Each session focuses on a distinct aspect of social comparison and spending. They can be taken in sequence or explored individually, depending on where you want to start.
An introduction to how social comparison operates in everyday life. This session covers the basic mechanisms: upward comparison, downward comparison, and why the reference group we use shifts depending on context. We examine how these comparisons happen below the level of conscious decision-making and why that matters for spending.
Spending communicates. This session examines the signalling function of consumer choices: what we signal with visible purchases, how accurately the signal lands, and the gap between intended and received meaning. We look at how signalling behaviour changes across different social contexts and what that reveals about the underlying motivations.
Neighbourhood, workplace, friend group, family. Each of these environments carries implicit norms about what's ordinary to spend. This session maps how those norms form, how they're enforced without anyone saying anything directly, and how they become internalised as personal standards. We examine what happens when you move between environments with different norms.
The final session introduces a practical framework for building a personal threshold of sufficiency. Not a number. Not a rule. A way of orienting toward your own values when the social environment is pulling in a different direction. We work through how to identify what genuinely matters, what's borrowed from elsewhere, and how to tell the difference in real time.
Each session runs as a live event with participant Q&A, and is also available as a recording for those who prefer to work through the material at their own pace.
Each session is accompanied by a reading list drawing from academic research and accessible writing on behavioural economics, social psychology, and consumer behaviour.
Participants have access to a structured discussion space after each session where questions, observations, and reflections can be shared and explored.
All sessions are conducted in English. Supporting materials are available in both English and Polish.
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