Construct · 3 names · 6 citations
Different names. Different fields. One construct. One map.
● jangle · one pattern, many disorder names Nearest construct by meaningimpulse buyingcompare the meaningsEvery construct on the map is compared with every other by the meaning of its definitions, and the closest one is surfaced here. The nearest construct to compulsive buying is impulse buying.
Hold this as a prompt, not a verdict. Two constructs sitting close in meaning is a reason to read them side by side and decide for yourself whether they are one idea under two names. It is not proof that they are. Compare the meanings in the Collider.
Spokes are the names and the models that coined them; dashed arcs are borrowings. Tap a field for its definition, unit, and measures.
Drag to watch the word get claimed. Each name appears at the publication date of the earliest source cited for it. Tap a year to see which.
The construct at the root of this page: a pattern of chronic, repetitive buying that a person finds hard to resist and that is driven largely by relief from negative feelings such as anxiety, low mood, or boredom rather than by any need for the goods. O'Guinn and Faber's 1989 Compulsive Buying: A Phenomenological Exploration described the experience from buyers' own accounts, and Faber and O'Guinn's 1992 A Clinical Screener for Compulsive Buying built the short scale that marks off a small high-scoring group from ordinary shoppers. In consumer research the thing being named is a measured pattern of behaviour, scored by a screener and studied alongside materialism and low self-esteem. The clinical tradition renames and reframes this same pattern, and it must be kept apart from the ordinary, pleasurable impulse purchase that shares part of the word.[1][2]
The same pattern studied as a mental-health condition, named compulsive buying disorder or by the older term oniomania, and debated as either an impulse-control disorder or a behavioural addiction. Müller, Mitchell, and de Zwaan's 2015 review Compulsive buying set out the addiction framing, the pattern's overlap with mood and anxiety problems, and the treatments studied for it, while Dittmar's 2005 work tied the pattern to materialistic values and to differences by gender and age. The thing being named is the same repetitive, distress-driven buying the consumer researchers screened for, now placed in a diagnostic frame with a course, common co-occurring conditions, and a treatment question. What changes from the consumer-research meaning is not the behaviour but the framework: a condition to be classified rather than a pattern to be scored in a sample.[3][4][5]
The confusable neighbour: the sudden, in-the-moment urge to buy something right away, felt with reduced regard for the consequences. Rook's 1987 The Buying Impulse is the reference for this meaning, treating the impulse purchase as a spontaneous, often pleasurable episode within a single shopping trip rather than a standing pattern. This is a different construct, not another name for compulsive buying: an impulse purchase is one unplanned urge that is usually enjoyable and self-limiting, whereas compulsive buying is a chronic, repetitive pattern tied to relief from negative feelings and to a loss of control. The words overlap and the two are often blurred, but the line between a single urge and a durable disorder is exactly what this page is built to hold. The urge itself is treated in full under impulse-buying.[6]
Next
See how compulsive buying sits against neighbouring constructs in the Collider, or export every reference on this page in one click.
Open in ColliderExport BibTeXReport this collisionCited on this page?
If your work is cited behind one of these entries, you know better than we do whether we captured the meaning right. Confirm it, suggest an edit, or dispute it, and your name goes on the entry as an author who has checked it, linked to your ORCID.
Claim your construct