KOREASCHOLAR

“When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping.” This expression used as a part of an article, (Cotton Incorporated's Lifestyle Monitor™, 2002) look into the group that depicts a part of numerous contemporary consumers' ways of life, that is, shopping to ease a negative state of mind. This type of shopping is alluded to as retail therapy or retail therapy. "Retail therapy" or "compensatory consumption" is frequently connected in the observation to brighten oneself up through the buy of self-treats and additionally lacking self. The significance of the study is to identify the factors influencing the consumption behaviour among women with reference to retail therapy. Most of the research in this area belongs to socio-psychology, psycho-sociology and clinical psychology. The concrete and crystallized conceptual framework in the field of consumer research is very few. The complex theoretical background which lacks unified conceptual framework. Thus, the present research aims to understand the influence of selfconcept theories on consumption behaviour. The research question broadly focuses on the two major aspects of the study that is importance of self-discrepancy in understanding behavioural response in consumer behaviour. Another aspect is to investigate in detail the various moods and emotions related to retail therapy among women. The research question of self-discrepancy has several sub-components ideal-self, self-incongruence, ought-self, satisfaction, dissatisfaction, dejection, disappointment and actual-self are analysed. The various emotions (described in the hypotheses section) related to consumption behaviour w.r.t retail therapy which are aligned and relatable to self-discrepancy concepts are analysed to understand the relationship with the outcome-retail therapy among women. The study uses the sequential transformative strategy of mixed method research. In the present study, the qualitative data is collected is followed by quantitative data collection. The qualitative approach includes in-depth interviews, focus group discussion and quantitative data collection was through the self-administered questionnaires. The study uses inferential analysis and structural equation modelling for the data analysis. The present work holds critical ramifications for consumers' well-being and prosperity. The findings propose that consumer’s uncovered passionate turbulence may be more inclined to overspending and sinking overwhelmingly into obligation because of their expanded eagerness to pay for status-related items. the consumption is both reactive and proactive which originates from self and terminates in consumption. This is cyclic and extends temporary relief.

• Krupa A Rai(K J Somaiya Institute of Management Studies & Research, Mumbai, India)
• Ajoy S Joseph(Srinivas Institute of Technology, Mangalore)
• Shrinivasa Mayya D(Srinivas Institute of Technology, Mangalore)