Markus Castro
FYI: Experts claim addiction to shopping is a mental health condition
Online shopping addiction is considered a mental health illness, claims an expert.
German psychotherapist Dr. Astrid Müller from Medical School in Germany, together with her colleagues, says this condition is still unrecognized at the moment.
The study involved 122 patients who needed help for their online shopping addiction.
According to their study, those people who have this kind of addiction had higher rates of anxiety and depression. The study claims that this addiction is attributed to the increase in the number of online stores. At the moment, there are quite a few apps that people can download. These online shops, apart from being open at any time of the day, also offer home delivery. As such, people are more encouraged to shop anytime and anyplace they want to snag what they wish to buy.
These online stores also offer more affordable prices and better accessibility as opposed to physical stores.
According to the German researchers, this illness named buying-shopping disorder (BSD) affects 5 percent of the population.
How BSD Affects People
Dr. Müller and her team explained in a journal how BSD affects people.
Buying online, according to them, leads to continuous cravings for purchasing products. People can also gain satisfaction when they spend money on buying things online. It will then result in a breakdown in self-control.
Next, they will then experience psychiatric issues along with “extreme distress.” On top of that, the BSD also results in physical clutter, debt, as well as difficulties in relations.
As for the symptoms of this illness, the researchers also enumerated some of them, which include: difficulty to resist buying items that are not necessary; shopping for unneeded products; and financial struggles because these people have trouble in controlling themselves in shopping.
A Unilad article reveals that the BSD is still under “other specified impulse control disorder.”
Are you also an online shopping addict? It’s now time to control yourself before it is too late.
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