It is 8pm and you have finished work for the day. Do you wind down with a decadent chocolate cake or a bowl of fruit? Scientists say the answer, which may come as no surprise to anyone, is that most people will reach for the cake because we are programmed to make more hedonistic choices in the evenings.
Study Reveals Evening Indulgence Pattern
A study has concluded that while we tend to be sensible and restrained in the mornings, evenings are for excess because we are more psychologically aroused at that time of day. And while it might be tempting to suggest that reaching for a sugary treat is linked to exhaustion at the end of the working day, the researchers claim that, in fact, we can blame our body clocks, which push us into being indulgent as the sun goes down.
The Australian and Chinese researchers looked at how circadian rhythms – the body's internal clocks, which operate on a roughly 24-hour cycle – affect what we choose to buy. Our body clocks are implicated in a range of processes including body temperature, hormone secretion, cardiovascular activity, sleep patterns, and levels of arousal. But until now, little has been known about how they affect the way we shop.
Analysis of Online Shopping Transactions
To examine this, the team analysed the timing and content of nearly 250,000 online shopping transactions, which showed that the number of hedonic purchases – items which were luxurious, indulgent or decadent – increased significantly during the early evening hours, rising sharply at 7pm and reaching their peak at 8pm.
Experimental Evidence
In a second experiment, 200 people were asked to imagine they were doing their daily shopping and wanted to treat themselves to a chocolate lava cake, or a bowl of fruit. The group which was asked this question at 8pm were 60 per cent more likely to opt for the cake, compared to a second group asked the same question at 10am. Tests also showed that people were more psychologically aroused in the evenings.
Writing about their research in the Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, the scientists said: 'The heightened preference for hedonic options in the evening is not driven by fatigue, but rather by the natural rise in psychological arousal which provides the motivation resources necessary to pursue and justify pleasure-oriented choices. Hedonic consumption is an active pursuit of pleasure that requires overcoming the guilt of indulgence. Our experimental data confirms that the high-arousal state of the evening equips consumers to navigate these hurdles.'
