It matters whether you give your loved one a material gift or an experience for Valentine's Day, say researchers at The University of Texas at Austin's McCombs School of Business and Washington University in St. Louis.

Past research has shown that opting for shared experiences such as vacations and theatre tickets will lead to more long-term happiness than will buying material goods. However, new research to be published in a forthcoming issue of the Journal of Consumer Research shows that sometimes experiences can backfire.

The research was co-authored by Leonardo Nicolao and Julie Irwin of the McCombs School of Business and Joseph K. Goodman of Washington University in St. Louis.

"Previous studies have only tested happiness with positive experiences versus positive material purchases," said Irwin, associate professor of marketing at the McCombs School of Business…