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Article Excerpt
A growing number of people engage in uncontrolled, excessive buying of consumer goods that can lead to psychological distress and serious effects on individuals' lives, such as substantial debt (e.g. Benson, 2000; Dittmar, 2004b). Such dysfunctional behaviour, termed compulsive buying in the clinical literature, has started to attract research attention (cf. Black, 2004; Dittmar, 2004a; Faber, 2004), and prevalence estimates range from 1% to 10% of adults in Western developed economies, including the UK and US. Moreover, a recent study confirmed empirically that compulsive buying is on the increase (Neuner, Raab, & Reisch, 2005). Yet, despite posing a substantial problem, its underlying causes are still poorly understood. To date, clinical models are the main approach, which view compulsive buying as a manifestation of underlying psychiatric disorders, but without agreement on the type of disorder (e.g. Black, 2004). Recent proposals, which draw on social psychology, conceptualize compulsive buying as compensatory behaviour, where individuals attempt to deal with identity and mood problems through buying material goods (Dittmar, 2004b; Elliott, 1994). This perspective is consistent with an emphasis on materialistic values, 'the importance ascribed to the ownership and acquisition of material goods in achieving major life goals' (Richins, 2004, p. 210) such as happiness, satisfaction and success. Endorsement of materialistic values has been linked to lower well-being (e.g. Kasser & Ahuvia, 2002; Kasser & Ryan, 1993).
In order to improve our limited understanding, the present research therefore examines materialistic value endorsement as a factor that may make individuals more vulnerable to compulsive buying. Age is also assessed, given indications that compulsive buying is negatively correlated with age (e.g. D'Astous, 1990; Magee, 1994) and findings that younger people tend to be more materialistic (cf. Myers, 2000). Finally, gender is examined, given the disproportionate prevalence of compulsive buying among women (see reviews by Black, 2004; Faber, 2004).
Definition, measurement, and prevalence estimates
In the current diagnostic manual DSM-IV-TR (American Psychiatric Association, 2000), compulsive buying is included in the residual category 'Disorders of Impulse Control Not Otherwise Specified'. Although there is no agreed specific definition, consensus exists on three core features of compulsive buying: the impulse to buy is experienced as irresistible, individuals lose control over their buying behaviour, and they continue with excessive buying despite adverse consequences in their personal, social, or occupational lives, and financial debt (Dittmar, 2004b). These core features are consistent with proposed diagnostic criteria for compulsive buying, which focus on maladaptive preoccupation with buying or shopping and irresistible impulses to buy, which result in distress and impairment (McElroy et al., 1994). It should be added that compulsive buying manifests itself mainly with respect to personal consumer goods, such as clothes and appearance-related products, rather than everyday household and grocery shopping.
Compulsive buying can be measured by questionnaire-based screeners that have been validated on clinical samples, although they assess the behavioural aspects of excessive and uncontrolled buying more directly than the extent of impairment. Thus, a diagnosis of compulsive buying requires clinical assessment, but questionnaire-based scales are ideally suited to measuring the relative strength of compulsive buying tendencies in individuals--which is the main concern in the present research--because their items assess its core features. The two most widely used as screeners are scales developed by Faber and O'Guinn (1992) and by Valence, d'Astous, & Fortier (1988). The Faber and O'Guinn screener, employed predominantly in US research, has a comparatively strong focus on loss of financial control, whereas the Valence scale, or a later modification (D'Astous, Maltais, & Roberge, 1990), has been used in Canadian and European studies, as well as in the UK (e.g. Elliott, 1994). This scale was chosen for the present research, because it focuses on both financial and psychological aspects of compulsive buying, and the following example items illustrate how each of the three core features of compulsive buying is addressed: irresistible impulses--'As soon as I enter a shopping centre, I want to go in a shop and buy something'; loss of control--'I sometimes feel that something inside pushes me to go shopping'; and continuing despite aversive consequences--'I have often bought a product that I did not need even when I knew I had very little money left'.
Although 'oniomania' (buying mania) was described as early as 1915, there are good reasons for proposing that compulsive buying has emerged as a widespread phenomenon recently, and swiftly. First, there are no published research studies before 1986, when they started to appear, first in the US and Canada, then in Europe. Since then, publications have steadily increased, particularly from 1994 onwards (Dittmar, 2004b), alongside increasing attention in the mass media, and a proliferation of self-help literature (cf. Benson, 2000). Although this increased attention can, of course, not be equated with prevalence, this growing concern indicates that increasing numbers of people are experiencing problems with their buying behaviour. A recent study in Germany, using nationally representative samples, provides the first empirical confirmation that compulsive buying increased significantly between 1991 and 2001 (Neuner et al., 2005).
The prevalence of compulsive buying has (not yet) been established in a proper epidemiological study, but estimates from general population surveys in the US using questionnaire-based scales range from an upper estimate of 8.1% of adults (Faber & O'Guinn, 1992) to figures as high as 16.0% (Magee, 1994) and 12.2% (Hassay & Smith, 1996) among younger samples. More conservative estimates by clinicians suggest that 2-5% are affected (e.g. Black 1996), but even 2% translates into half a million sufferers in the UK, and more than 10 million sufferers in the US. Clearly, even the most restrictive prevalence estimates underscore the need to understand better such prominent dysfunctional behaviour.
Explanations of compulsive buying
When it comes to explaining the causes of compulsive buying, psychiatric and clinical perspectives are the main approaches to date, which tend to treat it as a specific manifestation of general psychiatric disorders. The focus has been on four main types of disorder: impulse control (e.g. Christenson, Faber, De Zwaan, & Raymond, 1994), obsessive-compulsive (e.g. Hollander, 1993), addiction (e.g. Scherhorn, 1990), and mood, particularly depression (e.g. Lejoyeux, Tassian, Solomon, & Ades, 1997). The main form of evidence used as support is co-morbidity between compulsive buying and these disorders. However, there is little support for one type of disorder over another (Black, 2004), and co-morbidity rates found in samples of psychiatric patients (whose compulsive buying was often diagnosed during treatment for some other disorder) are usually much higher than co-morbidity rates reported in studies that identified compulsive buyers in general population samples through a questionnaire (cf. Dittmar, 2004b). This raises the possibility that the evidence for co-morbidity of compulsive buying with other psychiatric disorders may be less compelling than assumed. In addition, notwithstanding the merits of clinical and psychiatric approaches, they have some explanatory 'blind spots', which are worth addressing in order to achieve an improved understanding of compulsive buying. Although there is consistent evidence that the overwhelming majority of compulsive buyers are women (cf. Black, 2004; Faber, 2004), there is no account of this lop-sided gender ratio. A further commonly reported feature of compulsive buying not explained is that only certain goods--such as fashionable clothes--are typically bought, whereas others are not, such as basic kitchen items (e.g. Christenson et al., 1994; Schlosser, Black, Repertinger, & Freet, 1994). Finally, no account is offered of underlying motivations, and because a radical disjuncture is assumed between the pathological behaviour of compulsive buyers and ordinary consumer behaviour, clinical models typically do not examine underlying motivations that may be similar in both (cf. Dittmar, 2004b).
Instead of a radical dichotomy between ordinary buyers and those who are clinically dysfunctional, the theoretical orientation taken in this paper conceptualizes compulsive buying as an extreme manifestation of individuals' seeking mood repair and an improved sense of self-identity through material goods (Dittmar 2000, 2001, 2004b). It therefore views compulsive buying as constituting the 'abnormal' end of a continuum, which has 'normal' psychologically motivated buying at its other end. This orientation therefore sees the growth of compulsive buying as linked to the economic, social, and cultural transformation of consumer behaviour during the last two decades. Personal disposable incomes are markedly higher, and mushrooming credit facilities are conducive to spending money that one does not have, therefore enabling immediate gratification independent of financial constraints. Moreover, consumer goods have come to play a greater psychological role in people's lives (Dittmar, 2000, 2001, 2004a), where people buy to regulate their emotions (e.g. Elliott, 1994), to gain social status (e.g. McCracken, 1990), and to search for a better, more ideal self through the symbolic meanings associated with material goods (Dittmar, 1992, 2004a). In short, buying appears increasingly psychologically motivated, rather than driven by utilitarian benefits and financial constraints, so that people buy goods motivated by the desire to obtain emotional, social, and identity-related benefits. If compulsive buying is indeed characterized by an extreme preoccupation with mood and identity repair through material goods, as proposed here, then it follows that those factors likely to be associated with variations in psychologically motivated buying also make likely predictors of compulsive buying.
Gender
Probably the most consistent finding in over 30 research studies on compulsive buying is that women are disproportionately affected. In studies that classify individuals as compulsive buyers, the percentage of women ranges from 74% (Hanley & Wilhelm, 1992) to over 93% (Black, Repertinger, Gaffney, & Gabel, 1998), with the majority reporting around 90%. In research that examines continuous scores on Compulsive buying scales, women typically score significantly higher than men (e.g. Scherhorn, Reisch, & Raab, 1990), although one survey showed that women in their late twenties scored only slightly higher than men (Magee, 1994), and a study on adolescents failed to find any gender differences (Roberts & Tanner, 2000). Thus, women are highly vulnerable to compulsive buying, although gender differences may be less pronounced in young samples.
This gender difference in compulsive buying is not explained in previous research. It is, however, consistent with research that demonstrates stronger psychologically motivated buying in women. Emotional and identity-related dimensions of shopping are more important for women than for men (Babin, Darden, & Griffin, 1994; Dittmar, Long, & Meek, 2004). Women tend to have positive attitudes towards browsing, shopping, and social interaction, associating buying with a 'leisure frame', whereas men's attitudes tend to be negative, seeing buying in a 'work frame', as a task that they want to accomplish with the minimum input of time and effort (Campbell, 2000). Clearly, this general tendency may be less strong or even reversed for particular types of goods (e.g. tools or computer equipment), but it can be argued that, overall, shopping plays a stronger emotional, psychological and symbolic role for women compared with men (Dittmar & Drury, 2000). If we accept that there is a link between female gender identity, at least in its traditional form, and shopping, then we would expect compulsive buying to be disproportionately more likely among women. However, it is important not to mistake such differences for essential differences between women and men. Rather, buying behaviour is likely to remain gendered in the way described only as long as cultural norms and shared representations continue to frame shopping as closely linked to women's social, personal, and gender identities, and as long as women--who still are the majority of home-makers and primary carers for children--have fewer opportunities than men for other psychological compensation strategies. In summary, it is hypothesized that women are more affected by compulsive buying than men, although possibly less so among younger people.
Age
There is no previous research that addresses possible age differences in compulsive buying systematically, but there are indications which support the...
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