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Garnering insights into the relation between the general demographic variables such as age, gender, occupation status and psychological imbalances of anxiety, depression, self-esteem levels and loneliness and their subsequent influence on compulsive buying levels in an individual from the marketing perspective was the impetus and main motivation behind undertaking this study. Study was conducted over a 7-month period with a balanced homogeneous mix of randomly chosen respondents belonging to various occupations, ranging from an age band of 20 to 35 years. They were then administered a 5-Point Likert Scale questionnaire that incorporated demographic as well as psychological variables of loneliness, self-esteem, depression and anxiety. Responses were analyzed using frequency Analysis, principal component analysis, linear regression and cross tabulation to derive insights. The study revealed that along with loneliness, which was a major constituent, occupation type and marital status also significantly contributed in determining whether or not an individual would be compulsive in his or her purchase behavior. The study is significant as it discusses Compulsive Buying Behavior from a marketing perspective in a developing young economy such as India and discusses the implications of the findings as well. Corresponding author: A. S. Suresh Email addresses for the corresponding author: suresh.a@christuniversity.in First submission received: 16th May 2018 Revised submission received: 10th August 2018 Accepted: 6th December 2018 1. INDIA – Moving towards an Acquisitive Future – Myth or Fact India, one of the world’s largest economies is slowly yet steadily moving towards an acquisitive future. This statement may be bold but not unfounded and is rather grounded in reality. Reports from the World Bank as recent as 2016, using the world development indicators shows that the household final consumption per capita has been slowly witnessing a steady growth since the 60s. The graphical representation of the same has been mentioned below which shows this rise. Journal of Business and Retail Management Research (JBRMR), Vol. 13 Issue 3 April 2019 www.jbrmr.com A Journal of the Academy of Business and Retail Management (ABRM) 59 Figure 1: Household final consumption expenditure per capita (1960 – 2016) Source: World Bank national accounts data, and OECD National Accounts data files. Middle class of the Indian society is aspiring to grow and lead a better life style that can help reach a level of societal reputation. Today reports from firms such as IBEF as well as KPMG and EY show that India is experiencing a retail boom and the main reason behind this boom is that the consumers are increasingly becoming brand aware as well as with a growing disposable income at hand they are free to buy at their own will. IBEF, in fact reports that with increasing investments through Cumulative FDI in retail which was around US$ 1,141.5 million as of December 2017, it is evident that people are starting to ape the western culture in their lifestyle choices as well with increasing demands for foreign brands across all sub sectors in retail be it clothing or footwear or even outside of retail such as food and beverages etc. All these increasing choices has some impact on the consumer psyche which in turn makes an impact on the per capita consumption expenditure, which then shows a rise as seen above. But what makes the consumers behave in such a manner is still a mystery. Is it only the economic conditions, the rising GDP, or is there something deep within that sets the trigger for consumers to buy products at their will? This is what sets the basic premise of this study wherein the aim is to explore an often-disregarded avenue of consumer behavior that is compulsive buying wherein consumers buy products driven by inner psychological feelings. Whether the same holds true in Indian context or is there something else that sets India apart from the rest is what would form the crux of this study. 2. Compulsive buying behavior – An Overview and the need for the study Black (2007) describes Compulsive Buying Disorder or CBD as the summation of the following actions – Anticipation (wherein a person with inherent compulsive buying characteristics would develop the urge, thought or preoccupations with the act of either possessing a specific item or with the act of shopping in itself). This was followed by Preparation (wherein the person starts the preparation for the act of shopping or spending which could include events such as checking upon which credit card to use and deciding upon the one with the highest possible limit and deciding upon the website of purchase, disregarding the subsequent consequences). This is akin to the Information Search phase of the normal buyer’s purchase process. The Preparation phase is followed by the Shopping phase which involves the actual shopping experience, described by many as an intensely exciting experience and finally, spending which deals with the post purchase decision and the shopper’s state of mind. Psychologists have observed that the shoppers go through a cyclic state of limited excitement followed by a state of depression during which they feel as if they have not bought enough which leads them to repeat the pattern. Journal of Business and Retail Management Research (JBRMR), Vol. 13 Issue 3 April 2019 www.jbrmr.com A Journal of the Academy of Business and Retail Management (ABRM) 60 This study is an endeavor to understand compulsive buying behavior traits of individuals, from a marketing perspective as opposed to a medical disorder perspective. Impetus for this study is provided by the fact that even though compulsive buying behavior is a widely researched topic, it is limited to studies within developed economies such as the U. K. and the U.S.A. despite India emerging as one of the world’s strongest economies in recent times. 3. Literature Review Though compulsive buying behavior is an extensively researched topic, empirical review revealed that not enough studies exploring the marketing perspective and potential of compulsive buying as a marketing issue have been conducted. Studies done outside India: Studies conducted by A. Maraz, Griffiths, & Demetrovics, (2016) as well as Divine, (2016) ascertain that the prevalence of compulsive buying behavior within different populations in terms of age, gender and location is mainly location independent and that compulsive buying disorder is on the rise within the younger generations. P. Maraz, (2015) earlier took a different approach altogether and stated that lack of awareness and studies about compulsive buying exists mainly due to problems in measurement and thus, it is imperative that research be done on validating the existing scales of measurement to infer about the effectiveness of each scale. Yeong Ng & Kalhour, (2015), considered compulsive buying as a lifestyle problem stating that this behavioral aspect includes high levels of stress and anxiety which leads to a person buying unneeded goods, which are never used causing regret and starting the cycle all over again which was reiterated by Steiger & Muller, (2015) who stated this as “the senseless und uncontrollable acquisition of items. The main focus is on the act of buying and the purchased items are afterwards hardly used or not even at all.” MikołajczakDegrauwe, Brengman, Wauters, & Rossi, (2012) have revealed that demographically women were more significantly affected by compulsivity than men as they can relate to emotional shopping more than their male counterparts, whereas, Thornhill, Kellett, & Davies, (2012) analyzed the emotional aspect of compulsive buyers and stated that within their respondents, one group tended to identify with the pleasurable facets of buying, while the other realized the emotional distress factor by associating financial, communicational and other interpersonal difficulties with Compulsive Buying. End results showed that respondents who linked compulsive buying with emotional distress had greater debt levels and were also shown to have significantly higher levels of Compulsive Buying. However, Workman & Paper, (2010) highlighted the consequences of compulsive buying by stating that compulsive consumers experience at least some temporary positive outcomes. These outcomes include reduction of stress as well as temporary restoration of self-concept and self-esteem during times of personal crisis and critical life events. Thus the authors have managed to establish that while compulsive buying does offer temporary relief, its negative aspects far outweigh the temporary results. Dittmar, (2005) attempted to identify the relationship between the variables of age, gender and the endorsement of materialistic value and how it influenced compulsive buying behavior. Alongside significant gender differences it was also observed that those who prioritized materialistic value over spiritualistic values were more prone to compulsive buying tendencies and that materialistic endorsement mediated the observed age differences. Miltenberger et al., (2003) displayed with highly consistent results that negative emotions were the most common influencers of compulsive buying, and a temporary sense of euphoria or relief from the negative emotions as the most common consequence of compulsive buying. Christenson et al. (1994) revealed that compulsive buyers had a higher levels of psychological disorders which lead to other pathological addictions as well whereas d’Astous (1990), established that compulsive buying tendencies positively correlated with irrational expenditure through credit card and other forms of electronic payment. His study also stated that, compulsive buying tendencies correlate negatively with age and positively with one's susceptibility to social influence. O’Guinn & Faber (1989)who pioneered the study of compulsive buying disorder, revealed that levels of compulsiveness amongst

A study of interrelation of psychological factors and demographic variables and its impact on compulsive buying behavior: A Marketing Perspective.