Making Sense of Consumer Psychology: Retail Therapy or Shopping Addiction?

 Pranaya Prakash

The focus of Consumer and Marketing Psychology has been different from that of Clinical Psychology; the former takes a psychosocial and business-oriented approach (Rick et al., 2013; Lee, 2015) while the latter takes a mental health and psychopathological approach. A subject that has always been of interest in popular culture (“Shopping: Pros and Cons,” 2010) is the understanding and functionality of “retail therapy”. Moreover, whether retail therapy falls under the ambit of Consumer Psychology or Clinical psychology is a matter of concern.

Typically, consumerism and consumption in Economics is studied from hedonistic and capitalistic principles (Lee, 2015) but one research study (Rick et al., 2013) observes retail therapy from a mental health viewpoint. This particular study is interesting because the researchers (Rick et al., 2013) hold that retail therapy, also known as “compensatory consumption” (Yurchisin et al., 2006), is viewed negatively. They (Garg & Lerner, 2013; Rick et al., 2013) consider that retail therapy can be employed conscientiously in order to relieve lingering/residual sadness – the sadness experienced in memory, i.e., after the after sadness-inducing event has occurred – when an individual is experiencing low mood. They (Rick et al., 2013) mention that there are psychological benefits to shopping. However, they (Rick et al., 2013) also mention that they are unsure of how the “healing” mechanism happens considering the activity of shopping encompasses scanning, selecting, trying on clothes, talking with salespersons, etc. making controlling for variables difficult. 

On the other hand, I hold that the researchers (Rick et al., 2013) are undermining the potential of a superficial coping mechanism to turn into a visible manifestation of an addiction. As established previously (Alavi et al., 2012; The Essence of Drug Addiction - NIH Curriculum Supplement Series, 2007), an addiction starts out as a habit and turns into an obligation (Murali et al., 2018). Therefore, it is necessary to identify when a habit transitions into compulsivity and to further learn healthy coping behaviours when one experiences sadness.

It is important to understand and reinforce the fact that it is acceptable to seek professional help when one is experiencing even minimal stress / low mood or feeling a lack of control (Garg & Lerner, 2013; Rick et al., 2013) in their lives. Psychopathology manifests when one denies the existence of a problem and maladaptively believes that substance-reliance and/or pursuing temporary solutions – like going on a shopping spree and binge eating “occasionally” – are effective coping strategies (Rick et al., 2013). Studies (Murali et al., 2018; Smith, 2018; Poppe, 2020) show that (shopping) addictions, typically, are comorbid with substance abuse, anxiety (Poldrugo, 2020), depression (Adès & Lejoyeux, 2020), personality disorders (Murali et al., 2018; Homayouni et al., 2020), etc. Another study (Kreitler & Kreitler, 2020) attempted to study addictions by categorising them: abuse of psychoactive drugs as substance addiction and the addictions of shopping, binge-eating, video games, gambling (Duven et al., 2020) and the internet (Poppe, 2020) – characterised by compulsive behaviours (Alavi et al., 2012; Smith, 2018) – as process addictions. While there has not been much research (Smith, 2018) on the neurological basis of process addictions, I am inferring from existing literature (Murali et al., 2018) that the neural processes are similar  – with the release and dysfunction of dopamine, glutamate, and/or GABA (Nutt, 2014; Lingford-Hughes & Nutt, 2018) – since individuals experience a “high” in both cases.

Subsequently, I believe that shopping functions as a maladaptive distraction. Though the researchers hold that shopping can serve as a “good” distraction by instilling a sense of control through choice (Garg & Lerner, 2013; Rick et al., 2013), it is neither a long term solution nor is it addressing the cause(s) of an issue. Regardless, an important take-home message from the study was: the participants in the simulated e-commerce shopping environment emotionally improved by only engaging in the activity; the participants didn’t spend money but solely “adding things to the cart” reduced their lingering sadness (Rick et al., 2013). 

This observation from the study is useful to think about the ways an individual can gradually disengage from the maladaptive behaviours resulting from the inappropriate handling of emotions. I speculate whether such a technique will be useful in the process of de-addiction. It is known (Hooley et al., 2020) that Virtual Reality is being used in exposure therapy, so that clients can face their fears in a simulation knowing that the exposure is not happening in real life. Likewise, in therapy, I suppose individuals can systematically disengage from maladaptive behaviours using simulations, along with Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (Murali et al., 2018; Hooley et al., 2020). I hold that systematically disengaging will be effective as it gives individuals time to disengage rather than opting for aversion techniques and negative punishment; the latter options are effective only in the short term since the occurrence of a behaviour is externally motivated rather than internally (Sommers et al., 2016; Hooley et al., 2020).

References

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