The Effects of Having, Feeling, and Thinking on Impulse Buying in European Adolescents

ABSTRACT

There is an abundance of research on impulse buying tendencies (IBT), yet few studies have used adolescent samples, especially in Europe. The aim of the present study was to examine the relation among materialism, hedonic shopping, and the need for cognition (NC) with IBT. The study sample consisted of 1,016 adolescents (625 female and 391 male, aged between 13 and 18 years) from five European countries (Croatia, Hungary, Serbia, Spain, and Switzerland). Results showed a positive correlation between IBT and materialism as well as hedonic shopping. NC was negatively correlated to IBT only in the Hungarian sample. Furthermore, it was observed that materialism and IBT were mediated by hedonic shopping, and the relation between materialism and hedonic shopping was not moderated by NC except in the Spanish sample. These findings support the literature and contribute to a better understanding of impulse buying in European adolescents.

KEYWORDS:

• Adolescents
• hedonic shopping
• impulse buying tendency
• materialism
• need for cognition

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to thank the organizers of the Junior Researcher Programme of the European Federation of Psychology Students' Associations (EFPSA) for providing the fantastic opportunity to carry out the present study.