Materialism, Depression, and Compulsive Buying among University Students

Abstract

This paper examined the relationship of materialism, depression and compulsive buying among university students. Moreover, it aimed to see the role of demographic variables in the relationship between these variables. Material Value Scale (Richins & Dawson, 1992), Compulsive Buying Scale (O’Guinn & Faber, 1989) and the subscale of depression of DASS (Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995) were used to measure materialism, compulsive buying and depression respectively. The sample comprised of 430 university students within the age range of 18 to 24 years (M = 21.55, S.D = 1.95) from five universities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi. A significant positive relationship between depression and materialism was found. A significant difference between males and females on materialism and depression was found with males scoring significantly higher on both as compared to females. However, no significant difference was found between males and females compulsive buying. There was a significant difference among adolescents and adults on materialism with adults scoring higher as compared to adolescents, while no significant differences were found on depression and compulsive buying.