Why We Want More Than We Need | How To Academy
Exit

You can watch this video when you sign up to our new subscription service, How To +.

How To + subscribers can access more than 250 videos for free, and attend our livestream events with the world’s most exciting thinkers.

Why We Want More Than We Need

With Bruce Hood

20 mins watch time

Posted September 2019

Psychology, Conference Video

Our love affair with our possessions seems to be all-consuming. Despite the constant warnings about our future, we are reluctant to change our ways when it comes to accumulating more and more things. Why is this?
The answer is our need for ownership.  Award-winning psychologist Bruce Hood draws on research from his own lab and others around the world to explain why psychological ownership is an emotional state of mind that governs our behaviour from the cradle to the grave, even when it is often irrational and destructive. What motivates us to buy more than we need? How does our urge to acquire control our behaviour, even the way we vote? And what can we do about it?