendly
practices reported more satisfaction and overall CWB. Self-creations
were unrelated to the five outcomes. Surprisingly, those who limited
spending reported more stress and lower CWB.2
Exploratory Mediational Analyses
Finally, we attempted to understand the processes through which age
was related to CWB by conducting exploratory mediational analyses.3
Sheldon and Kasser (2001) found that older people reported greater
overall well-being, but that this correlation was accounted for by the
content of subjects’ strivings. Specifically, older individuals were more
likely to have strivings focused on generativity and spirituality, and less
likely to have strivings focused on money and popularity, which par-
tially accounted for why they reported greater overall happiness. We
tested whether a similar mediational pattern might emerge in the cur-
rent sample by examining whether older people reported having more
of the experiences associated with CWB, and whether these associa-
tions accounted for older persons’ enhanced CWB. As shown earlier
A MERRY CHRISTMAS 323
in Table IV, age was related to CWB, as were four of the variables
representing the relative occurrence of different types of experiences.
Two of these experiences were correlated with age, namely, the relative
occurrences of religion (r=0.33, p<0.01) and of receiving gifts
(r=−0.45, p<0.01). To test the final link of the mediational chain
(Baron and Kenny, 1986), we conducted a partial correlation between
age and CWB, controlling for the relative occurrences of religion and
receiving. Consistent with our mediational hypothesis, age no longer
bore a significant association to CWB (pr =0.09, p=0.37) after
controlling for these two types of experiences.
DISCUSSION
In this study, we set out to understand the experience of well-being at
Christmas. First, we explored people’s reports of their holiday satis-
faction, stress, and PA and NA. Most individuals did indeed report a
relatively merry Christmas: Around 75% of the sample said that they
were satisfied with their Christmas and that they had experienced sub-
stantial PA, while under 10% reported much NA. This sample did report
significant amounts of stress, however, with just under half saying that
they agreed their holiday had been stressful. Comparing our results to
other published norms suggested that this sample experienced some-
what more PA, but did not differ in satisfaction or NA, from how people
report feeling during other times of the year. Although these compar-
isons should be treated with great caution, as the samples and scales
were not entirely comparable across studies, it does appears that peo-
ple were somewhat “merrier” during Christmas than usual, but no more
satisfied and no less upset. It would be very interesting to know how
stress levels during the holiday compare to other times of year.
Next, we examined several predictors of holiday well-being.
Individuals who reported a high relative occurrence of being with their
families and of engaging in religious activities reported greater over-
all well-being. This is consistent with past research demonstrating that
relationships and spiritual experiences enhance personal well-being
(Emmons et al., 1988; Kasser and Ryan, 1993; Myers, 2000). Why
might these types of experiences lead to better well-being during the
holiday? We suggest that both family and religion can provide sat-
isfaction of needs for relatedness to others, which is a well-known
324 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
determinant of positive functioning (Baumeister and Leary, 1995);
additionally, religious experience might provide a sense of greater
meaning, another important determinant of happiness. A different inter-
pretation is that because family and spirituality are core aspects of
the Christmas season, people with these types of experiences meet
the dominant social expectations of the season, and thus may be
happy because they know that they are being consistent with such
expectations.
If, however, following the dictates of society is the primary way by
which people obtain happiness at Christmas, the season’s materialis-
tic aspects should also be positively associated with well-being, given
the number of cultural messages trumpeting the path of spending and
receiving. Such a prediction was clearly not supported in the current
study. Instead, individuals reported significantly lower well-being when
spending and receiving were especially salient experiences. Despite
the fact that people spend relatively large portions of their income on
gifts, as well as time shopping for and wrapping them, such behav-
ior apparently contributes little to holiday joy. Further, the amount
individuals spent and went into debt was unrelated to their CWB,
suggesting that excessive economic activity does little to enhance satis-
faction. Additionally, when people received gifts that totaled a substan-
tial percentage of their income, they reported more NA, adding more
evidence that the materialistic aspects of the season may undermine
happiness.
While apparently at odds with the bulk of messages in America’s con-
sumeristic, capitalistic society, these results fit quite well with research
showing that well-being is low when materialistic values and experi-
ences are relatively central to people’s lives. Kasser (2002) reviewed
evidence that a focus on money, possessions, image, and status dis-
tracts people from experiences which could enhance their well-being.
It seems likely that similar processes may occur during Christmas, such
that people who focus on the materialistic aspects of the season are prob-
ably less involved with the family and religious experiences that could
bring them greater joy. Indeed, the relative occurrence of spending
was associated with less family (r=−0.14, p=0.13) and religious
(r=−0.37, p<0.01) occurrences, and the relative occurrence of
receiving was associated with less family (r=−0.36, p<0.01) and
religious (r=−0.45, p<0.01) occurrences. Materialistic strivings
also involve more stressful experiences (going to the mall is generally
A MERRY CHRISTMAS 325
more stressful than going to church) and provide fewer chances for
intrinsic motivation and flow (wrapping presents generally yields fewer
inherent rewards than spending time playing games or conversing with
family). Simply said, a focus on materialism, while perhaps benefi-
cial for the economy, distracts people from the “true meaning” of the
season.
Another way in which we investigated the materialistic aspects of the
season was by assessing individuals’ consumption behavior. Consistent
with our assumption that the same types of behaviors that benefit the
environment are also good for people’s well-being, we found that indi-
viduals who engaged in more environmentally friendly consumption
behaviors were more satisfied during the holiday. Thus, by diminish-
ing the negative environmental impacts of their Christmas consumption
practices, people may be able to experience more happiness.
Notably, however, individuals who attempted to limit their spending
within their giving circle reported greater stress. Although our interpre-
tation is speculative and post hoc, it may be that such practices bring
stress when all members of the family do not agree to maintain such
limits. Anecdotes certainly suggest that grandparents do not cut back
on presents for grandchildren, despite the pleas of parents. Further,
Caplow (1984) believes that shopping and gift giving are important
ways by which individuals maintain social networks and abide by the
largely unacknowledged rules of the season. Perhaps limiting one’s pur-
chases creates stress because of a failure to express affection to one’s
relatives.
Age and gender were also associated with holiday well-being. Older
individuals reported greater Christmas happiness, although this effect
was largely explained by more frequent experiences of religion and
lessened salience of receiving. Males in the current study also reported
having a merrier Christmas than did females, although we were unable
to identify the processes responsible for this effect. Although females
are more involved in holiday shopping (Caplow, 1982), they were not
more likely than men to report that spending was a salient holiday
experience. The fact that well-being differences between the genders
were most notable for the outcomes of stress and NA suggests that the
result may reflect females’ general tendency to report more negative
experiences (Costa et al., 2001) than men. That is, perhaps women
typically feel (or report feeling) more stress and more NA, and this
generalizes to their experiences of Christmas.
326 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
Limitations and Future Research
Future research could correct for several limitations of the present study.
For example, it would have been helpful to measure people’s baseline
well-being to understand how it relates to happiness during the holiday;
this might especially elucidate the role of gender in CWB. Our sample
was also rather small and homogenous, so research with larger sam-
ples from other US subcultures, and from other nations, would help
to expand the generalizability of these results. We also believe it is
important to test the generalizability of these results to the well-being
of children during Christmas. Children receive about seven times more
gifts than they give (Caplow, 1982) and many adults claim that the
season is “for the kids.” Would the relative salience of materialistic
experiences be negatively related to well-being in a sample of children
and early adolescents?
Another limitation of the current study is that we asked people to rate
their experiences of Christmas after the holiday had occurred, yielding
retrospective reports. It would be fascinating to conduct a study of CWB
in vivo through experience sampling methods. Would people report
more NA and stress while shopping, and more PA and satisfaction
while engaging in religious activities, as the current results suggest?
Or are these findings due to biases in participants’ retrospective reports
on their holiday experiences and happiness?
Although people reported slightly more PA when they donated to
churches and charities, there was no relationship between the relative
occurrence of helping others and CWB. This is a rather surprising
finding, given the generally beneficial effects of a focus on helping
the world (Kasser and Ryan, 1993), and Christ’s injunction to help
others. Perhaps helping others at Christmas is perceived by some as a
burdensome obligation, given the many other stresses of the Christmas
season. Future research could examine this question as well.
CONCLUSION
The many values and behaviors of individuals and society are reflected
in festivals such as Christmas (Hirschman and LaBarbera, 1989), which
is why so many themes intermingle during the holiday. The current
study investigated many of these themes, finding that family and reli-
gion provided the greatest benefit to holiday well-being, whereas the
A MERRY CHRISTMAS 327
secular, materialistic aspects of the holiday either contributed little to
Christmas joy, or were associated with less happiness and more stress
and unpleasant affect. Such findings fit well with research about how
family, religion, and materialism relate to well-being during the rest
of the year (Kasser, 2000; 2002; Myers, 2000) and suggest that the
path to a merry Christmas comes not from purchasing many expensive
gifts at the mall, wrapping them, and placing them under the tree, but
instead from satisfying deeper needs to be close to one’s family and
find meaning in life.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks to Rebecca Mowers and Laurie Sauer. This research was sup-
ported in part by the Positive Psychology Network (M. Seligman,
director). Portions of this work were previously presented at the
Social Psychologists Around the Midwest (SPAM) conference at the
University of Missouri-Columbia in April, 2002.
NOTES
1We added “sad” to the list of NA items, as it is an emotion related to the “Christmas
blues” but is not part of the 20-item PANAS.
2Because two means of recruitment were used to obtain this sample, we exam-
ined whether participants’ sample membership (community or college student) might
interact with the relative occurrences, money usage, or positive consumption prac-
tices variables in predicting well-being. As such explorations would have involved
a large number of interactions if we examined for every well-being variable, we
limited these analyses to the summary CWB variable. Of the analyses conducted,
only two were significant at p<0.05. The relative occurrence of sensual enjoy-
ment was not associated with CWB for the students (r=−0.09, ns) but was for the
community sample (r=0.30, p<0.05). The expense of the gifts received as a per-
centage of one’s income was negatively related to well-being for students (r=−0.38,
p<0.05), but was non-significant for the community sample (r=0.21, ns). These
interactions should be interpreted with caution, as they were unpredicted and could
be due to chance.
3We were also interested in whether the effects of gender on well-being might be
mediated by any of the predictor variables, but none of the predictors which were
related to well-being were also related to gender; thus, mediational analyses were not
possible.
328 T. KASSER AND K.M. SHELDON
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Address for Correspondence:
TIM KASSER
Box K-83
Knox College
Galesburg, IL 61401
USA
E-mail: tkasser@knox.edu
