Who`s wealthy? Beyond net worth, asset and debt levels change our perceptions
Tuesday, January 10, 2012 - 07:30
in Psychology & Sociology
(Medical Xpress) -- Will borrowing money to buy a new car make you feel richer? It depends on your net worth, says a new study in Psychological Science, a journal published by the Association for Psychological Science. Peoples perceptions of wealth vary not only as a function of their net worth, but also of the amount of assets and debt they have, says Princeton University psychology graduate student Abigail B. Sussman, who wrote the study with Princeton professor Eldar Shafir. In fact, increasing your assets by taking on debt affects perceived wealth in opposite ways for people who are in the red (their debt outweighs their assets), or in the black (their assets outweigh their debt).