Prevalence of compulsive buying among customers of a Parisian general store.

Compulsive buying is defined by the presence of repetitive impulsive and excessive buying, leading to personal and family distress. The objective of this study is to assess the prevalence of compulsive buying among "normal consumers" and to describe the specificities in the buying style of compulsive buyers. We tried to answer several questions. (1) Does compulsive buying occur more often during sales or periods of sales campaigns? (2) Is compulsive buying more impulsive and unplanned than normal buying? (3) Are compulsive buyers more "affectively" involved in their purchases (preference for specific brands they have a narcissistic relationship with, tendency to consider purchases as exceptional special occasions)? (4)Do women who buy compulsively use shopping Web sites and the Internet in general more than controls? We interviewed 200 women successively entering Les Galeries Lafayette, a famous Parisian department store. We diagnosed compulsive buying with standardized criteria and a specific rating scale. All subjects answered an additional questionnaire assessing their buying behavior. We also rated their duration of connection to the Web, the number of e-mails sent and received, and the time spent speaking on a cellular phone. Prevalence of compulsive buying was 32.5%. The proportion of married women was lower among compulsive buyers (66%) than in controls (85%). Compulsive buyers do not seek sales more than controls. Their decision to buy is more often made during their stay in the shop (48% vs 24%, chi(2) = 117, P < .001). Women buying compulsively consider more often their purchases as opportunities not to be passed by (33.7% vs 23.1%, P = .006). They have a higher tendency to use items less than expected (23.4% vs 14.4% in the control group, P < .001). They more often make purchases to impress others (6.5% vs 2.5%, P = .04) and consider more often their purchases as personally gratifying (44% vs 23%, P < .001). Their connections to online shopping sites are longer and more frequent. They spend significantly more time than controls speaking on their cellular phones.