Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy

by James A. Roberts

In Shiny Objects, a cross between In Praise of Slowness and The Tipping Point, consumer behavior expert Professor James A. Roberts takes us on a tour of America's obsession with consumerism—pointing out its symptoms, diagnosing specific problems, and offering a series of groundbreaking solutions.

Roberts gives practical advice for how to correct the materialistic trends in our lives which lock us into a cycle of financial hardship and stress. Shiny Objects, a new The Paradox of Choice for the modern reader, is more than a critique of capitalism—it's also an exploration into how we can live happier, fuller, more productive lives today.

Genres: Nonfiction, Psychology, Self Help, Finance, Sociology, Business, Society

373 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 1, 2010

About the author

Dr. James A. Roberts is a well-known author with approximately 100 articles published in the academic literature. He is currently the Ben H. Williams Professor of Marketing at Baylor University in Waco, Texas where he has been a faculty member since 1991. “Too Much of a Good Thing” (his second book) follows closely on the heels of his highly successful first book, “Shiny Objects” (Harper Collins), which focused its attention on how our love of money and material possessions impacts our happiness.

Dr. Roberts is a nationally recognized expert on human/consumer behavior and has studied one form or another of addictive behavior for the past 15 years.

He has been quoted extensively in the media and has appeared on the CBS Early Show, ABC World News Tonight, NBC’s The Today Show, Yahoo.com’s “The Daily Ticker”, and has been quoted or featured on The O’Reilly Factor, US News & World Report, the New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, National Public Radio, Cosmopolitan Magazine, Yahoo! Tech (one million page views), and countless other newspapers, magazines, websites, and television appearances.

Reviews

[Don · Rating 3 out of 5]

A rarity: an accessible book on consumerism and marketing written by an academic for a popular audience. There's not much new here--the kids-and-marshmallows test of self-control, for example, was an inescapable part of the zeitgeist all last year--but Roberts does an admirable job of weaving far flung statistics, surveys, articles, anecdotes, and self-assessment quizzes into a coherent and eminently readable whole.

[Sue · Rating 1 out of 5]

Some of the ideas on managing money in Robert's book were interesting, but not particularly new, such as using cash. I disliked this book in part because of its many references to god. I also take issue with his suggestions to punish oneself if one doesn't follow the rules; maybe this is part of his Christian thought process, which didn't resound well with this heathen at all.

[Glenda · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is an exploration into the psychology of consumerism and its impact on our lives. Roberts delves into the reasons behind our frequent pursuit of material goods and the illusion that they will bring us lasting happiness.

As a matter of background, Roberts is a marketing professor with an understanding of consumer behavior. He presents a well-researched and thought-provoking analysis of why we are driven to spend excessively combined with academic research and real-world examples to illustrate how marketing tactics, societal norms, and psychological factors converge to create a culture of (over) consumption.

One of the book’s strengths is its accessibility. Roberts writes in a clear and engaging style, making complex psychological concepts easy to understand for a broad audience. He effectively uses anecdotes and case studies to bring the material to life, making it relatable and thought-provoking.

"Shiny Objects" contains some eye-opening revelations about the true cost of our consumer habits, the detrimental effects of debt, the environmental impact of overconsumption, and the emotional toll of living in a society that equates worth with wealth. He challenges readers to reconsider their spending habits and to reflect on what truly brings happiness and fulfillment.

In addition the book offers practical advice for breaking free from the cycle of consumerism. Roberts provides actionable steps to help readers develop healthier relationships with money and material possessions. His suggestions are realistic and grounded in psychological research, making them both practical and achievable.

"Shiny Objects" feels especially relevant in today’s society, where the pressure to keep up with the latest trends and gadgets is ever-present. Roberts’ insights encourage readers to think critically about their consumption patterns and to seek happiness beyond the superficial allure of shiny objects.

If you are looking to understand why you buy what you don't need, or are looking for control over your finances, to reduce your environmental footprint, or simply find more joy in life, this book provides some salient points along with valuable guidance.

[Yaaresse]

DNF@16% plus some random skimming.

I was hoping for more Paco Underhill and less self-help and theology. There really wasn't anything new in this marketing researcher's studies that make up the first half, and most of the tips in the self-help half are the usual fodder of blogs every January and April.

Had a good laugh at the part where he suggests you can save money by doing your own housecleaning, yard work, cooking, etc. Dude's been living on six or seven figures too long if he thinks that's the norm.

[Quratulain · Rating 4 out of 5]

“An unexamined life is not worth living” Socrates
In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.” Oscar Wilde
It is the preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly.” Henry David Thoreau
We are happiest when we feel good about who we are, have meaningful relationships with others, and get involved in our community— and those things can’t come about unless we exercise financial self-control.”
The pursuit of power, personal glory, money, and material possessions (American Dream) has undermined our happiness. Such pursuit comes at the expense of personal growth, good relationships, and service to the community.”
Materialism is an attempt to find meaning in one’s life.
Doing great good is unlikely if your primary focus is seeking personal happiness.”
Attitudes: thinking, feeling, doing
Stage 1 (preconventional): decisions based upon the possibility of punishment
Stage 2 (preconventional): behavior deemed appropriate of it serves the individual’s best interest.
Stage 3 (conventional): decisions based on approval from others; conformity.
Stage 4 (conventional): law and order thinking. Society’s rules about proper behavior and feel obligated to conform.” Little thought given to ethical underpinnings of such social rules.”
Stage 5 (post conventional): recognize the underlying moral purpose of laws and social customs.
Stage 6 (post conventional): moral reasoning based on relavent universal truths. Law is valid only if just.”
Environmental and behavioral programming to improve self-control.
Self-control requires Self-monitoring, clear standards, and capacity to make changes in your thoughts and behaviors.”
Identify a target behavior and record how often, how long, and when the behavior occurs. This helps to get clear grasp on the frequency, timing, causes, and effects of that behavior.”
When you have knowledge of and control over the antecedents and consequences of your target behavior, you can be incredibly successful at making desired changes.
1) how often the behavior occurs 2) what you think prompted the behavior 3) any resulting consequences.”
When clear standards are lacking, are ambiguous, or contradict each other, self-control failures are more likely.”
No product will make you happy for more than a fleeting moment if you are not satisfied with who you are on the inside.”
Not having enough strength to combat one’s impulses is Ego Depletion.
Even with clear goals and close monitoring of your situation you need strength to resist life’s many guilty pleasures.”
Emotion-Focused Coping: Making yourself feel better at the expense of longer term concerns leads to various breaches in your self-control.”
The fewer times we face temptation and have to make a choice, the more potential for self-control we conserve.”
The likelihood of a response (behavior) is highly influenced by the absence or presence of environmental cues associated with that response.”
Couples who have vastly different attitudes about money and material possessions will have a tough time finding the happiness we al desire.
Home: biggest down payment, fixed rate, 15 year term, never take out a home equity loan.”
When your financial house is in order, you can make a real difference in the lives of others.”
Every single thing you do to tweak your environment to avoid unwanted behaviors and encourage desired behaviors and every single time you implement those tweaks, will increase your likelihood of achieving your goals.”
1) identify clearly the desired behavior 2) choose appropriate rewards-reinforcers 3) plan your reinforcement schedule 4) be vigilant against backsliding.”
Marketers have enlisted your friends, family members and acquaintances as a stealth marketing force to sell you the latest goodies .
Word of Mouth, Fourth Wall
The ongoing use of deception and lack of disclosure by WOM marketers will continue to erode the distinction between human interaction and marketing efforts and further the commoditization of human relationships.”
Laggards are somewhat disenfranchised and don’t like change. Tradition bound and are often driven by lack of financial resources. When a laggard ultimately purchases a product, it is likely out of date already, with earlier adopter categories having already moved on to the next generation of the product.”
Laggards may be targets for companies trying to clear their shelves of products the rest of the market has already passed by.
How we pay for purchases might affect our purchasing decisions.
Credit cards- quicker purchases, more likely to buy something, more willing to pay a higher price.”
Form of payment mechanism impacts the recollection of past payments and influences future expenditures.”
The delay built into the billing cycle separates the enjoyment of the purchase from payment, which leads to a softening of the payment’s impact.”
Credit card payments are also less memorable because of the lack of Rehearsal
We overestimate the amount of available wealth, which in turn increases the likelihood of making additional purchases.”
Credit card allow us to shop impulsively, indulge our every whim, and postpone worrying about the consequences until another day.”
Self-actualizing humans have the ability to assess their underlying condition and choose a course of action that enables them to adapt and continue to develop.”
People who reach the peak of self-actualizatkom find themselves in a place where they are driven by an inner voice rather than by lower-level survival needs or the dictates of others.”
Meeting extrinsic goals is contingent upon the approval of others, and their pursuit often results in anxious and unhappy people. Distract people from understanding psychological needs.
Extrinsic goals are symptomatic of a more insecure personal style and that certain people address these insecurities through purchasing , consuming, and displaying material possessions.”
The potentially negative impact of winning the lottery on interpersonal relationships is an important reason why lottery winners are not happier than the rest of us.”
A person may or may not be happy with good social relationships but without good social relationships the chances of achieving happiness are remote.”
Highly materialistic people prefer to own and keep things instead of renting or borrowing or discarding objects; they tend to be envious of what others have and to become upset when others have things they don’t.”
Spending money on gifts for friends or donating to charity increases one’s happiness.”
A materialistic spouse is a better predictor of a couple’s financial problems than is the couples income.”
As an important socialization agent, the family— if it doesn’t do it’s job well— can produce insecure offspring that cling to possessions as a source of security and self-esteem.
Children express lower levels of materialism when mothers provide them a secure supportive environment.@
Insecure people may be more susceptible to the daily marketing onslaught whose primary job is to foster insecurities and then provide consumer remedies for such ailments.
When threatened economically or reminded of mortality, we gravitate to extrinsic goals and materialistic impulses.
If we can foster a feeling of insecurity or self/doubt, a sale is soon to follow.”
The desire for more is useful only in a resource-strapped environment. It is not well suited for the consumer culture.
General cognitive ability is only 50% genetics during adolescence but it increases to 80% by the age of 65.
Our ability to control our impulsive behavior has generic roots. Materialism is an elemental personality trait.@
Sensation seekers search out novelty in an unconscious attempt to increase their dopamine levels. MAO-B is biological force behind desire for novel, varied and thrilling sensations and experiences.”
Materialism is positively related to sensation seeking. Materialistic people get a thrill or high from buying possessions.”
Pentecostal church- prosperity gospel. Name it and claim it theology. Oral Roberts after WWII
Henry Ward Beecher early 19th century Prosperity Gospel.
You can’t solve the problem of wealth creation through debt creation.” Louis Hyman
Community Reinvestment Act 1977
Martin Seligman: H=S+C+V
Our escalating consumption does not bring us closer to the so called good life; it only speeds up the treadmill.”
1995 Easterlin Paradox
The new dream was the dream of instant wealth won in a twinkling by audacity and good luck.
The promise that wealth could be obtained overnight, that boldness and luck were at least as important as steadfastness and frugality.”
California Gold Rush 1848
Industrial Revolution increased output.
By 1900, nearly 1,200 catalogs took the latest products to even the remotest outposts.”
Standardized products can be bought and sold to anyone regardless of social standing. Americans joined consumption communities in which the common thread was the consumption of the same brands.”
Advertising and buying in credit are most responsible for today’s consumer culture.”
The new culture speaks to us, only of ourselves, our pleasures, our life. It does not say pray, obey, sacrifice thyself, respect the king, fear thy master. It whispers Amuse thyself, take care of yourself.”
Henry Ford- father of mass consumption
Americans have come to consider their standard of living as a somewhat sacred acquisition, which they will defend at any price. This means that they would be ready to make an intellectual or even moral concession in order to maintain that standard.” André Siegfried
1931: phrase American Dream by Truslow Adams
The higher wages being offered to workers were not intended to create more well-rounded people, by increasing their leisure and the chances to make good use of it, but to provide Americans with the time and money to expand their powers as consumers.”
The use of credit became nearly universal when the last vestiges of control were lifted with the conclusion of the Korean War. Regulation W during WWII
Mortgage debt helped make people comfortable with debt in general. The home was the nexus that connected the cars, television, furniture and myriad appliances.”
Vance Packard, Thorstein Veblen, Herbert Marcuse
We work to buy things we’re told we need and are enslaved to meaningless jobs in their endless pursuit.
Eventually Baby Boomers of the 1960s would have to grow up, possibly graduate, find jobs, start families, and buy into the values of the prevailing culture.”
People seemed to need particular products and apparel to communicate with others and to feel part of a larger group.”
1960s : repeal of Blue Laws that banned shopping on Sundays
1970: Stagflation- combination of high inflation, stagnant economy, and high unemployment
Internet Dot-Com boom lasted 5 years. Most of us were burned. 2000
This pattern of increasing homeownership followed by a loosening of credit standards and a spike in foreclosures would play itself out with the 2008 mortgage crisis.”
The 300 year old Protestant worth ethic to breakup with the cultural protests of the 1960s which questioned and discarded many traditional American virtues.”

[Prima Seadiva · Rating 2 out of 5]

I more skimmed this book rather than read every single page. I thought it was going to go more in depth about why people overbuy. It did to some extent but the moralistic tone bugged me.
A lot of what the author discussed also seemed very obvious to me. I kind of felt like I was reading a companion book to a self help t.v. special which, even though I am an old geezer, I find really dull. I found it to be more of a how to get out of debt and control spending plan which I do not need. If you are looking for help this may help you.
I recommend you check it out of the library rather than buy it.

Don't spend more money than you have, objects will not grant real status or happiness, marketing is a ploy to make you spend, don't run up credit cards. If run up, how to pay off your credit cards, don't use them, use cash etc. I'm sure for some this is a useful guide. The focus and examples were for people far more affluent than I ever have been or will be.

Though it seems obvious in every commercial and ad ever made, thoughtless accumulation and then discarding so as to buy more new stuff for status grubbing and uber sex appeal, is prevalent in our society. Our economy is based on manipulating and persuading people they need something that they can only use a few times or have to have what the newest in crowd pleaser is.
I have to give the book credit for pointing this out in various areas-clothing, food, electronics. If it helps people resist great.

I am no saint of minimalism. First by necessity, then by choice and now once again by necessity, I have long been frugal. I buy virtually everything I need and want on the thrift store level so I see the vast acres of stuff cast off to buy more new. I also see how impulsive overbuying fills second hand shops with useless crap (as seen on t.v.). I can only imagine how much more is wasted by being tossed into the landfills.

[Martha · Rating 5 out of 5]

a great exploration of materialism in our culture - how it’s increasing, all of the encouragement from TV to some preachers, how materialism is documented to lead to lower satisfaction in life, and what you can do to combat it’s influence in your own life. Very readable.

[Beth Gordon · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book had such a shiny title and ended up being on the dull side. The author is a university professor and summarized a lot of consumer research studies that had conclusions such as people who score higher on a materialism scale have more credit card debt.

[Linda Cox · Rating 4 out of 5]

Intense look at our materialistic society and our individual complicity

The book provides lots of food for thought. It helps each to see how we tend to seek more stuff, but end up less content. The author offers several reasonable ways to get out of debt and live a life not concentrating on possessions. Here is a quote the author gives from Aristotle:
There is no sense in producing or acquiring more shoes than can possibly be worn. This is self-evident. With regard to money, however, which has become exchangeable against everything, the illusion arises that it is good to accumulate it without limit. By doing so, man harms both the community and himself because, concentrating on such a narrow aim, he deprives his soul and spirit of larger and more rewarding experiences.
Highly recommend this book.

[Jeff G · Rating 3 out of 5]

Roberts, a Marketing professor at Baylor, covers a number of topics in this book. In at least the first half, he discusses a number of consumer behavioral topics related to money (e.g. we spend more using a credit card than with cash, our level of materialism). Near the conclusion, he exhorts the reader to exhibit self-control & provides a list of "25 tweaks to financial tranquility".

I particularly appreciated Ch 10: Heaven Help Us: the Prosperity Gospel. In this chapter, Roberts connects consumer materialism with the modern prosperity gospel, and also provides some of the history behind that movement.

[Bryan Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

A fairly interesting exploration of the history of American materialism is followed by a fairly pedestrian self-help guide for changing our overspending ways. As someone who is financially solvent and doesn't even own a credit card, the former was far more informative than the latter (though even if you do have financial problems, I don't think much that he says in the self-help section is all that revelatory).

[Cherity · Rating 3 out of 5]

The theoretical part was very interesting, but the self-help part... what kind of advice to save money for supposedly broke people is to mow your own lawn and to clean your own house? That's like that family from a joke "the family was very poor. The parents were poor, the kids were poor, their gardener was poor, their maid was poor"

[Sara Goldenberg · Rating 2 out of 5]

The title was the best part. The rest was just commentary

[Cherry (_forevermint) · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lots of history and boriiing stuff ~ had to skim to get to the interesting parts. Nothing really new either :/

[宅女阿reen · Rating 2 out of 5]

It is absolutely nothing wrong with the book, as the matter of facts it's educational, factual and informative enough. Just that it is lacking of fun, too much of preaching. There are many times that i was tempted to abandon the book (I'd keep on checking on the reading percentage at the bottom of pages). It had reminded me of a text book.

[Don B. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Has the American Dream been perverted by the lure of easy money? Have the old-fashioned values of hard work, thrift and moderation given way to sloth and envy and shop-till-you-dropism? Is there any way out of the tar pit of mindless, endless compulsory consumption in which America seems to be trapped?

Yes, yes and yes, says James Roberts in his provocative Shiny Objects: Why We Spend Money We Don't Have in Search of Happiness We Can't Buy.

Though Roberts is a professor of marketing, his book is no dry academic treatise. There's not much genuinely new here—the kids-and-marshmallows willpower test, for example, was a newsy meme last year—but Roberts does an admirable job of weaving far-flung statistics, anecdotes, scholarly papers and current events into a coherent and compelling narrative of a way of life thoroughly corrupted by materialism and commercialism. He deftly sketches the outlines of the American Dream, traces its origins and development, and examines its decline over the past century or so as the combined forces of mass production, mass communication and mass marketing converged to overwhelm an increasingly rootless, affluent and leisured populace. Finally, he offers practical advice on how to spot and resist those forces as well as how go about living a simpler, more humane and meaningful life without dropping out of mainstream American society.

Shiny Objects is brisk reading. It is liberally peppered with graphs, USA Today-style box quotes, and self-assessment quizzes covering everything from your "General Happiness Scale" to your susceptibility to product placements in movies and television. I found it insightful and informative overall, but two things kept me from rating it higher.

First, when it comes to dispensing practical advice in the final third of the book, Roberts turns out to be an enthusiastic disciple of Dave Ramsey. Nothing wrong with that, but if I want Dave Ramsey's advice I'll go straight to the source. Then, too, there's an element of blaming the victim at work when Roberts wags his finger at Americans for not saving enough, not planning for retirement, and not buying homes they might actually be able to afford. Nevermind the paucity of affordable new housing in this country, the decimation of pensions and IRAs in the wake of the stock market collapse, or a federal monetary policy that—intentionally or not—has discouraged personal saving by artificially suppressing interest rates for the past three decades.

Nevertheless, Shiny Objects is a worthwhile read. Any book that gets me to consider picking up a Cecily von Ziegesar novel must have something going for it. Why would any grown man read Ziegesar's Gossip Girl, Zoey Dean's A-List or Lisi Harrison's Clique? Simple: to see if it really is possible to cram an average of one product placement on each and every page of a 200+ page book.

[Vicki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Actually, this book totally worked for me. It CAN sound a little academic, but ultimately, the author explores some pretty compelling ideas. There are some really basic truths in here (do you have an emergency backup fund? No? Then you probably need to rethink every purchase you make until you've got a good one going). There's also some interesting exploration of where the concept of the "American Dream" came from. (I, for one, never knew who coined it, but it's interesting how most companies use the expression to serve their own needs, rather than how the author really intended it.) Anyway. An interesting book, and pretty timely, with all the Christmas shopping.

[Abigail · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though the idea of materialism as something we need to get away from is not a particularly new subject, the author presents research that is scary and frustrating. I was surprised at some of the numbers about product placement. The chapter on Prosperity Gospel was certainly an interesting reminder of how pervasive this has become. Caught a number of phrases that I've heard in my own head that I need to break out of. There are definitely more positive affirmations one can have than "I deserve to buy...."

[Kate Woods Walker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Marketing professor James A. Roberts takes us on comprehensive tour through human greed, with particular attention to the American consumer culture.

Shiny Objects could be a high school or college text, a book club choice, a Sunday School lesson or just a spiritually-tinged personal challenge for the overly materialistic. It's well-written and not too preachy.

Comedian Bill Hicks thought anyone involved in marketing should just kill themselves. I don't know that this book would have changed his mind, but it might have made him merciful enough to recommend a painless method.

[TheSaint · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting, but kind of all over the place, research-wise. I suppose that might be necessary in re the topic. Though the chapter on the prosperity gospel might have been a stretch!

Solid reporting of studies from sociology, biology, and even my new fave, evolutionary psychology. Spent: Sex, Evolution and Consumer Behavior by Geoffrey Miller is the go-to for that topic.

Beyond the individual and social causes of materialism, the author also includes chapters for people who want to step off the earn-spend cycle.

A solid effort for the lay reader.

[Rick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Meh, this was ok. There were some interesting bits and pieces, but I didn't find it to be an overly compelling read. Pretty much the standard message: money can't buy -- and things don't provide -- happiness. Clearly our culture has a serious habit when it comes to buying stuff, and views having lots of money and possessions as proof of success and the key to happiness. Nothing new there...

[Catania Larson · Rating 2 out of 5]

I felt like this book was okay. It was dry and sometimes boring. A lot of it seemed kind of obvious (money can't buy you happiness). There were a few parts I liked, but I just kept falling asleep while reading this. I think that there are more interesting non-fiction books that can deal with this subject.

[C. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This made depressing reading, if only because it made clear a lot of the things we all kind of half-know but try not to acknowledge.
I found myself saying "nah" and closing out of shopping sites without buying the junk in my cart several times because of this book. Which is a good thing: I could stand to do a lot less pointless acquisition.

[Daphne Stevens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating--almost

The first part of the book, on the history of materialism and marketing, was fascinating. Second part was less helpful--a tired review of operant conditioning and behavior change and platitudes about money not buying love. I really wanted to like this book--and almost did.

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good, well researched and enlightening. A bit of a finger wagger, yes but I can't say I didn't agree. I didn't find the self-help chapters to be burdensome, they were the shortest and were well done.

[Alvin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Part review of current trends and part self-assessment/self-help. I prefer and started this book for a look at the state of materialism today and what it is doing to us individually and collectively. I just skipped the "answer the following questions about your spending habits" chapters.

[K · Rating 2 out of 5]

Based on the abstract on the inside cover and the title, I was expecting more of a socioeconomic discourse. This was more self help book about finances, which I don't need or want. Would be helpful for someone who wanted a more clinical version of Dave Ramsey, I guess.

[Chris Ramirez · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good book that sadly I think probably a fourth of my friends could benefit from reading. Bonus to the author for including "Prosperity Gospel" as another factor in what's making the country so material.

[Melissa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Nothing earth shattering. A lot of information I already knew and more of a self-help book than I thought it would be.

[Tracey]

Author appearance on Diane Rhem show 23 Nov 2011