#9 - online shopping

For this assignement I have chosen to analyse whether online shopping provides an opportunity for individuals to engage in Problematic Internet Use (PIU) which Caplan (2004) defines as “maladaptive cognitions and behaviors involving Internet use that result in negative academic, professional, and social consequences.” Individuals with access to the internet can now buy just about anything their hearts' desire without ever leaving the comfort of their own home. In fact, it is likely that people ordering items online are doing so because they do not have physical access to their desired purchases. Thus, the convenience of online shopping provides an explanation for why it has easily grown into a huge market in which items ranging from cars, to shoes, to ice cream can be bought and delivered across the world at the click of a button. Currently, online shopping is not necessarily catergorized with many other problematic online behaviors, such as pornography and gambling, as potentially "addictive." However, this does not remove the possibility that individuals who do a lot of online shopping are at risk for Probelmatic Internet Use.

Online shopping covers a broad variety of online interactions. Internet users may visit the websites of their favorite retail stores to purchase clothing (for example) directly from a vendor. They may order these items for themselves or have them sent directly to somebody else. More recently, sites such as e-bay which allow users to both buy and sell items from other users of the site, have become increasingly popular. Rather than involving a large company, ebay provides a smaller community where people who have never met trust each other with not only their belongings but with their financial information, because of the security and social norm associated with the site. These two different examples provide two very different examples of shopping online, but both provie an area in which internet users can aquire objects withouth being physically, financially responsible for their purchases. There are no photo ID's checked in online checkouts, and no ability to determine whether the credit card information being entered actually belongs to the person entering it. Thus, online shopping provides an opportunity for indivuduals to take advantage of several of Caplan's factors for determing which behaviors constitute PIU: anonymity, less perceived social risk, and less social responsibility.

The unique properties of the online space provided by online shopping sites allow users to take advantage of its anonymity not only in a financial sense, but also in the fact that they can hide purchases that they consider unfit for public display. Although it may be a drastic example, there has been a large increase in online purchases from sex sites, that will even send packages in discrete packaging to keep the puchases anonymous to everybody but the user. In this sense, users are able to dissociate themselves with purchases they deem inappropriate, and avoid the social responsibility that they have to present themselves in a certain way.

Davis, Flett, and Bessner (2002) note that PIU has four dimensions: diminished impluse control, lonliness/depression, social comfort, and procrastination. I believe that online shopping provides a space in which many of these factors come into play. For example, with the sex shop example, the social comfort of keeping purchases anonymous is provided by the online nature of the shopping experience. Furthermore, users tend to shop alone online, whereas in person it is often a social event, where your peer may help discourage you from making poor decisions. This fact, combined with the indirect financial consequence of online shopping provide an environment in which diminished impulse control is certainly present in users. Associating yourself with a site such as ebay, where members communicate and chat with each other also provides a space to cure lonliness and an area for procrastination.

Online shopping, if used only moderately, certainly provides all the convenience that a busy lifestyle needs. You don't have to leave home to shop, spend time in busy stores, and look for items than may not be directly available to you. Although no evidence that it leads to PIU in the sense that Caplan (2004) defines it (i.e. negative academic, professional and social consequences) the factors for developing an addiction to online shopping are certainly present and must be actively monitored in order to avoid developing problematic internet use.