Washing The Hands For New Beginning – Ownership And The Endowment Effect
Christopher Philip
“Physical touching is practical ownership.”
Those in sales understand that if they can get the product into your hands, that you are far more likely to purchase the item.
You are also more likely to rate the product more favourably than a product that never reaches your fingertips.
The “endowment effect”, on the hand, says that people evaluate the objects they possess more favourably than those in the possession of others. Research has shown that people are less likely to; trade their own items away, and also value the worth of an object they possess already, as significantly higher.
One theory which explains this effect is called “loss aversion.” This says that people focus far more on what they might stand to lose, rather than what they stand to gain, in a potential transaction. In other words, the loss weighs heavily upon us, forcing us to lose sight of what we may potentially gain. We also tend to focus on the negative attributes of an un-owned objects and downplay the negative attributes of the objects we already possess.
However, the embodiment of hand-washing from past research says that the simple act of washing the hands works to cleans the body of the morality of sin, but may also, based on the same reasoning, rid the body of it’s perceived ownership of an object, thereby reducing the endowment effect.
In the current study, Arnd Florack, Department of Psychology, University of Vienna, Austria, led a team of researchers in the study of hand-washing to see if it would eliminate the negative feelings associated with loss aversion.
There have been many studies conducted that provides evidence that hand washing might just have such an effect. Hand washing serves a real purpose to wipe away germs and contaminants. Therefore, hand washing has become ubiquitous in people and become ingrained in human metaphor.
For example, washing the hands finds itself in many religious rituals to wash away sin. Studies have found that physical cleansing weakens the motivation to compensate for unethical behaviour and when people experience bad luck, they feel that washing the hands reduces the chances of it reoccurring. Overall, people feel that washing the hands, “wipes the slate clean.”
Over three studies, the researchers found evidence that hand washing mitigates the endowment effect.
In the first study, participants were offered a soft drink in compensation for their participation in the study. As the study progressed, one set of subjects were measured for height (the control) while the other set were instructed to wash their hands. Nearly twice as many people who were instructed to wash their hands, swapped their chosen soft drink for a newly offered drink of the same value and desirability (as independently rated). Thus, simply by having subjects wash their hands, it was enough to affect their ability to swap their owned item for another. The effect was not found in the group that did not wash their hands.
In the second experiment subjects were offered a snack bar rather than a drink and instead of washing their hands, they were instead primed on hand washing. In this case, the experimenters had subjects rate dish soap in a wash basin without actually using the soap. The simple priming of hand washing, however, did not have a strong effect on the subjects. In other words, priming, rather than actual hand washing, was not enough to have subjects swap their snack bar for another.
The third experiment was much like the first and showed that 45.8% rather than only 16.7% exchanged their soft drink in the hand washing condition versus the control condition. Interestingly, hand washing also led to more favourable evaluations of both products, and not just the alternative product.
Drawing Conclusions
The results indicate that hand washing opens people up for changes by reducing the endowment effect and reduces their focus on negative information. Therefore, washing the hands led people to consider what they might gain from an exchange instead of what they might lose.
In other words, washing the hands is a potential cognitive “reset button.”
“We suppose that hand washing is a physical routine or a ritual that is strongly associated with closing a previous action and starting something new,” say the researchers.
Importantly, the mere priming of hand washing, was not enough to produce the same effect – actual hand washing was required.
The researchers conclude by saying that “Hand washing is a daily routine that individuals conduct after they have finished a task to start a new one. In the present paper, we argued that such a routine can reset the mind to be open to something new and to detach the ties to the old. The present studies are in line with this reasoning and provide evidence that even such a robust finding like the endowment effect can be diminished with the simple action of hand washing.”
Final Thoughts
In nonverbal communication, “hand washing”, “hand cleanse” or “rubbing the hands together” is normally seen in an anticipatory condition. That is, when people expect good things to come their way, they will rub their hands together. For example, in sales, someone might rub their hands together when they expect a deal to close. A child might rub his hands together on Christmas morning as he prepares to open gifts.
This action has, at times, been read as a preparatory condition to “warm the hands” to better handle the objects a person is about to receive. However, I would contest this idea based on the present research. I believe that hand washing body language, or rubbing the hands together is an action that prepares the hands to receive an item by activating the cleansing metaphor. While no soap or water is used, the body still goes through the motion to ready the hands for “new beginnings.”
My own observations have proven this to me. While fishing, I witnessed, and even filmed my Uncle rub his hands together vigorously much like one would do with soap in water in anticipation of landing the big fish. Unfortunately, however, the fished proved to be a strong match and broke off the line! Nevertheless, his body language showed his excitement and his desire to start the new beginning by landing the monster fish.
Resources
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