Is Compulsive Shopping a Mental Disorder?

Filed in archive Buying Stuff on July 8, 2008

Photo courtesy of iStockphoto, Image# 5925293

Nancy Trejos wrote an interesting article in the Washington Post last week about compulsive shoppers. Here's the lead:

Shannon Hassemer went on a shopping spree when she got her first credit card in college. Tired of owning just one pair of tennis shoes, she quickly filled her closet with luxury items from designers such as Gucci, Coach and Louis Vuitton.

"I wanted to fit in," she said. "I was tired of looking like a boy."

It was a boost to her self-esteem, which she describes as particularly low. Over the years, shopping became a source of comfort. It was a daily habit. When she had children, she started buying them expensive clothing. Now at 36, shopping has become a source of pain. She has enrolled in a debt-consolidation program to pay down the $35,000 she owes on her credit cards, and she is getting therapy once a week.

I have to admit that I normally scoff at the idea of people having a "problem" when it comes to shopping - I just think they lack self control. This article sort of budged me, at least a little. This part in particular:

According to a study in the American Journal of Psychiatry, 5.8 percent of Americans are compulsive buyers. They buy things they don't necessarily need or can't afford to the point that it affects their relationships, their finances and/or their health. Even mounting bills aren't enough to keep some hard-core shopaholics from spending money on clothing, vacations or meals at fine restaurants...

...

It is so widespread that the American Psychiatric Association has for years been discussing including compulsive buying in its manual of mental disorders, which it plans to finish updating by 2012.

I don't believe that everyone who digs themselves into credit card debt has a mental illness, just as that hangover from the 4th of July doesn't make me an alcoholic. However, I'm coming around to the idea that some people's lack of self control is not 100% laziness or greed, but a true need to fill a void in their lives. Some people drink and do drugs, some people shop - that's plausible. Just because shopping doesn't contain an addicting substance like alcohol or drugs, that doesn't necessarily mean it couldn't be addicting to some people who come into it with the wrong frame of mind.

I'd probably equate it more to a gambling addiction - not because they are alike in terms of the reasoning behind them, but because they are both a mental addiction versus a physical addiction.

What do you think?