Friends as Tools: Exploring the Role of Dispositional Greed in Social Relationships

Abstract

Greed is the insatiable desire for more. Greed research has mainly focused on economic decisions, and little is known about greed in the realm of social relationships, despite these being essential to people’s well-being. We explored in four studies how dispositional greed is associated with various aspects of social relationships. We analyzed survey data from the Dutch Representative LISS-panel (2013-wave, N = 2,299–4,943; 2019-wave, N = 694–892) and ran two additional studies (Lab, N = 205; Prolific, N = 503). Together, these studies revealed that people higher in greed are lonelier and objectify friends more. Even more, some Studies showed that people higher in greed are less satisfied with and less close to their contacts, while other Studies showed no effect of greed. These findings shed light on how greed affects people’s social lives. We address potential mechanisms and expound avenues for future research.

Keywords

greed relationships friendship well-being

Greed is the insatiable desire for more: more money and possessions and more immaterial outcomes, such as sex, power, and status (cf. Seuntjens et al., 2015a). Previous research has focused mostly on economic decisions, such as investment decisions (Hoyer et al., 2021, 2023), self-interested behavior in experimental games (e.g., Bao et al., 2022), working harder in the lab (Zeelenberg et al., 2020) and in real life (Okulicz-Kozaryn et al., 2021), gambling more (Weller et al., 2025), spending more, saving less, and having more debt during adolescence (Seuntjens et al., 2016) as well as vocational choice (Krekels & Pandelaere, 2015; Van Muijen & Melse, 2015). Greed is also associated with psychological outcomes, such as emotional instability, lower self-esteem, and worse mental well-being (e.g., Hoyer et al., 2024; Liu et al., 2019; Masui et al., 2018).

We explored associations between greed and social relationships. These are of great importance to people’s functioning and well-being, just like material possessions (e.g., Amati et al., 2018; Haller & Hadler, 2006). As outlined subsequently, we have reasons to believe that greed relates to various features of social relationships, beyond the straightforward desire to want more friends, and that greed relates to treating friendships differently. Before turning to these expectations, let us shortly explain what greed is and how individual differences can be assessed.

Greed

Contemporary greed research started with Wang and Murnighan (2011, p. 282), who noticed that greed has a long intellectual history, but empirical research on greed was rare. Seuntjens et al. (2015a, p. 518) subsequently conducted a multi-study prototype analysis, concluding that “Greed is the experience of desiring to acquire more and the dissatisfaction of never having enough.” Further studies found that greed is related to, but distinct from self-interest, materialism, envy, and maximization (e.g., Seuntjens et al., 2015b). Rational people know that enough is enough and will stop striving for more, when acquiring more does not lead to more utility, but people higher in greed do not stop, continuously striving for more, which—in the end—leaves them dissatisfied no matter how much they have.

Not everyone is equally greedy. Individual differences in greediness can be assessed validly and reliably. Different greed scales have been developed that all measure a similar construct (Mussel et al., 2018; Zeelenberg et al., 2022), with dispositional greed being a naturally distributed trait in populations (Zeelenberg & Breugelmans, 2022).

Greed in Social Relationships

Social relationships are associated with higher well-being: individuals with strong social ties are happier and more satisfied with life than others without these ties (e.g., Amati et al., 2018; Haller & Hadler, 2006). Social ties can be more important to life satisfaction than income (Powdthavee, 2008), being, for example, associated with longevity (e.g., Holt-Lunstad & Smith, 2012). Social relationships can be helpful in reducing stress levels and decreasing the risk of heart-related issues (e.g., Cohen, 2004; Hostinar, 2015). Social relationships are thus important and valued.

Dispositional greed is associated with dissatisfaction, because people higher in greed cannot fulfill their desires, likely also in the domain of social relationships. Hence, people higher in greed can be expected to want more social relationships and gain more from them. Seuntjens et al. (2015b) found that dispositional greed predicted a desire for more friends on social media and more casual sex when single. Hoyer et al. (2024) found that people higher in greed reported having more frequent sexual encounters, albeit shorter-lasting romantic relationships. Weiß et al.’s (2024) Domain-Specific Greed Scale identified 10 different domains for greed, including friendships. Their four-item friendship subscale assesses the desire to acquire more friends, and correlates with the number of friends on social networking sites. These three studies thus document the relation between greed and relationships, but remain mute with respect to the kinds of friendships people higher in greed would be interested in (e.g., functional friendships vs. hedonic friendships), and the perception of these social relationships (e.g., whether people objectify their friends).

Examining the link between greed and social relationships is important because the process of “acquiring” social contacts is different from that of acquiring material goods. Three features are important here. First, relationships require mutual selection (Newman et al., 2017), meaning that other people need to reciprocate one’s desire to establish a relationship (Curtis & Miller, 1986). This is qualitatively different from material purchases, as buyers choose their products, and not the other way around. Second, becoming and staying friends is typically an evolving process, repeatedly spending time together and sharing experiences. There are multiple moments in the formation and maintenance of a social relationship where one party can change their mind. In contrast, material purchases are typically one-time decisions. Third, time is finite, and spending time creating new social relationships means less time to maintain existing friendships, and risking losing them. Material goods usually do not require time investment over extended periods.

Thus, greed is well studied for unilateral, momentary decisions (in the domain of economic/consumer decisions), but there is hardly any insight into how greed would operate in a lengthier, bidirectional, and social contexts. Therefore, we believe that expanding greed research into the social domain is important.

Research on materialism, a closely related construct, may be informative for what greed can do in the social domain. Materialistic values can damage “the quality of connectedness and decrease the ability to satisfy needs for intimacy, closeness, and connection” (Kasser, 2002, p. 64). Pieters (2013) found a bi-directional relationship between materialism and loneliness. This is referred to as the “material trap,” the “vicious cycle of materialism,” or the “loop of loneliness.” Finally, materialists use Facebook more frequently, have a larger number of Facebook friends, and have a higher tendency to objectify these friends (Ozimek et al., 2017). We believe that similar effects can be found for greed.

There are further theoretical reasons to expect that greed is related to elements of social relationships. First, people higher in greed might have different wishes concerning social relationships. In addition to wanting more friends, they might desire functional friends that they can use as tools to reach their goals. Second, people higher in greed may not be the best company, as they have lower standards concerning morality (Li et al., 2023; Seuntjens et al., 2019). Hence, people may not be willing to engage in relationships with people higher in greed.

Fromm (1967) argued that people higher in greed have the propensity to view people around them as commodities that can be acquired. In interpersonal relationships, greed manifests itself as a desire to have numerous acquaintances and the desire to have shallow romantic relationships with multiple partners: “[things] are utterly expendable, along with friends or lovers, who are expendable, too, since no deeper tie exists to any of them.” (p. 122). Thus, people higher in greed can be expected to desire more social relationships and to actively pursue that desire. Pursuing additional relationships, and dedicating time and effort to this pursuit (instead of maintaining and deepening existing relationships) might cause people to feel less attachment to existing relationships, and perhaps even to feelings of loneliness.

People higher in greed may also desire qualitatively different social contacts (cf. Ozimek et al., 2017). We expect people higher in greed to prefer functional relationships that fulfill their needs without requiring too much in return. People higher in greed more often cheat on their partners (Seuntjens et al., 2019) are more self-interested and only care about others when their interests are aligned (Bao et al., 2022; Zeelenberg et al., 2024). Thus, they might view and treat their social relationships more as possession or a means to an end (i.e., objectification; Gruenfeld et al., 2008; Ozimek et al., 2017), replacing friendships as soon as they lose their value. This corresponds to exchange theory, which “tells us that a person will not stay in a relationship unless the balance of rewards minus costs is sufficiently high” (Argyle & Henderson, 1984, p. 214). Thus, people higher in greed might seek to maximize benefits and minimize costs in their interactions and end the relationship once the balance is off (Stafford & Kuiper, 2021).

On top of that, people higher in greed tend to demonstrate less favorable interpersonal qualities. This is important because relationships require mutual selection. Greed is one of the dark traits (Hilbig et al., 2023) and a source of interpersonal conflict (Hoffman et al., 2018). People higher in greed score lower on “agreeableness” (Krekels & Pandelaere, 2015; Mussel & Hewig, 2016) as well as higher on “meanness” (Mussel & Hewig, 2016), indicating deficient empathy (Seuntjens et al., 2015b), lack of close attachments with others and egocentrism. Greed has also been linked to immorality and unethical behavior (Li et al., 2023; Seuntjens et al., 2019). As a result, relationships with people higher in greed, if they occur, might more easily break up. If people feel like they are not getting their fair share out of the relationship because the other person is greedy, equity theory would predict they would be compelled to end the relationship with the greedy person (e.g., Adams, 1965; Stafford & Kuiper, 2021).

Thus, there are reasons to expect differences in how people higher in greed relate to others. These differences might be due to what people higher in greed look for in social relationships, but also to what they bring into the relationship. Below we explain our expectations and how we examined these in a set of four studies.

Overview

In four studies, we explored the associations between dispositional greed and various aspects of social relationships. Study 1 examined data from a large, representative sample of the Dutch population (N = 2,299–4,943). Study 2 replicated this in another representative sample (N = 694–892). Study 3 further explored this in a Dutch student sample (N = 203, preregistered). Finally, Study 4 is a preregistered replication (N = 503) of all main insights from Studies 1 to 3, with a US-American sample from Prolific Academic.

We report on two types of relationships measures that go beyond the simple desire to acquire more friends, namely, measures that consider people’s needs fulfillment (such as satisfaction with social contacts and loneliness) and measures that concern how people look at and treat their social relationships (such as objectification, inclusion of others in self,¹ how long they know and how often they talk to their closest contacts).

We expected to find the following: People higher in greed are less satisfied with their social relationships and experience more feelings of loneliness (because they establish less deep ties). We further expected people higher in greed to objectify their friends more (because they view their social contacts as objects to acquire), to feel less connected to their social relations² (because they more easily exchange one for another), know their closest relationships for a shorter time (because of more easily exchanging relationships, and the other that ends the relationship), and talk to their social contacts more often (because of “using” them more intensely and beginning/formation phases of friendships generally require more time³). For the number of friends mentioned, we expected a positive relationship with greed (more friends could be a way to showcase their social network and signal more status).

Because the setup of all studies is very similar, we report them together for reasons of brevity. Data, code and materials for all studies and preregistrations can be found at: https://researchbox.org/534.

Method

Participants

Study 1

Our initial exploration of the relationship between greed and social contacts used a subsample of the LISS (Longitudinal Internet Studies for the Social Sciences) panel, a large, representative sample of the Dutch population consisting of 5,000 households, comprising approximately 7,500 individuals. All LISS data are openly available via www.lissdata.nl.

We included participants who completed the Dispositional Greed Scale (DGS; Seuntjens et al., 2015b) as part of the 2013 single wave study “155 Dispositional Greed Scale,” and the “Personality and Social Integration” and “Leisure” questionnaires are from the 2013 LISS core study (wave #6). The sample consisted of N = 2,299 to 4,943 participants depending on the measure (53.7% Female, 46.3% Male;⁴ M_age = 51.88, SD = 17.19).

Study 2

This study replicated Study 1 using a later wave of the LISS-panel. Participants completed the DGS as part of the 2019 single wave study “198 Motives for greed and self-interest,” and the “Personality and Social Integration” and “Leisure” questionnaires are from the 2018-2019 LISS core study (wave #11). The 1,452 participants of this 2019 sample who also completed the earlier 2013 wave were excluded to ensure an independent sample.⁵ The final sample consisted of N = 694–892 participants depending on the measure (52.1% Female, 47.9% Male; M_age = 46.40, SD = 19.16).

Study 3

Participants were first-year Psychology students from a Dutch University, recruited in April 2019. We excluded one participant who did not complete the DGS, leaving a total sample of N = 205⁶ (72.3% Female, 27.2% Male, 0.5% Other; M_age = 20.21, SD = 2.40). This study was preregistered at https://aspredicted.org/rmsy-7zcr.pdf.

Study 4

We aimed to replicate the main findings of Studies 1 to 3 in a sample from the United States. Participants were recruited through Prolific in August 2019 (N = 503; 46.5% Female, 53.3% Male, 0.2% Other; M_age = 29.66, SD = 9.91). This study was preregistered at https://aspredicted.org/424r-3hsw.pdf.

Materials and Procedure

Dispositional Greed Scale

Individual differences in greed were measured with the 7-item DGS (Seuntjens et al., 2015b). This scale consists of statements like “I always want more.” Participants indicated agreement with each statement on a 5-point Likert-type scale (1 = strongly disagree; 5 = strongly agree). In Studies 3 and 4, half of the sample started with the DGS, while the other half ended with the DGS. Mean scores of participants who filled out the DGS at the beginning of the survey in Study 3 (M_begin = 2.52, SD = 0.68) did not differ significantly from those who filled it out at the end of the survey (M_end = 2.51, SD = 0.69), t(203) = −0.07 and p = .943. The same holds for Study 4, M_begin = 2.82, SD = 0.75 versus M_end = 2.74, SD = 0.74, t(501) = 1.35, p = .178 (see Table 1).

Table 1

Means, Standard Deviations, and Reliabilities of the Dispositional Greed Scale and Various Measures of (Evaluations of) Social Relationships

	Study 1		Study 2		Study 3		Study 4
	Dutch adults LISS-Panel 2013		Dutch adults LISS-Panel 2019		Dutch students in the lab		U.S. Prolific participants
Variables	M	SD	M	SD	M	SD	M	SD
DGS (α₁ = .89; α₂ = .90; α₃ = .81; α₄ = .81)	1.99	0.72	2.18	0.76	2.57	0.71	2.78	0.74
Loneliness (α₁ = .82; α₂ = .83; α₃ = .78; α₄ = .79)	1.32	0.41	1.34	0.43	1.41	0.45	1.73	0.54
IOS	4.60	1.53	4.40	1.57			3.93	1.64
Satisfaction with social contacts	7.35	1.61	7.33	1.54	7.05	1.84	6.60	2.25
5 Closest friends
Names mentioned	2.98	1.77	2.94	1.87	4.13	1.21	3.56	1.27
Relationship length	2.79	0.38	2.73	0.42	2.99	0.78	3.42	0.65
Frequency of talking	1.86	0.60	1.85	0.58	1.61	0.44	2.08	0.87
Objectification (α₃ = .69; α₄ = .65)					2.92	0.68	3.02	0.74

Note. Greed (DGS) was measured using the 7-item Dispositional Greed Scale (Seuntjens et al., 2015b). Loneliness was measured using the 6-item Loneliness scale (De Jong-Gierveld & Kamphuls, 1985). IOS is the Inclusion of Other in Self scale (Aron et al., 1992). Objectification was measured using the 10-item Objectification Scale (Gruenfeld et al., 2008).

Measures of Relationships and Relationship Quality

All studies included the 6-item Loneliness Scale (De Jong-Gierveld & Kamphuls, 1985). An example item (rated on: 1 = yes, 2 = more or less, and 3 = no) is: “there are enough people to whom I feel closely connected.” A higher score indicates more loneliness.

Studies 1, 2, and 4 incorporated the Inclusion of Other in Self-scale (IOS; Aron et al., 1992). The IOS assesses the degree to which people feel connected to others, using 7 circles that depict different degrees of overlap between the circles “Self” and “Other.” A lower score indicates less connection with others.

All studies included the item: “How satisfied are you with your social contacts?” (0 = not at all satisfied; 10 = very satisfied). All participants also named their (at most) five closest contacts. They were then asked how long they had known them (1 = less than a year, 2 = 1–3 years, 3 = 3–5 years, 4 = longer than 5 years) and how often they talked to them (1 = daily, 2 = weekly, 3 = monthly, 4 = quarterly, 5 = yearly, 6 = less than once a year).⁷

Studies 3 and 4 included the 10-item Objectification Scale (Gruenfeld et al., 2008), a trait measure of objectification of others. To make the scale applicable for our purposes, in the scale-items the term “this person” was changed to “my friends.” An example item is: “I think more about what my friends can do for me than what I can do for them” (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree).

Study 3 also included a number of additional relationship questions taken from the Cambridge Friendship Questionnaire (Baron-Cohen & Wheelwright, 2003), from the McGill Friendship Questionnaire-Friendship Functions (Mendelson & Aboud, 1999), and some single items. Because these were only assessed in Study 3, we only briefly report them here. A full description of these measures can be found in Online Appendix 1.

Results

We analyzed the results from all four studies separately with regressions controlling for age and gender.⁸ A summary of the results for the effect of Dispositional Greed can be found in Table 2. In Online Appendix 2, we explored the correlations between dispositional greed and the various measures of relationships⁹ and conducted a meta-analysis on the correlations from the different studies. Means and standard deviations of the different measures can be found in Table 1.

Table 2

Summary of Regression Results of the Effect of Dispositional Greed for Study 1–4

Variables	Study 1 Dutch adults LISS-Panel 2013	Study 2 Dutch adults LISS-Panel 2019	Study 3 Dutch students in the lab	Study 4 US Prolific participants
Loneliness	+	+	+	+
IOS	−	−		ns
Satisfaction with social contacts	−	ns	ns	ns
5 Closest friends
Names mentioned	−	ns	ns	ns
Relationship length	ns	ns	ns	ns
Frequency of talking	ns	ns	ns	ns
Objectification			+	+

Note.+ indicates a significant, positive relationship; − indicates a significant, negative relationship; ns indicates a non-significant relationship.

Results Studies 1 and 2

The regression results of Study 1 can be found in Table 3; the results of Study 2 in Table 4. We found support for some of our predictions in both LISS-panel samples. The higher people were in greed, the less they perceived closeness between themselves and their friends (IOS) and the lonelier they felt. People higher in greed were less satisfied with their social contacts (Study 1). The results for relationship length and frequency of talking were nonsignificant. People higher in greed mentioned fewer friends in Study 1.

Table 3

Regression Analyses of Relationship Indicators on Dispositional Greed, Controlling for Age and Gender in Study 1

Dependent variable	Loneliness	IOS	Satisfaction with social contacts	Names mentioned	Relationship length	Frequency of talking
N	4,424	2,299	4,321	4,321	3,801	3,801
Intercept	1.13*** (0.04)	3.65*** (0.21)	8.25*** (0.26)	3.46*** (0.28)	2.31*** (0.06)	1.52*** (0.10)
Greed	0.08*** (0.01)	−0.15** (0.05)	−0.46*** (0.05)	−0.13* (0.06)	−0.01 (0.01)	−0.03 (0.02)
Age	−0.00 (0.00)	0.01*** (0.00)	0.00 (0.00)	−0.01*** (0.00)	0.01 (0.00)	0.01*** (0.00)
Gender	0.02 (0.01)	0.34*** (0.06)	−0.09 (0.08)	0.33** (0.09)	0.02*** (0.02)	0.01 (0.03)
R ²	.02	.05	.06	.03	.18	.05
F-statistic	35.34***	39.96***	31.34***	14.88***	94.92***	23.42***

Note. Greed (DGS) was measured using the 7-item Dispositional Greed Scale (Seuntjens et al., 2015b). Gender is coded such that 1 = male and 2 = female.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Table 4

Regression Analyses of Relationship Indicators on Dispositional Greed, Controlling for Age and Gender in Study 2

Dependent variable	Loneliness	IOS	Satisfaction with social contacts	Names mentioned	Relationship length	Frequency of talking
N	855	892	839	860	649	704
Intercept	1.15*** (0.09)	4.29*** (0.33)	7.27*** (0.34)	2.79*** (0.39)	2.26*** (0.10)	1.46*** (0.14)
Greed	0.05* (0.02)	−0.28*** (0.08)	−0.15 (0.08)	−0.11 (0.09)	0.01 (0.02)	−0.02 (0.03)
Age	0.00 (0.00)	0.01*** (0.00)	0.00 (0.00)	−0.02*** (0.00)	0.01*** (0.00)	0.01*** (0.00)
Gender	0.00 (0.03)	0.10 (0.10)	0.19 (0.11)	0.83*** (0.12)	0.00 (0.03)	0.02 (0.04)
R ²	.01	.06	.01	.08	.17	.08
F-statistic	2.25	19.46***	3.62*	26.01***	49.02***	19.85***

Note. Greed (DGS) was measured using the 7-item Dispositional Greed Scale (Seuntjens et al., 2015b). Gender is coded such that 1 = male and 2 = female.

p < .05. ***p < .001.

It could be that other, more broad personality traits could also account for our findings (e.g., extraverted people also tend to seek out more friends, and people low on agreeableness may also have greedy traits). For exploratory reasons, we ran regressions controlling for the BIG-5 in our sample from Study 1 (see Online Appendix 3). Within LISS, these traits were measured by the IPIP’s Big Five scale which has 50 items in total, 10 for each personality trait (Goldberg, 1992). In these exploratory analyses, in which we also controlled for age and gender, the effect of greed on loneliness remains significant when controlling for the BIG-5; all other effects become non-significant.

Results Study 3

Results are shown in Table 5. Replicating Studies 1 and 2, in the sample of Dutch students, we found students higher in greed experiencing more feelings of loneliness. There was no effect for satisfaction with their social contacts. With regard to participants’ closest friends, we found a negative effect of greed on the number of names mentioned (at most 5; replicating Study 1), but no effect of greed on relationships length, or frequency of talking. Furthermore, we found that people higher in greed objectified their friends more.

Table 5

Regression Analyses of Relationship Indicators on Dispositional Greed, Controlling for Age and Gender in Study 3

Dependent variable	Loneliness	Satisfaction with social contacts	Names mentioned	Relationship length	Frequency of talking	Objectification
N	204	204	204	204	204	204
Intercept	0.54 (0.35)	7.66*** (1.44)	5.61*** (0.93)	3.30*** (0.61)	6.26*** (0.34)	2.45*** (0.50)
Greed	0.10* (0.05)	−0.37 (0.19)	−0.23 (0.12)	−0.09 (0.08)	0.00 (0.04)	0.32*** (0.07)
Age	0.02 (0.01)	0.01 (0.06)	−0.03 (0.04)	0.02 (0.02)	−0.04** (0.01)	0.00 (0.02)
Gender	0.12^ (0.07)	0.06 (0.29)	−0.20 (0.19)	−0.27 (0.12)	0.00 (0.07)	−0.23* (0.10)
R ²	.01	.02	.02	.04	.06	.12
F-statistic	3.11*	1.32	1.66	2.94*	3.93**	9.44***

Note. Greed (DGS) was measured using the 7-item Dispositional Greed Scale (Seuntjens et al., 2015b). Gender is coded such that 1 = male and 2 = female.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

As part of Study 3, we also included a number of additional questionnaire items (reported in full in Online Appendix 1). We correlated these items with dispositional greed. We found a negative correlation with the number of close friends, r(204) = −.15 and p = .029, and a marginally significant correlation with the satisfaction with these close friends, r(204) = −.14 and p = .051. Furthermore, there is a positive correlation between the DGS and the functional friendships items, r(205) = .18 and p = .008. Individuals scoring higher on dispositional greed find the function Reliable Alliance less important in an ideal friendship, r(204) = −.23 and p < .001. Finally, we found a marginally significant preference for quantity over quality in terms of friendships, r(205) = −.13 and p = .067. All other correlations were nonsignificant.

Results Study 4

Results can be found in Table 6. We found a positive effect of greed on loneliness (replicating Studies 1–3). There was no effect of greed on satisfaction with social contacts. We found no effect of greed with the number of names mentioned (in contract to Study 1, but replicating Study 2 and 3), no effect of greed on relationship length and frequency of talking (replicating Studies 1–3). We also found a positive effect of greed on objectification (similar to Study 3).

Table 6

Regression Analyses of Relationship Indicators on Dispositional Greed, Controlling Age, and Gender in Study 4

Dependent variable	Loneliness	IOS	Satisfaction with social contacts	Names mentioned	Relationship length	Frequency of talking	Objectification
N	502	502	502	502	502	502	502
Intercept	1.62 (0.14)	3.58*** (0.43)	6.19*** (0.59)	4.83*** (0.33)	3.03*** (0.16)	5.05*** (0.23)	2.41*** (0.18)
Greed	0.10** (0.03)	−0.01 (0.01)	−0.08 (0.14)	−0.11 (0.08)	−0.07 (0.04)	0.02 (0.05)	0.39*** (0.04)
Age	−0.00 (0.00)	0.00 (0.00)	0.01 (0.01)	−0.02*** (0.01)	0.02*** (0.00)	−0.01** (0.00)	−0.00 (0.00)
Gender	−0.03 (0.05)	0.34* (0.15)	0.31 (0.20)	−0.13 (0.11)	−0.03 (0.06)	0.14 (0.08)	−0.31*** (0.06)
R ²	.03	.01	.01	.04	.12	.02	.21
F-statistic	5.48**	1.98	1.16	6.59***	21.85***	4.15**	43.05***

Note. Greed (DGS) was measured using the 7-item Dispositional Greed Scale (Seuntjens et al., 2015b). Gender is coded such that 1 = male and 2 = female.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

General Discussion

Our research started from the observation that research on greed has until now primarily focused on individual, material decisions, and that little was known about greed in the social domain. We analyzed how social relationships are governed by reciprocal and repeated processes, which differ from the unilateral and single-shot processes that are more typical of material acquisitions and did four studies to examine the expectations. What did we learn?

Together, the studies revealed differences in social relationships between people higher in greed and people lower in greed. They also reveal potential consequences of such differences, with people higher in greed tending to be lonelier and to be less satisfied with (cautionary note: this was only found in Study 1, the highest powered Study¹⁰) and less close to their social contacts (not replicated in the final Study 4). These results paint a picture of people higher in greed being less invested in and happy with their current social relationships. This fits with the general tendencies related to greed: being dissatisfied with what one already has¹¹ and the insatiable desire to acquire more (Seuntjens et al., 2015a).

People higher in greed also viewed their social relationships in different ways. Our findings show that people higher in greed objectify their friends more. Friends are more seen as instruments (“tools”) for goal attainment and approached on the basis of their utility, rather than being valued for their human qualities (Gruenfeld et al., 2008). Viewing their social relationships as tools might have benefits for people higher in greed. As DeSciolo and Kurzban (2011, p. 209) noted: “social psychologists have long claimed that people’s friendship choices are surprisingly unintelligent, based on strategically irrelevant factors such as proximity, familiarity, similarity, or very simple reinforcement learning,” while animals, such as primates and dolphins, more strategically choose their friends. They argue that human friendships can also be strategic. The greedy approach to friendships can be seen as strategic alliance-building, indicating that people higher in greed may have a more rational or utilitarian approach to friendship selection. People higher in greed have been found to employ more utilitarian strategies in economic games (i.e., keeping more money for themselves; Seuntjens et al., 2015b), to be more likely to take bribes (Seuntjens et al., 2019), to be more corrupt (Li et al., 2023), and to exhibit more rational behavior in economic markets (Hoyer et al., 2023). However, there may be a psychological price to pay.

Viewing friends as tools may be one of the reasons why people higher in greed experience more loneliness. Perlman and Peplau (1981) defined loneliness as “the unpleasant experience that occurs when a person’s network of social relations is deficient in some important way, either quantitatively or qualitatively” (p. 31). We found that greedier people differ from less greedy people in terms of how they approach them (e.g., objectification). Thus, there may be a clear trade-off between a greedy, instrumental view of social relationships that yields greater material pay-off and a less greedy, relational view that yields greater psychological pay-off.

Interestingly, we found no effect of greed on the length of social relationships, not replicating Hoyer et al.’s (2024) finding that people higher in greed tend to have shorter. We expected this relationship for two reasons. First, people higher in greed might feel less connected to their contacts and stop investing as soon as they lose their functionality, and exchanging them for new friendships (as can be done with objects). Second, it could be that this decision comes from the partner because people higher in greed tend to demonstrate less favorable interpersonal qualities. Meaning that, by using others as tools, people higher in greed may be the proverbial “tool” themselves. That this relationship is absent might stem from the questionnaire asking for at most five names and perhaps there would be a difference when it would have asked for a larger number. Research should investigate this relationship further to develop a clear answer to this open question. Such research might benefit from a dyadic study where friends perceptions of the relationship and the person higher in greed are also assessed, or from a longitudinal study that monitors greedier people’s relationships over time.

The results seem to suggest that people higher in greed have different criteria for evaluating friendships (i.e., does this contact help me gain access to greater status, popularity, or more material things vs. does this contact offer me emotional support, intimacy, and belonging). This might explain why greedier people mentioned less friends in Studies (i.e., their thresholds for calling someone a friend might be higher). As part of Study 3, we assessed which criteria the ideal friend should meet (cf. Mendelson & Aboud, 1999). We assessed six friendship functions: stimulating companionship (doing enjoyable, amusing, or exciting things together), help (providing guidance, assistance, and other forms of aid), intimacy (being sensitive to the other’s needs and states and being open to honest expressions of thoughts, feelings, and personal information), reliable alliance (remaining available and loyal), self-validation (reassuring, encouraging, and otherwise helping the other maintain a positive self-image) and emotional security (providing comfort and confidence in novel or threatening situations). We found a negative correlation between greed and the function reliable alliance; all other correlations were nonsignificant. Hence, this could be investigated further.

These initial explorations of greed in the realm of social relationships have some clear limitations. One is the correlational design, which prevents any claims of causality. A related limitation is the self-reported nature of the data, which, despite yielding insightful results, are limited in their information about social interactions. Thus, we cannot convincingly answer the question of whether greed causes loneliness or whether loneliness causes greed, or that perhaps both are valid. Future research could examine relationship between greed and loneliness is uni-directional or bi-directional (cf. Pieters, 2013).

We believe that it is important for future research to investigate the mechanisms of how and why greed is related to poorer relationships. Well-being and satisfaction-with-life are closely related to social relationships, and more insight into these mechanisms could be used to alleviate the negative consequences of being greedy. Again, longitudinal data and dyadic studies might help in this case.

We used social contacts as well as friendships interchangeably because of the exploratory nature of the studies. We do not mean to imply that these are identical. Notably, social contacts can also include acquaintances, which might be more instrumental than true friends. One might also wonder whether the results also apply to romantic relationships (the result that greedier people have shorter romantic relationships of Hoyer et al., 2024, seems to suggest that). Unfortunately, we cannot assess to what extent these target differences affected our findings. Thus, it is best to regard our findings as pertaining the general domain of social relationships and not to specific target groups such as friends or close others. Further research should make a clearer distinction between the types of social relationships.

To summarize, greed may appear to be primarily a materialistic motive, but it has interesting correlates in the domain of social relationships as well. People higher in greed tend to view their friends more like tools, needed to achieve their ambitions. This may lead to greater economic success, but also to greater feelings of loneliness. Even more, people higher in greed might be less satisfied with, and less close to their social contacts (but results are mixed in our Studies). This may help to explain why people higher in greed, despite an abundance of friends, score lower on satisfaction-with-life and general well-being.

Supplemental Material

sj-docx-1-spp-10.1177_19485506251324692 – Supplemental material for Friends as Tools: Exploring the Role of Dispositional Greed in Social Relationships

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-spp-10.1177_19485506251324692 for Friends as Tools: Exploring the Role of Dispositional Greed in Social Relationships by Karlijn Hoyer, Marcel Zeelenberg and Seger M. Breugelmans in Social Psychological and Personality Science

Footnotes

Handling Editor: Yuthika Girme

Author Contributions

Karlijn Hoyer: Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Formal analysis, Investigation, Data curation, Writing – original draft, Writing – Reviewing & Editing.

Marcel Zeelenberg and Seger M. Breugelmans: Conceptualization, Writing – Reviewing & Editing.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: In this paper, we make use of data from the LISS panel (Longitudinal Internet studies for the Social Sciences) managed by the non-profit research institute Centerdata (Tilburg University, the Netherlands).

ORCID iDs

Karlijn Hoyer

Marcel Zeelenberg

Seger M. Breugelmans

Data Availability

Data, code, and materials for all studies and preregistrations can be found at: .

Supplemental Material

Supplemental material for this article is available online.

Notes

Author Biographies

Karlijn Hoyer is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Amsterdam.

Marcel Zeelenberg is a full professor of economic psychology at Tilburg University and a full professor of behavioral research in Marketing at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.

Seger M. Breugelmans is an associate professor at Tilburg University.

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