Dittmar Helga
Social and Health Psychology Research Group, Department of Psychology, University of Sussex, UK.
Br J Psychol. 2005 Nov;96(Pt 4):467-91. doi: 10.1348/000712605X53533.
Compulsive buying is an understudied, but growing, dysfunctional consumer behaviour with harmful psychological and financial consequences. Clinical perspectives treat it as a psychiatric disorder, whereas recent proposals emphasize the increasing endorsement of materialistic values as a cause of uncontrolled buying (e.g. Dittmar, 2004b; Kasser & Kanner, 2004). The present research aims to improve understanding of compulsive buying through examining gender, age, and endorsement of materialistic values as key predictors in three UK questionnaire studies, which sampled individuals who had contacted a self-help organization and residentially matched 'controls' (N = 330), consumer panelists from a multinational corporation (N = 250), and 16- to 18-year-old adolescents (N = 195). The results confirmed previously documented gender differences, and showed that younger people are more prone to compulsive buying. The central findings were that materialistic value endorsement emerged as the strongest predictor of individuals' compulsive buying, and that it significantly mediated the observed age differences.
强迫性购买是一种研究较少但日益普遍的功能失调的消费行为，会产生有害的心理和经济后果。临床观点将其视为一种精神障碍，而最近的观点则强调对物质主义价值观的日益认同是无节制购买的一个原因（例如，迪特马尔，2004b；卡塞尔和坎纳，2004）。本研究旨在通过在三项英国问卷调查研究中考察性别、年龄以及对物质主义价值观的认同，来增进对强迫性购买的理解，这些研究的样本包括曾联系过一个自助组织的人以及与其居住情况匹配的“对照组”（N = 330）、一家跨国公司的消费者小组成员（N = 250），以及16至18岁的青少年（N = 195）。结果证实了先前记录的性别差异，并表明年轻人更容易出现强迫性购买行为。主要发现是，对物质主义价值观的认同是个体强迫性购买行为最强的预测因素，并且它显著地调节了观察到的年龄差异。
