The Pain of Paying

I recently took a web survey from our friends at the Carnegie Mellon Department of Social and Decision Sciences* which classifies consumers into three categories based on their patterns of under- or over-spending relative to the amount that they desire to spend. The survey is based on the theory that the immediate emotion (experienced at the moment of choosing to buy or not buy) of the anticipatory pain of spending money varies between individuals and impacts spending choices above and beyond the influence of old-school, rationalistic considerations of the forgone future consumption that a present purchase represents.

*Remember that this department remains on my list of Top 20 Grad School Possibilities.

They break down consumers into the three categories as follows:

• Tightwads (21%) - their affective reaction to spending may lead them to spend less than their more deliberative (i.e., consequentialist) selves would prefer
• Spendthrifts (18%) - the failure to feel the pain of paying may lead these consumers to spend more than their consequentialist selves would prefer
• Unconflicted consumers (61%) - tend to spend about as much as their more deliberative selves would prefer

Anybody want to guess where I fell on this scale? Yes, a tightwad.

The researchers have an interesting, freely accessible journal article on their development and validation of the Tightwad-Spendthrift (TW-ST) scale. I will bullet point some of the findings I found of particular interest.

• Women are more likely than men to be spendthrifts.
• Correlation between income and TW-ST scale is low (r=.12), suggesting that reluctance to spend is not a function of ability to spend.
• Tightwads are more motivated by avoiding the pain of spending rather than gaining the pleasure of saving. (Correlation between the two statements was an impressively low r=.08). Seeking the pleasure of saving is a defining characteristic of the "frugal" personality, considered a separate concept from the tightwad.
• Tightwads are more likely to find spending painful before a purchase, while spendthrifts are more likely to feel the pain after the purchase.
• Consistent with the researchers' hypotheses (and this is correlational, not causal), tightwads and spendthrifts both report lower levels of overall happiness than unconflicted consumers. However, highly frugal individuals are happier than the less frugal.
• Tightwads find it difficult to "suspend (otherwise beneficial) self-control when doing so would be desirable." Spendthrifts have the opposite problem with exercising self-control.
• Tightwads spend significantly more on investments than consumables, relative to their own desired levels of spending. In other words, spending money on investments (where "thoughts of future consumption dampen the pain" of spending) is less painful to tightwads than spending money on stuff to use, so they come closer to spending the "right" amount on investments.
• Spendthrifts overspend significantly more on consumables than investments (consistent with "present-based" time perspective).
• In an experiment, tightwads were more willing to pay a $5 fee when it was characterized as a "small $5 fee" than a "$5 fee." Spendthrifts and unconflicted consumers did not differ in their response based on how the fee was framed.
• There is no correlation between TW-ST scores and the Eating Attitudes Test. However, the researchers (and I!) are interested in further investigation into possible relationships between the TW-ST scale and dieting behavior.

I find the comparisons of frugal vs. tightwad individuals pretty interesting. I wonder if tightwads are more likely to "underearn" relative to frugal folks, since they are primarily about not spending rather than actually building up savings. (Of course, there is no reason why a person can't have elements of both.)

Right now, I'm glad that I'm a tightwad. That reluctance to spend money has allowed me to build up some reserves to go toward keeping me off the streets while I am back in school. And truly, I shudder to think how many pairs of shoes I would own if I were a merely "unconflicted" consumer.

First Zuma, then Calculus, then the World

For a while now, my goal in playing the free Yahoo game Zuma has been to complete all 16 levels on the first frog and thus utterly beat the game so I can give it up for good. (You start the game with three frogs and lose one when the chain of balls hits a certain point on the board.) After a more than two week hiatus and in a sick, slightly feverish state, I just now played a round of Zuma with very low expectations of my performance and finally beat the game - 16 levels with a final score of over 110,000 points on one frog.

So there goes one addictive time-waster that has potentially stood in the way of full devotion to my calculus class, which, by the way, I have still not received a single word about regarding when my test will be ready at the testing center. Even though they told me it would be ready in three days in that scary message at the time I requested the exam, it's now over two weeks and I've heard nada. (They were supposed to send a postcard to confirm.) I'll have to call the testing center on Tuesday morning and find out what gives. This examination limbo is really stretching the credibility of their claim that the course is "self-paced" and I'm tired of the whole screwed-up situation. At least I have now gotten grades on homework assignments 7 and 9 (100 and 98 points) but not on assignment 8, mailed in at the same time.

I am going to soldier through Calc I, but I have decided that I am not taking the Calc II course through the UT extension service. For a $10 application fee, a copy of my Rice BA transcript, and a minimal application, I can become a "non degree seeking graduate student" at Texas State (~20 minutes south of my apartment) and take Calc II there, as well as other undergraduate and graduate courses. (I am looking at the introduction to marketing class, which would allow me to take a consumer behavior class, which is right up my alley, the following semester; the undergraduate "independent study" in psychology; and two psych grad courses, advanced statistics and attitude assessment.) So conceivably, I could start my Cunning Plan of going back to school a semester earlier than previously planned, due to this special grad student status available at Texas State. This does not change my plan to enroll at UT in the spring semester. It would, however, give me a totally legitimate reason to leave my job in August instead of January, which is seeming more and more necessary for my mental health and future plans for a multitude of reasons which I will not bore you with in this venue at this time but that really crystalized for me in reading my work email while at my training class at CSU. (I will update you on my last week at CSU in a separate post.)

In other calculus news, Tam and I did some investigation into the math course descriptions at Rice, UT, and her school (Metropolitan State College of Denver) that finally clarified something that has been confusing me for a long time. The infamous "Calculus III" class that is offered at MSCD, Texas State, community colleges, and a lot of other colleges I got from a quick Google search just now (e.g. Georgia Tech, Columbia, Maryland, Iowa State, Florida State, Purdue, Minnesota), and that Tam took at MSCD and I took at Tulsa Community College right after I graduated from Rice, is, as I had thought from my experience of the class, the same class that is generally called "vector" calculus at many other schools. (At Rice, it's official title is Math 212, Multivariate Calculus, but it was always called vector.) The difference is in the order of the courses. Some schools offer vector as the third class in the calculus sequence, followed by differential equations, while others offer diff eq then vector. (And in a rare display of full disclosure, Stanford acknowledges that the two classes are independent of each other and says they can be taken in either order.)

Looking at the UT course listings, Tam also helped me determine that the discrete math class is the same as her "proofs" class at MSCD and is, as I had hoped, not necessary for what I want to do (despite its inclusion on the extremely helpful BS in mathematical sciences - prob & stat concentration degree plan I got from the UT web site). So that brings my post-Calc II math target down to 5 instead of 6 courses.

OK, after all that excitement, it's now time to lie down. Again.

Going to Colorado, Again

This blog will be updated sporadically at best for the next two weeks while I am in Colorado for my last week of human dimensions training and then a week of site visits to Jefferson County Open Space parks (among other things) with Tam. I will be taking my math book too in the hopes that I will return to Texas having memorized all those pesky formulas. Because as my mom said, it's important that I learn these by heart in the event that some disaster occurs which both makes all computers and calculators stop working and destroys all books. Well, if my plane back from Colorado gets swept way off course and crashes into an island (a la Lost), I should be prepared to whip out the formula for Tan(A-B). That'll keep those monsters at bay!

And I just have to shout out for the writers of the show Lost, by the way. I've caught up with the end of Season One and it just continues to be exciting and fun and occasionally goosebump-inducing. If you do watch Lost, you should also be reading this Lost Blog. Good times, people. If you don't watch Lost, well, your ... um ... loss. I will allow no comments about Lost on this post. I cannot stand the idea of risking someone letting lose a spoiler of any kind, even if it only amounts to "Season 3 starts getting lame." I'm too invested in this thing. You could tell me, but then I would have to kill you, and that just wouldn't be right. This is one of the downsides to watching all my TV via Netflix; I am not at the same point of the shows as anyone else but Robert and when it comes to a show with a heavily mysterious plot development as this one, that means not being able to discuss it at all.

Beautiful People in Film, a Novelty

I just finished watching the movie Closer, which was character-driven yet had characters that I found ultimately boring and disappointing when they weren't being immediately obnoxious, stupid, and shallow. I was surprised to read several reviews (after watching the movie) that suggest that the dialogue was intelligent and witty. Have we reached a point of such diminished expectations for movies that exchanges such as "You've ruined my life" / "You'll get over it" are considered conversational gems? It also featured a couple of the most eye-rolling "meet cutes" I have seen recently. (I learned this phrase from the at turns amusing and gagorific The Holiday. The scenes with Jude Law and Cameron Diaz become increasingly unwatchable due to way overload on giggly saccharine sweetness.) This is not to say I disliked the movie exactly, but I didn't like it - I guess I was influenced by the fundamental isolation (all the characters are emotionally distanced from anyone but themselves, and sometimes even then, despite whatever frenzied, ridiculous declarations of love are made to people they have hardly even spoken to) but not by the ongoing manipulation. I reached the end of the movie with a kind of "okay, who gives a rat's ass" attitude.

I remember in the advertising and discussion around the movie when it came out that much was made of the fact that the film was about the lives of four "beautiful people," which always struck me as idiotic. Because, yes, what we don't have enough of in Hollywood blockbusters is beautiful people. I hate how we are forced to watch so many movies with so many unattractive actors. Like, the aforementioned The Holiday. Jude Law, Kate Winslet, Cameron Diaz - all beautiful people right? But then Jack Black makes the fourth. While surprisingly charming in the movie, certainly not beautiful. This movie was working at only 75% beauty in its main four characters, to say nothing of the old dude who probably wasn't even beautiful in his prime!

And OK, I know it's bitchy to say, but let's face facts: Julia Roberts is no longer looking all that beautiful. If her face gets any thinner, you could cut rope with it. She still has appeal, in a sort of big-eyed, elf-like way, but she's not the stunning beauty she once was. And the blonde hair really wasn't working for her at all.

Distance Learning Frustration

It shouldn't be this hard to figure out what one must do, along what time line, and in what order to arrange to take the midterm exam for an online extension class at UT. They have information in about four different places on the course web site and it conflicts. One place says that I should request my exam at least two weeks before I plan to take it. So when I finally find the spot where I can "request midterm exam" and push the button, I get a message saying, "You can take your exam 3 business days from today." And it gives me the testing location address. This doesn't jive so I go back and see that there was a message above the button warning me "be sure you are ready to take the exam before submitting your request" because "the request cannot be recalled." What? Was the idea that I am to be "ready to take the exam" and stay in this primed, ready state for the next two weeks? That's not how any college student in history has faced an exam. I still need to, you know, study for the damn thing.

And they don't tell me whether it is necessary for me to schedule a time to take the exam or if I can just show up during their business hours at any time. But if that is the case, and they will basically sit on the exam until I show up, why all the scary talk about "the request cannot be recalled"?

I guess I will have to call the testing center on Monday and find out what the hell is going on. Call them from Colorado State, I mean, since I am in class all next week.

Ah, I just found some other information that says: "Your online confirmation will be followed in the U.S. mail by a postcard which will give you the information you need to take the exam; for example, your testing site and the date when your eligibility for exam administration expires. It will tell you also what identifying information and authorized materials you will need to bring to the testing center." So I guess I wait until the post card comes and Robert tells me what it says. Hopefully my testing eligibility will last a while after I get back from Colorado.

Grrrrr.

By Popular Demand, My Gold-Toothed Rock Rabbit - View at Own Risk

I hasten to say, I take no responsibility for the aesthetic horror that is this statue. Does the gold tooth distract you from the shockingly disturbing hot pink eyes and devil horn-like ears? How about the drooping 1970's era redneck truck driver mustache? I thought not. It could only be more horrifying if it were wearing Birkenstocks. Although, now that I look at this photo more closely, can't you imagine that it is wearing a pair of dark grey Crocs? Yikes.

Successfully Too Short

I managed to get my hair cut too short at Super Cuts on my way home from work this afternoon. I told her that I usually get my hair cut at the hairline but I actually wanted it somewhat shorter than this and the extra hair on the neck shaved. She looked at it and said, "I can go an inch shorter than your hairline because your hair is so blonde. If it were black, no." I agreed and ended up with nicely too short hair that I am looking forward to washing and drying extremely quickly while I'm at Colorado State next week and on a night-time shower cycle. And if I'm lucky, it will be at least 3 days before my hair starts frizzing out again at the ends.


Woo hoo, I was able to get a photograph of the back of my head! Note the impressive use of double mirrors. The lighting in the bathroom makes my hair look really orange. I have not actually been washing my hair in Libby's pumpkin puree, despite what a fan of the product I am and that I still have a dozen or so cans of it from that crazy 17c per can (or whatever it was) sale at Albertson's. Man, my neck looks really weird with my head turned slightly to see the camera - I look like I'm about to go all Hulk any moment. You know, if Hulk turned orange.