I also agree with Mr. Bowen’s point that we often do not speak frankly to the person doing us wrong. I was in a class where everyone was annoyed at the teacher for regularly failing to show up on time. It was an easily fixable problem, but all of us — about a dozen — complained in whispers to one another for weeks.

A few grumbled to other teachers and even spoke to the head of the entire program. But nothing changed. Finally, one brave soul broached the subject directly with our teacher.

He responded graciously and started showing up promptly.

Mr. Winch said research had shown that when customers bought something they were dissatisfied with, 95 percent would not complain to the company but would voice their dissatisfaction to 10 or 15 friends.

What made my class more typical was that it was all women. While women do not complain more than men, Professor Wolfe said, they seem to because of the way they complain. They are more likely to complain rather than request an action, she said, such as saying, “It’s cold in here,” rather than asking to shut a window or turn up the heat.

Men, on the other hand, tend to complain more to bolster their egos, she said — attacking a politician’s stance, for example, to show their own astuteness.

We may complain differently by sex, but we certainly do it a lot. While studying videos of teams working on creating proposals and brochures, Professor Wolfe found that within an hour, there were 50 expressions of discontent, or close to one complaint a minute.

So we have a long way to go toward a complaint-free world, although it may not be for lack of trying. Ten million people in 106 countries have ordered the purple bracelets since the campaign began in 2006, Mr. Bowen said, although he said he did not know how many went a full three weeks without breaking down.