Brain and shopping

This Is Your Brain on Shopping -- An fMRI study determines where the brain appraises products and evaluates prices:

"Researchers discovered that when the product first flashed on the screen it activated the nucleus accumbens, a section near the middle of the brain that has been implicated in the brain's reward center, effectively appraising the item. When the price appeared, the scientists noticed activity in the mesial prefrontal cortex, a region of the brain known for higher executive functions. Its activity seemed to vary according to the difference between what someone would pay for an item and its actual cost, as if in error adjustment. Finally, the response of the insula (a lateral section of the brain's cortex known to activate during responses to negative stimuli) depended on the purchasing decision--activity there increased when a participant nixed a purchase. 'What we're looking at is not so much the brain's reaction to products and prices as a person's subjective reaction to the products and prices,' Knutson says. 'Is the product preferable? And is the price too much?'"

Interesting finding. However how much we find it too expensive to spend on one thing is not absolute and subjective to external influence.

I remember when I heard how much my friend had to pay on her apartment, I think it's outrage to pay so much for so little space. However, after I seriously look into the real estate market in Taipei, I realized the average prices might be just about that. So I stopped raising my eye brow when I hear the price I might need to pay for a new apartment in a building with elevator in Taipei city. I wonder whether my insula cortex is less activated now then before when I am consider how much mortgage we have to pay every month.

There must be somewhere that really important about how we change our synaptic connections for buying!! Well, if we can find it out, maybe we can exercise it to ease the pain when we can't afford what we dream for and live on.