Bags of trouble! Calls for shopping addiction to be classed as a mental illness as 6% of the population now suffers from urge to spend
- Research has found shopping addiction has distinct causes and characteristics
- Sufferers of compulsive buying disorder feel anxious until they purchase an item
- Up to six per cent of population suffers from ‘an uncontrollable desire to shop and spend money’
Admitting to occasional bouts of shopaholism might seem like a light-hearted confession resulting in little more than belt- tightening and spending less on the credit card.
However, shopping addiction could soon be recognised as a mental illness thanks to pivotal research that has shown the problem has distinct causes and characteristics.
Experts have welcomed the news, which comes in the wake of internet gaming addiction being officially recognised by the World Health Organisation – and the first NHS diagnosis of a 15-year-old boy with the condition in June.
Bags of trouble: Experts want compulsive shopping disorders to be recognised as mental illnesses
An official classification of shopping addiction may lead to scrutiny of ‘hard sell’ tactics used by High Street and online retailers that encourage shoppers to buy.
Professor Astrid Muller, a clinical psychologist with a special interest in addiction at Hannover Medical School, Germany, said of the findings: ‘It’s time to recognise compulsive shopping disorder as a separate mental health condition, which will help us develop better treatments and diagnosis methods.’
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Aniko Maraz, a shopping addiction specialist researcher at Humboldt University, Berlin agreed, saying there was now a need for ‘public preventative strategies’ of the type that are used to help people quit smoking, drinking and, most recently, gaming.
The condition – compulsive buying disorder (CBD) – once came under the umbrella term of impulse-control disorder, along with pyromania, an urge to start fires, and kleptomania, the urge to steal.
Sufferers of CBD often describe an increasing urge or anxiety that can only be alleviated when a purchase is made. Research has suggested that up to six per cent of the population may suffer from ‘an uncontrollable desire to shop and spend money’. Six in ten patients are women.
I had to rely on family to pay my £20,000 debt
Property consultant Samantha Simon, 53, admits she has always loved shopping – but her addiction to buying clothes and shoes eventually left her unable to pay off £20,000 in store card debt.
‘From my early 20s, I’d go to a shop like Harrods or Harvey Nichols and get a store card with three months’ interest-free credit,’ she says. ‘I didn’t buy hugely expensive items – a £300 pair of shoes or £500 jacket.
‘I didn’t think about how much I was spending or how I’d pay. There is a feeling; a high that comes with a purchase.’
‘I like to look good and feel admired. I never dress down. For the same reason, I am very careful about what I eat and like to stay slim – you might say I’ve had an unhealthy relationship with food over the years.’
Divorced Samantha began having problems paying off her credit and store cards about ten years ago, transferring debt from one card to another, and eventually had to ask family to pay off the debt.
She is now in therapy and describes herself as a ‘functional’ shopaholic. ‘I get emails from shops, and a week doesn’t go by without me buying something, but it’s within my means at the moment.’
Aside from problems with debt, CBD may affect work and relationships, as sufferers spend an increasing amount of time shopping and also concealing their habit from partners.
The disorder seems to develop regardless of income and the items purchased by compulsive shoppers tend not to be expensive. However, many compulsive shoppers buy in quantity, resulting in out-of-control spending. Anecdotally, patients often report buying a product ‘because it was a bargain’.
Items may be returned or kept but never taken out of their packaging. Other shopaholics may attempt to sell their items on, or even give them away.
Research at Pennsylvania State University involving about 400 students found that those who displayed traits of CBD also had similar preoccupations with dieting and body image to sufferers of eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia.
The researchers said that as items bought during a shopping binge are usually appearance-related, such as clothes or jewellery, it could suggest a strong desire for social acceptance.
Treatment includes antidepressants, psychotherapy and advice such as getting rid of credit cards, shopping with a friend or relative who doesn’t suffer from CBD, and finding meaningful ways to spend leisure time other than shopping.
Psychotherapist Anna Albright said: ‘With all addictions, proximity to the substance or behaviour you are addicted to is problematic.
‘People are lured by advertising and marketing emails. It’s so easy to go online now and click to buy and feel that pleasure of buying.
‘The single biggest thing I advise patients to do is unsubscribe from those store newsletters, stop buying magazines. It’s important to recognise there is a problem and seek help in finding alternative coping strategies.’
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