...You Stop: How to Treat Compulsive Spending By MELINDA BECK Daily door-buster deals … friends and family discounts … free shipping if you spend over $150! For an estimated 6% of Americans with compulsive buying tendencies, this is a tough time of the year. "The whole culture conspires against us in the holiday season," says April Lane Benson, a Manhattan psychologist who has treated compulsive shoppers for 15 years. Besides tempting sales, pressure to top last year's gifts and the urge to shop for oneself, she says, "the holidays bring up a lot of unfulfilled longing for some people—and that's one reason why they shop, as a salve for disappointment." While the stereotypical compulsive shopper is traditionally a woman in her 30s, experts say the ease and speed of Internet shopping is luring more men and more young people. Over Black Friday weekend, men outspent women $484 to $317, on average, according to the National Retail Federation. Men also spent an average of $200 online—twice as much as the average woman. In a 2005 survey of 195 U.K. teenagers, who grew up with the Internet, 44% showed signs of compulsive shopping habits, according to research published in the British Journal of Psychology. "The Internet is dangerous for compulsive buyers in two ways," says psychiatrist Elias Aboujaoude, director of the Impulse Control Disorders Clinic at Stanford University School of Medicine. Transactions move so quickly, it is hard to pause to reassess the buying urge, he says. The Internet...
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...Exchange School Donghua University Undergraduate Research Project: Motivations for impulsive buying behavior and the effective marketing strategies selling grocery products Case: CITY SHOP By: Ilja Khanan Nationality: Germany Major Business Administration Student ID: 113110246 Supervisor: Nikola Zivlak Date: June 2014 Abstract For over sixty years, marketers and consumer researchers have studied Impulsive-buying behavior. Today, 30 to 60% of all purchases are impulsive in the USA (Crawford & Melewar 2003) for different product categories and it is considered to have a $4.2 billion annual volume. That’s why it is becoming more important for marketers to understand how people can be influenced when shopping in order to increase revenues and profits. Millions of dollars are spent on in-store marketing efforts. Over the years, different models have been created for marketers to better understand the key drivers that lead to impulsive buying. This dissertation is written for the retailer or marketer who will adjust their marketing strategies to capture the opportunities of the consumer impulse purchases. This dissertation focuses on City shop and the strategies they use to encourage impulsive buying behavior. The thesis will cover the following topics in regard to impulsive buying: - Factors and influences that lead to impulsive buying behavior? - The different promotional approaches used by marketers? - What personal traits...
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...Compulsive Shopping And Its Negative Effects In today’s scenario more than 1 in every 30 adults suffer from compulsive shopping, it can be described as the human mentality of compulsive consumption, whether or not it is crucial for their needs or not. It is also stated as a mental disorder, referred to as oniomania, buying mania, compulsive consumption, compulsive shopping and addictive or impulsive buying. Marketers have always emphasized on how to encourage this consumption pattern among all consumers. A recent search has shown that in the area of disease theories, a model that is dominant metaphor used to increase both the drug addiction and alcoholism in many treatment program such as Alcoholics Anonymous. Within the market three characteristics have showed the common symptom of compulsive shopping that includes the presence of a drive, impulse, or urge to engage in the behavior, denial of the harmful consequences of engaging in the behavior and repeated failure in attempts to control or alter the behavior. The primary criterion to determine whether buying behavior is innocuous or potentially compulsive buying is whether or not such behavior is causing disruption in the normal life of the individual. One aspect of looking this is that it is an impact of marketer who is putting up such deals that their urge to buying the products is increasing. This can be explained by taking an example, a company is offering an exchange offer on a product and the extra payment has to...
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...Address: 2100 College Street City, State, Zip: Newberry SC, 29108 Email: tomas.garcia@newberry.edu Instructor: Gerald Seals Abstract This paper discusses how compulsive spending fits the ethical issue of compulsive behaviors and describes the different ways compulsive consumption can be manifested. Addictive behaviors are characterized by the ability to produce immediate satisfaction or relief from any discomfort. Addictions begin as pleasant behavior but later in variable term for each of them, enslave the subject who feels compelled to repeat, despite the discomfort that you are causing, and may provoke some conflicts. If the person is caught in this repetitive behavior, he finally created a real addiction. We talk about addiction when an addictive behavior so largely it involves the subject that leads to a dependency. Conspicuous consumption is becoming a cultural problem in the society, leading to crippling consumer debt and our consumption is unsustainable both economically and environmentally. Consumerism goes hand-in-hand with a compulsive attitude. This compulsive attitude is a pathological behavior and is considered as physiological dependence, or a behavior addiction. It is considered a recurring behavior, which despite attempts to resist the urge occurs. A behavior is considered compulsive when it results from compelling impulses or urges and is inappropriate or disruptive (Ullman and Krasner 1969). There are individuals where consuming things, whatever...
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...Are You a Shopaholic? 3 Steps To Fixing Your Addiction 1 Posted June 26, 2012 by Danica Saarah Nelson in Advice “The first step to recovering is admitting you have a problem,” is a cliché we hear all the time. But do you see overspending on constant shopping trips as a crucial life issue that’s nearly as harmful as drugs or alcohol? It can be! Spending your disposable income on unnecessary items (especially when they’re charged to your credit card) is a surefire way to an unsuccessful and unhappy future. Below are the first three steps you can take to curing your illness. Step 1 – Remove Yourself From ALL Mailing Lists It’s hard, but it’s the easiest way to avoid succumbing to the temptations of spending money on something you wouldn’t have otherwise if you weren’t victim to that specific e-mail. If you REALLY want to get exclusive information on a sale or get your hands on a coupon code, a simple Google Search will do the trick. Removing yourself from every mailing list you’ve subscribed to is your first step towards curing your spending habits! Step 2 – Ditch the Plastic. Adopt the Paper! This one is pretty simple. All you have to do is take your Credit and Debit Cards out of your wallet. People essentially spend less when they’re using cash because they can see for themselves how quickly it can decrease as opposed to when you’re using plastic, you just swipe and go. Ever change your mind about purchasing something because you don’t want to break your $20? Then...
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...we have this uncontrollable urge? Researchers agree that its much more than opening the wallet and removing the card. In fact, women complete many of the visits to a store or mall without purchasing anything. That’s because for women these visits also symbolize entertainment, creativity, pleasure and independence. Which matters much more than just buying, says Patricia Huddleston, consumer specialist at the University of Michigan, in her book behavior Consumer Behavior: Women and Shopping. But is there such thing as too much shopping? Shopping addiction is characterized by an uncontrollable urge to buy unnecessary and superfluous products and when the wild and compulsive consumption exceeds the financial capacity of the person it is when the problems begins. In this post we will see what is Compulsive Shopping Disorder, its main problems and how we can overcome it. What is shopping addiction? As mentioned earlier, shopping addiction is an uncontrollable impulse to buy products that a person does not need. This disorder ends up creating a relationship of dependency and tolerance. In other words, the feeling of compulsive shopping will grow progressively worsening over time, and sooner or later, it becomes a vicious cycle which is...
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...can occur in a variety of psychiatric disorders and in the normal population, but are most commonly found in people with obsessive-compulsive disorder. Hoarding creates a lot of problems; both for the hoarder and those around them. One is just navigating through a congested obstacle course of stuff in a house becomes difficult. To get something requires searching through stacks of stuff. To put something away requires a nuisance of movement of all the stuff in the cramped area, as well as thinking and decisions on how to do it. Another problem is that there are no areas to do any real work such as counters, tables or workbenches. All this consumes a huge amount of time and energy of the people who live in such conditions. According to demographics, psychiatrists estimate between 2% and 5% of the adult population in the United States and Canada are compulsive hoarders. In North America alone, there are about 4000 cases of animal hoarding involving up to 250,000 reported animals. (Frey, 760) Researchers only began to study hoarding in the 1980s so it is possible that the actual rate of hoarding is higher than reported. This disorder is more common among older adults though it can typically begin in late childhood or adolescence and will become worse as the person grows older. There is no evidence that ethnicity or race is a factor in compulsive hoarding. Men are more likely than women to become hoarders but women typically begin hoarding at an earlier age. Hoarding disorder...
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...English 102 10 June 2010 Contamination OCD and Our Health Contamination obsessive-compulsive disorder can be the most unnecessary and most annoying disorder out there. Consider the feeling of constantly tracing the history of germ contents for everything you touch. It’s nearly impossible, but enough to drive a person crazy. Dealing with contamination OCD myself, I am a self-proclaimed “germ-a-phobe” or “germ-freak,” but living in fear of germs is not what I always dreamed of. Anxiety is an understatement in regards to never touching the TV remote control just because I don’t know who touched it last and what they’ve touched last, or letting everyone believe I’m unfriendly just to avoid a high-five, even though I do carry hand sanitizer with me. These are unnecessary and irrelevant thoughts to anything worthwhile, but somehow they aren’t as easy to get rid of as you might think. Contamination OCD can cause so much fear and anxiety in a person’s life, but what is it that actually jump starts this seemingly endless annoyance? Should the rest of the world consider our thoughts on the fact that maybe germs are dangerous or is it the disinfectants that are really causing us harm? Even though disinfectants pose such a dangerous threat to our health due to toxins in them, those living with contamination OCD still can’t seem to accept that fact and put down the cleaners in fear of being contaminated by germs because of the habits and rituals that have taken over in our minds and...
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...To me, compulsive overeating is a disease where a person has no control over their food intake. It's a constant eating, a wanting for a more and more. You can't get enough, sort of like a junkie looking for the next high. That is my relationship with food. And I have no control. People that suffer from Compulsive Overeating have what can be labeled not only as an eating disorder, but also as an addiction and even more so as an illness. There are many reasons why people become addicted to food, many using eating as a way to cope with problems or stress in their lives. Eating can also help them conceal their emotions, to fill the emptiness that they feel inside. Food is used as a narcotic to not deal with their feelings or emotions. The tendency for people with this eating disorder is overweight because of the abnormal eating habits. People that do not suffer from the epidemic can and won’t empathize with the victims because of the common stereotypes, stereotype such as greed, gluttony or lack of disciple. Simple suggestions to a sufferer such as “Just slow down or go on a diet” are equally insulting as telling a person suffering from Anorexia to “eat something”. Not only are the words hurtful, but this disorder will negatively bleed into the body and causes health risks. A sufferer with this Compulsive Overeating disorder is prone to high blood-pressure and cholesterol, can develop kidney disease or kidney failure, arthritis, deterioration of the bones, strokes, heart attacks,...
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... Food addiction is a real addiction, just like those related to drugs and alcohol. It most often shows up as a compulsive need to eat. This can occur even when you are not physically hungry. Food, like drugs or alcohol, can trigger the release of dopamine in the brain. This chemical is related to pressure. If you are addicted to food then you can get bad eating habits in the middle of the night, Feeling Ashamed and guilty of bingeing. Food Addiction is a like being addicted to drugs saw Technically it is the same. If you get food addiction you may be overweight but it is not your fault. If you eat Processed food from McDonald’s or any other stores with processed food your body can get more effected than usual. Some symptoms about food addiction can cause cancer. Furthermore, increasing evidence is showing that obesity is really the result of the true disease, including eating disorders and food addictions. Obesity was not always a problem. Over the past decades obesity has become more of a worry to the common man than it was one hundred years ago. Some people believe that the consumption of calories twenty years ago is no more than the caloric consumption today. Someone who is addicted or hooked psychologically believes that they cannot function without this substance in their bodies because once they eat processed food they cannot take their eyes of it. Compulsive eaters crave and continue to eat those allergenic foods to which they are addicted...
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...Mental Health in order to work with families in a person [spelling error] cent[e]red, strength based manner to ensure sustainable results. I incorporate Jansson’s steps of, diagnosing the context to identify contextual constraints and opportunities, softening the context to make it more amenable to a specific policy initiative and lastly activating change to get a decision maker or legislator to put an issue on the agenda of the other decision makers in the agency, community or legislative setting. (Jansson, 2003, pp. 148-165). Diagnosing Context What is Hoarding and Squalor In May 2013, for the first time ‘Hoarding Disorder’ was defined, and included in a new chapter of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-5 (DSM-5) on Obsessive-Compulsive and Related Disorders. Hoarding is regarded as abnormal (pathological) if there has been excessive collection of items such as clothing, newspapers, electrical appliances, food packaging (with many such items appearing to have little or no...
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...ability to function,” Tolin says (Metcalf 1). Many individuals may keep things that they do not need; however, if they cannot live in their home securely or their living situation poses a danger to others, then it becomes a matter of concern. Hoarding, therefore, can be categorized by the persistent inability to desert or separate with possessions despite their actual value. Hoarding, however, although gaining some popularity through television shows, is still not respected as a serious disorder. Thus, although individuals may be aware of the hoarding disorder, they do not understand it, as well as knowing the symptoms and the treatments that take place. Before hoarding appeared in 1980 as one of nine diagnostic criteria for obsessive-compulsive personality disorder in DSM-II (Frost 5), the earliest reference to hoarding was written in a poem by Dante Aligheri’s in the 14th century, followed by other references in literature written by other authors such as Charles Dickens'. However, within the mid 20th century, psychologist William James theorized that one’s sense of self is a fusion between “me” and “mine.” (Frost 3). Based on this, psychologist Erich Fromm suggested one's acquisitions are a way for some individuals to speak to the world around them, as well as to express what is central to one’s character. Fromm's theory, a “hoarding orientation” was one of four types of a dysfunctional character. This orientation corresponded with a fundamental orientation to existence – “having...
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...have severe anxiety when attempting to discard items such as Hoarders, Extreme Clutter, or Hoarding: Buried Alive. In a recent study The Relationship Between Self-Control Deficits and Hoarding: A Multimethod Investigation Across Three Samples (2012) which looked at self-control and hoarding and wanted to see if there was a significant relationship. The researchers looked at self-control from a resource model that was created from a theoretical framework (Timpano & Schmidt, 2013). Literature states that “Self control can be exhausted through physical, cognitive, and emotional mechanisms“ (Timpano & Schmidt , 2013, p. 13). Upon looking at self control, researchers also wanted to see if there is any relevance of self-control to compulsive hoarding. Prior to Timpano & Schmidt (2013) studied, there has been no study or literature that has explicitly investigated the relationship between self-control and hoarding. However, previous studies have seen that “individuals with hoarding often had the intent to tackle their saving and acquiring behaviors, yet lacked the necessary behavioral follow-through (Timpano & Schmidt, 2013). In other words, the findings demonstrated that there was a possibility that there was no self-control when trying to follow through. The study conducted three different studies ,which had three different purposes . The first purpose of...
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...Baltimore, MD 21287, USA b a r t i c l e in fo Article history: Received 14 February 2008 Received in revised form 7 April 2008 Accepted 8 April 2008 Keywords: Hoarding Prevalence Risk factors Personality disorders Comorbidity abstract Little is known about the prevalence and correlates of hoarding behavior in the community. We estimated the prevalence and evaluated correlates of hoarding in 742 participants in the Hopkins Epidemiology of Personality Disorder Study. The prevalence of hoarding was nearly 4% (5.3%, weighted) and was greater in older than younger age groups, greater in men than women, and inversely related to household income. Hoarding was associated with alcohol dependence; paranoid, schizotypal, avoidant, and obsessive–compulsive personality disorder traits; insecurity from home break-ins and excessive physical discipline before 16 years of age; and parental psychopathology. These findings suggest that hoarding may be relatively prevalent and that alcohol dependence, personality disorder traits, and specific childhood adversities are associated with hoarding...
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...Lukasz Giza Essay discussing causes of disorders for three selected case studies The case of Bess Obsessive compulsive disorder commonly referred to as OCD is an anxiety disorder; people who suffer from OCD act compulsively and have obsessive thoughts. The fear of contamination is most common type of OCD; it leads to compulsive cleaning rituals as fear of germs, or dirt is a frightening thought for OCD sufferers. OCD could be explained biologically and psychologically. Genes could be a factor that could expose one to OCD. It is thought of that OCD could be passed on genetically. Family studies are good source supporting this theory; the siblings, parents or children of OCD sufferer have 50% genes similar to the OCD sufferer. The risk of getting OCD is between 2-3%, if the percentage is bigger than 2-3% within the family members it is the suggested as an evidence for genetic influences. Close family members have 10-15% risk of developing OCD which stands as a strong evidence. Another study has concentrated on the twins both identical and fraternal. The twins that were studied where selected based on if one had definitely OCD and they looked if the other twin had it too. The results showed that the second twin had 53-87% risk of developing OCD. With the fraternal twins the risk was smaller at 23-43%. To fully understand OCD psychological factors that could trigger OCD need to be taken into consideration too. Regression to an anal stage is an example of psychodynamic explanation...
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