Journal of Psychological Science ›› 2021, Vol. 44 ›› Issue (4): 800-806.

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The Digital Possession in the Information Era—— Digital Hoarding and the Relevant Studies

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  • Received:2019-07-19 Revised:2020-04-07 Online:2021-07-20 Published:2021-07-20

信息时代的“数字占有”——数字囤积及其相关研究

吴旭瑶,李静   

  1. 华中师范大学心理学院
  • 通讯作者: 李静

Abstract: Digital hoarding has been defined as “the accumulation of digital files to the point of loss of perspective, which eventually results in stress and disorganization”. While people hoard a large amount of items, the individual living space is obviously clutter. Compared with the hoarding disorder, the harm of the digital hoarding is more concealed and the result is more unpredictable. In addition, unlike hoarding cases to obtain worthless items, individuals may exacerbate digital hoarding behavior in order to maintain their own competitiveness and protect themselves from future threats. Neave et.al. designed a questionnaire (Digital Behaviors Questionnaire: DBQ), which is available to measure digital hoarding behaviors, comprising 2 sections: the Digital Hoarding Questionnaire (DHQ) assessing two key components of physical hoarding (accumulation and difficulty discarding); and the second measuring the extent of digital hoarding in the workplace (Digital Behaviors in the Workplace Questionnaire: DBWQ). At the same time, Thorpe et al. adapted the existing Saving Cognitions Inventory to form the Digital Saving Cognitions Inventory, and Luxon et al. measured the emotional performance of digital hoarders by modifying Object Attachment Questionnaires. However, there is a lack of measurement methods for digital hoarding behavior in the background of China. Cross-cultural research shows that the core performance of digital hoarding behavior in different cultural backgrounds is different, hoarding beliefs in China may be centered on themes of “usefulness” and “wastefulness”, compared to a wide variety of beliefs in the West, it is necessary to revise the existing scale. The cognitive performance, emotional characteristics and behavioral motivation of digital hoarders can be explained from the perspectives of ego depletion, endowment effect and evolution. Digital hoarding is widely existed in the crow, it impairs the cognitive functions such as individual's categorization, decision-making, attention and memory. It could be the result of ego depletion. Individuals with high ego depletion tend to engage in shallow cognitive processing, causing digital hoarders to “accumulate” large numbers of digital files without considering the value. Digital hoarders are often unable to manage documents effectively, hesitating to classify and rank the importance of electronic documents which involving personal emotional value or deep processing, and cognitive classification shows the characteristics of "inclusiveness". Digital technology can recreate situations, allow people to relive events and gain emotional support, causing digital hoarders difficult to delete digital photos and music. It is worth noting that the research about endowment effect indicates that loss aversion is the reason why individuals are unable to give up using digital possession, while highly involved individuals are difficult to give up enjoying digital possession. It necessary to examine the motivation of individuals for hoarding different types of digital files in the future. However, most of the previous researches were qualitative interviews, lacking of empirical data to prove the reliability of the results. In the future, researchers should be committed to exploring the causes of the individual's digital hoarding behavior, determining the extent to which it affects cognitive function, deeply analyzing the relationship between hoarding disorder and digital hoarding, in order to help individual produce good adaptive behavior and enable people to have a happy and healthy life.

Key words: Digital hoarding, hoarding disorder, cognition, emotion, motivation

摘要: 数字囤积是指数字文件的积累致使个体降低目标检索能力,最终导致个体的压力和混乱,与实物囤积有联系但有所不同。数字囤积者的认知表现、情感特点、行为动机可分别从自我损耗、禀赋效应、进化的视角进行理解。未来研究应完善测量工具,并考虑文化背景,针对不同数字囤积人群,考察其行为的潜在动机和前因后果,同时应采用不同的研究方法,加强该领域的量化研究。

关键词: 数字囤积, 实物囤积, 认知, 情感, 动机