Assignment#9 Online shopping

It was my freshman year when I was first introduced to online shopping. Since I am from New York City, comparing to the malls I usually went for shopping, malls in Ithaca were quite disappointing. One day, I saw my friend looking for a semi-formal dress online. She also told me there were actually lots of online shopping mall websites, so you could find almost everything you want. I started looking at these websites for fun at first. However, soon I found myself looking at online shopping websites most of the time when I was in my room. Sometimes, I thought it was annoying to open a new window to go to the website, so I left it on for about a week. Whenever I was bored, I searched for any new item added to the website with a reason that I was looking for a good deal. Luckily, as I spent more time with my friends outside my room, the amount of time I spent on online shopping websites gradually decreased. Now, I barely remember which websites I usually went.

Online shopping seems to have many factors that can lead to Problematic Internet Use (PIU). First of all, it has lots of addictive features. Every time you visit the website, it has eye-catching products with advertising phrases that make you think you should not miss this great chance to get these items. It is quite probable that you keep coming back to the website not to miss any good opportunities. When you are shopping, the item you are looking at may be something necessary, but often, it is not the case. However, your rationalization says since it is such a great opportunity, you should be able to find a good deal which you believe it might benefit you. Moreover, most of the online shopping websites have features that would ‘help’ customers to find what they want such as ‘Customers Who Viewed This Item Also Viewed’ and ‘Bestsellers in related categories.’ With these features, your shopping soon would branch out to getting a whole set of outfit when you only wanted to buy a shirt. Something unique or rather irony about online shopping is that many people say that online shopping is faster and more convenient, but these addictive features usually make you spend longer hours on shopping.

Caplan’s theory of PIU and Psychosocial Well-Being can be applied to this PIU. Caplan’s model first says that individuals with psychosocial problems hold negative perceptions about their social competence (Lecture Slide). Indeed, lonely or depressed people usually think they do not look good enough to present themselves in front of others. Shopping is a type of activity that you embellish yourself and try out new style for better looks. Since people with psychosocial problems think that they are not good enough to be part of other people who try new style and they would never be able to find good looks that fit them, they prefer going shopping online. Their preference for online shopping is combined with addictive features of online shopping and eventually, these result in an excessive and compulsive online shopping. As Caplan’s model predicted, this PIU becomes a vicious cycle.