Every holiday season, Americans spend an average of more than $1,000 on gifts for friends, family, and coworkers. When shoppers try to predict whether a present will be a hit, they usually focus on the item itself, such as how much it costs or whether it came from a wish list.
However, a new study published in Psychology & Marketing reveals that how much someone appreciates a gift depends not just on what is inside the box, but on the physical appearance of the person handing it over. Specifically, the researchers found that people tend to appreciate a gift more when it comes from an overweight woman than when the exact same item comes from a slim woman.
To understand how a giver’s appearance shapes gift exchanges, marketing researcher Tongxi Wang of Grand Valley State University and her colleagues at the University of Alabama looked beyond the traits studied in past consumer research. Previous studies had established that less visible characteristics of a giver, such as their personality traits or cultural identity, can color how a recipient feels about a present. Yet researchers had not tested whether an immediately obvious physical trait like body size changes how a gift is received.
The team noted that body weight is tied to some of the most pervasive stereotypes in society. While many of those stereotypes are negative and lead to stigma or discrimination, social groups are often judged through positive stereotypes at the same time.
Psychologists generally break down how people evaluate others into two main categories: competence, which covers how capable or intelligent someone seems, and warmth, which reflects how friendly, kind, and trustworthy they appear. Prior research shows that overweight individuals are frequently stereotyped as warmer and more emotionally expressive than thin individuals. The authors hypothesized that in a relational setting like gift giving, this assumption of warmth would take center stage and make a present feel more meaningful.
Testing the link between body size and gratitude
The researchers began by testing whether this pattern shows up in everyday life. They surveyed 203 U.S. adults and asked them to recall a Christmas gift they had received in 2024, with responses ranging from laptops and gaming consoles to socks. Participants rated how grateful and pleased they felt about the present, alongside questions about the giver’s body size, physical attractiveness, gender, warmth, and how close they were to that person.
Even after accounting for the value of the gift, the giver’s attractiveness, and the closeness of the relationship, a clear link emerged. Recipients reported higher appreciation for gifts that came from people with larger body sizes. The survey responses also pointed to an explanation: larger givers were perceived as warmer, and that warmth was associated with greater gratitude for the present.
Because real-world memories can be influenced by outside factors, the team moved to controlled experiments to isolate the effect of body size. Before running these experiments, they conducted pretests to select pairs of photographs showing a slim person and an overweight person who were rated as equally attractive and who had matching clothing, posture, and facial expressions.
In their first experiment, 294 adults imagined receiving a coffee machine for their birthday from a friend named Julie, accompanied by either the slim or overweight photo of her. Participants who saw the overweight version of Julie expressed higher appreciation for the coffee machine than those who saw the slim version.
Warmth, effort, and the role of personal bias
Next, the researchers wanted to trace the chain of thoughts that leads a recipient to value the same coffee maker more when it comes from a heavier friend. They asked 174 university students to imagine receiving a coffee machine as a housewarming present from a friend named Jessica, again using photos that varied in body size while matching for attractiveness.
The results revealed a two-step mental process. Participants who saw the overweight version of Jessica viewed her as warmer and kinder than those who saw the slim version. Because they saw her as warmer, they assumed she had invested more time and effort into searching for the gift, and that perceived effort drove their higher appreciation for the coffee machine.
The team also checked whether perceptions of Jessica’s competence played any role in how students judged the gift. Ratings of how capable or intelligent Jessica seemed did not differ between the slim and overweight photos, confirming that warmth and effort were the specific drivers behind the boost in gratitude.
That warm glow did not apply to every recipient, however. In the same experiment, the researchers measured participants’ weight-related prejudice by asking how much they agreed with 13 negative statements about overweight people, including the belief that weight is entirely a matter of willpower.
For recipients with low or moderate levels of weight bias, seeing an overweight giver triggered perceptions of warmth, extra effort, and higher appreciation. Among recipients who held strong prejudices against overweight people, that chain reaction broke down: they did not view the overweight giver as any warmer than the slim giver, and they did not appreciate the gift any more.
Why the giver’s gender matters
In their initial Christmas survey, the researchers had noticed that the link between body size and gift appreciation was much more pronounced when the giver was a woman. To test this gender difference directly, they recruited 376 adults to imagine receiving a New Year’s gift of a coffee machine from either a female friend named Jessica or a male friend named Ethan, with each friend depicted as either slim or overweight.
Just as in the earlier experiments, participants appreciated the gift more when it came from an overweight woman rather than a slim woman, driven by perceptions of her warmth and effort. When the gift came from Ethan, body size made no difference. Participants rated the slim Ethan and the overweight Ethan as equally warm, and they appreciated the coffee machine to the same degree, a pattern that also held up in a separate experiment of 382 people imagining a watch given for a birthday.
The authors argue that this difference stems from how society evaluates men and women. Because warmth is traditionally treated as a central yardstick for judging women, and gift giving itself is often viewed as a communal, feminine activity, recipients may rely more heavily on physical cues like body size to gauge a woman’s warmth. Men, by contrast, are more often judged on status and competence, making their body size a weaker signal of how thoughtful they are when giving a present.
What this means for brands and influencer giveaways
Beyond personal relationships, gift giving is a common tool in digital marketing, especially when brands and social media creators run product giveaways. Historically, brands have tended to favor slim, conventionally attractive influencers on the assumption that they generate more audience interest. Wang and her colleagues wanted to see if the warmth advantage of plus-size givers would carry over to an Instagram giveaway.
They recruited 334 participants to view a mock Instagram post from a female influencer named Jane, pictured as either slim or overweight, who was hosting a water bottle giveaway. The researchers also varied one key detail in the caption: half the participants read that Jane had handpicked and wrapped the water bottle herself, while the other half read that the water bottle was provided by a brand sponsor.
When Jane stated that she had personally selected and wrapped the water bottle, participants viewed the overweight version of Jane as warmer, believed she had put in more effort, and appreciated the giveaway item more than when Jane was slim. Participants were also more likely to say they would like and share the post with others. When the caption stated that a brand was providing the water bottle, the advantage vanished because viewers attributed the gift to a corporate sponsor rather than to Jane’s personal generosity.
For retail managers and marketers curating holiday gift guides or hiring influencers, the findings suggest that featuring plus-size creators can boost consumer engagement and product appreciation. To unlock that benefit, campaigns need to highlight the creator’s personal involvement, such as having influencers handpick and recommend their favorite items rather than simply announcing a corporate giveaway. Marketers also need to consider their target audience, as strong weight biases among consumers can neutralize the positive warmth effect, which the authors note could make it helpful to pair inclusive casting with messaging that reinforces acceptance.
The researchers point out a few boundaries to their work that leave room for further testing. Because their experiments asked U.S. participants to evaluate hypothetical friends or unfamiliar social media influencers, physical appearance cues may have carried more weight than they would among close family members who already know each other well. In addition, the authors note that comparing photographs across genders involves subtle visual differences in facial structure and body composition that cannot be completely equated, meaning the lack of a body-size effect for male givers should be interpreted with caution until tested through other methods, such as written descriptions.
