Relationships often come with power struggles, whether it’s major disagreement between partners, or just quibbling over who controls the TV that night.
However, one area that you might not realise is subject to the power struggle is shopping.
According to psychologists, there is a secret power struggle going on in the supermarket aisles, and it can indicate a lot about how someone feels in their relationship.
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Retail therapy could be a way to vent hidden frustrations, with people who feel undervalued or ignored in their relationships tending to buy brands opposite to what their partners would choose, researchers found.
‘By unconsciously choosing the opposite brand to the one their partner prefers, people might feel better without realising it,’ lead researcher Dr Danielle Brick, assistant professor of marketing at the Peter T. Paul College of Business and Economics at New Hampshire, told The Telegraph.
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‘We found that consumers are using brand choice as a form of behaviour to deal with conflict in relationships.’
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His team came to that conclusion after a study involving 300 volunteers showed that people who felt frustrated with their partner were more likely to make ‘oppositional brand choices’.
So next time you come home and find your other half has filled the kitchen cupboards with completely the wrong products, maybe it’s time to tell them just how much you value them!
(Images: Getty)
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