Abstract

--- - "Consumption has been established in post-modern societies as a means of regulating social relations. In this context, compulsive buying could be established as pathological, creating significant psychological discomfort in people, to the point of impairing social and professional functioning, coupled with serious economic problems resulting from indebted-ness. Along the same lines, in the construction of a social identity and a socially shared reality, consumption patterns arise that are linked to what the public should be and what they want to be. Therefore, while compulsive buying has been conceptualized for decades, it is a substantial threat to psychological and finan-cial well-being. Few studies have explored the link between self-discrepancy and compul-sive buying within an identity construction context. In this scenario, it is young people who become particularly sensitive, since with consumption they access symbolic objects that are part of their identity construction and a dimension related to compulsive buying. Therefore, it can be hypothesized that access to the consumption of symbolic elements is self-discrepancy. That is why this research aims at determining the effect of the self -dis-crepancy on attitudes towards compulsive buying in Chilean university students.The study uses a quantitative, correla-tional, and non-experimental cross-sectional design. Study sample was comprised of 1 229 Chilean university students, who responded to the scale of attitudes towards consump-tion, the self-discrepancy scale, and answered questions for sociodemographic characteri-zation including: gender (male/female), age, geographical area of residence (rural/urban), people with whom they live, and whether they have any bank credit cards.Pior to data collection, ar letter was sent to Faculty Deans and Program Directors of all the universities associated with the Council of Rectors of Chile; these letters described the aims of the study, and requested infor-mation and authorization for the distribution of the instrument previously described. It is important to indicate that, after this, a random sampling process was initiated, after which each participant was contacted, so that they could sign an informed consent form, thus ensuring the anonymity ethical guidelines of the study.The data was processed through SPSS version 22 software, looking for the presence of univariate and multivariate outliers through Z-scores and Mahalanobis distance. A descrip-tive analysis of the variables was then carried out based on the dispersion, central trend and shape measurements. Subsequently, the data was analysed through bivariate statistics through Pearson correlations, to indicate into empirical relationships between compulsive purchase as a dependent variable and sociode-mographic variables (sex and bank credit card holding) and the dimensions associated with the self-discrepancy (intellectual, physical, physical beauty, personal, social, emotional and economic) as independent variables. Once the behaviour of the variables was observed, a hierarchical multiple linear regression was performed.Regarding the results of this research, multiple linear regression shows that physical self-discrepancy (beauty), economic self -dis-crepancy and gender are significant predictors of compulsive buying. Similarly, it is noted that women are a group with higher scores in terms of compulsive purchases than men, which may be mostly affected by the context, where marketing campaigns can influence a greater gap between the real self and the ideal self." - These results generate an alert that shows the relationship between women and atti-tudes towards compulsive buying. The study concludes that the pressures, either within the peer group or in the media construction of women are influencing the consolidation of behaviour patterns at an early age, which are projected as constant actions in adulthood. In the same way, they could be promoting high levels of anxiety and depression due to the stress generated by the search for a socially accepted image.