The research of the Transatlantic Institute leaded by Prof. Dr. Gerhard Raab has been dealing with the topic of impulsive and pathological ("addictive") buying behavior for many years. With an international team of scientists it was possible to do a research on new aspects on gender differences in compulsive buying regarding the use of credit cards via Internet shopping.
In February 2022 the Journal of Internet and Digital Economics has published the article of Changqin Xu and Chongzeng Bi (both Faculty of Psychology, Southwest University, Chongqing, China) Alexander Unger (East Asia Institute), Gerhard Raab (Transatlantik-Institut) and Julie Papastamatelou (all Ludwigshafen University of Business and Society, Ludwigshafen, Germany). The article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence.
For the part of "traditional/offline" shopping, there are already many studies on the topic of compulsive buying. The current representative study (sample n = 1,038) fills the gap by examining the area of online shopping with gender-specific aspects in connection with the use of credit card payment systems for Germany.
The study shows that compulsive buying can increase through "Internet shopping" as a main effect without gender differences, where the possession of a credit card can be an increasing risk factor for compulsive buying for women, but not for men. When interpreting the results, it is necessary to take into account the framework provided by the chosen payment system and their frequency of use by the individuals studied.
Read the complete study The influence of Internet shopping and use of credit cards on gender differences in compulsive buying
Further publications of the Transatlantic Institute on the topic of purchasing behavior can be found under the following link "Articles in peer-reviewed journals".
