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Buddhist psychology: Selected insights, benefits, and research agenda for consumer psychology
Author(s) -
Mick David Glen
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal of consumer psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.433
H-Index - 110
eISSN - 1532-7663
pISSN - 1057-7408
DOI - 10.1016/j.jcps.2016.04.003
Subject(s) - impermanence , buddhism , psychology , consumer behaviour , materialism , consumer research , consumption (sociology) , morality , set (abstract data type) , epistemology , social psychology , marketing , sociology , social science , philosophy , theology , computer science , business , programming language
Consumer psychology has been overly reliant on a small set of paradigms. As a result, the field appears less prepared than it could aspire to be for contributing new knowledge on, and relief from, our hyper‐consumption era. Accordingly, I explore Buddhist psychology by drawing from its foundational framework known as the Three Marks of Existence (suffering, impermanence, and no‐self) to introduce an Eastern theory of mind and provide alternative guidance on research for consumer well‐being. The TME framework offers an opportunity to re‐think the priorities, nature, and processes of the comparing and judging consumer mind (e.g., expectations, preferences, satisfaction); the attaching and depending consumer mind (e.g., ownership, materialism, excessive behaviors); and the deciding, choosing, and regulating consumer mind (marketplace morality, cognitive biases, values‐based choice, and free will). From these considerations I generate research questions and summarizing propositions for future research. The closing discussion synopsizes the contributions and limitations, including extra opportunities for integrating Buddhist and consumer psychologies.