Be careful those 'improving' presents aren't re-gifted this Christmas

Many of us will do it once. With any luck we’ll learn to read the social cues and try not to do it again. But some persist with it: Buying people an ‘improving‘ present.

The improving present is one where you spot what you think is an area in the recipient’s life they need to work on, and you try to enable that improvement to take place with the blunt instrument of a Christmas present. Sometimes it’s exactly the catharsis the recipient wants, but more often than not you’re placing a burden on them and they would have been much better off with a voucher.

This often manifests itself in early adulthood (ages 18-38) We can be afflicted with a mania to ‘improve’ their parents.