Abstract
Although the negative link between materialism and well-being has been confirmed by results from many empirical studies, mechanisms underlying this association still remain partially unexplained. The issue is addressed in this article in two ways. Firstly, the nature of the components of materialism is examined, and secondly—the article demonstrates that personality (particularly neuroticism and narcissism) is one of the important factors linking materialism and well-being. The article presents the results of three empirical studies, in which three main assumptions were verified—that the components of materialism, i.e. acquisition centrality, acquisition as a pursuit of happiness and possession-defined success, have dissimilar impacts on well-being, that materialists with high and low levels of neuroticism and narcissism differ with regard to well-being, and that neuroticism and narcissism mediate the relationship between materialism and well-being. The studies were based on self-reports and utilized well-known, established questionnaire measures of materialism, personality and well-being. The results showed that each component of materialism was associated with well-being in a slightly different way. Of the three possession-defined happiness was the strongest predictor of all aspects of well-being examined and the centrality component was not associated with any of them. Materialists with a high level of neuroticism and low level of grandiose narcissism experienced diminished well-being in comparison to materialism with a low level of neuroticism and high level of grandiose narcissism. Neuroticism and grandiose narcissism were both significant mediators, acting contrary to each other—neuroticism lowered well-being, whereas grandiose narcissism elevated it.
Highlights
The negative association between materialism and well-being is currently almost an axiom in psychology and consumer research
The mediation analyses confirmed that the relationship between MAT and General well-being (GWB) was fully mediated by NE, whereas in the case of MAT/Hap the mediation was partial—the belief that material possessions bring happiness hold its unique negative impact on GWB alongside NE
2.2.3.1 Well‐Being in Groups Differentiated by Materialism and Narcissism As in Study I the participants were divided into subgroups according to MAT and—this time—grandiose narcissism (GN), because—as Górnik-Durose and Pilch (2016) demonstrated—the Peacocks differ from the Mice only in relation to GN; no differences were found in vulnerable narcissism (VN)
Summary
The negative association between materialism and well-being is currently almost an axiom in psychology and consumer research. In their extensive meta-analysis Dittmar et al (2014) showed that the results of empirical studies concerning this association are consistent and indicate modest negative correlations between various measures of materialism and various aspects of well-being (the average effect is − .19). I aim to demonstrate that one of the major factors that bring materialism and well-being together is personality, neuroticism and narcissism. The domains of materialism were incidentally examined in relation to well-being, there is no systematic study addressing this issue. I am convinced that both matters mentioned above deserve more attention from scholars
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