We’re not immune to the “treat yourself” mindset. After a rough day do you find yourself buying something new or enjoying an extra nice meal? When in moderation, this type of spending can help with coping with the stress of everyday life. When we end up relying on purchases to lift our moods it becomes a concern known as “emotional spending”.
Emotional spending is a behavior that causes people to spend money whenever they experience negative or positive feelings, generally to fill an emotional need. While there is a short-term mental health benefit to spending, too much emotional spending can impact your financial well-being and lead to increased stress.
Most emotional spending is a pattern of behavior. When you start to recognize the behaviors, you can in turn disrupt them. Some behaviors may include:
- Spending beyond your means
- Withdrawing from conversations about money because it makes you anxious
- Accumulating more items during a stressful period
- Impulse buying
Changing behavior takes time but there are strategies and alternatives you can try to prevent emotional spending. Strategies include:
- Make a weekly or monthly budget to help pre-allocate your finances. Free Financial Coaching through the Student Wellness Center can help.
- Limit the use of credit cards and removing stored card information to make it less easy to make a purchase from your phone/computer/tablet
- Limit exposure to ads on social media by reducing screen time
- Create a waiting period when making purchases. If you want something in the moment, see if you still want it in a few days?
- Talk to a Wellness Coach to identify positive coping mechanisms
The Student Life Student Wellness Center offers free peer to peer coaching services. You can meet with a Financial Coach to discuss budgeting, credit cards, student loans, and more. Wellness Coaching serves provides stress management techniques, goal setting, communication strategies and more to improve your emotional wellness. Learn more and schedule a session by visiting the Student Wellness Center website.