Compulsive Behavior: Hoarding and Its Consequences, A Summary

The various course readings show that there are two sides to the "Hoarding" coin: that it could merely be unusual and unorthodox behavior; but, more serious, that it could be part of a deeper compulsive behavioral pattern. This could have far more problematical and disturbing bases which may require more than a shrugging of the shoulders at someone's "quaint" possessiveness.

Sometimes, as Furby (1978) points out, there is a need for an object, a need that begins often at an early age, whether it is a specific toy, a blanket, or other possession. While such possessiveness may well be just a child's desire to have and hold on to something, the readings illuminate the difference between possessiveness (whether money, clothes, real estate or other tangible possessions that provide an "image") and the accumulation of seemingly meaningless goods. In Bloom's article (1991) which leads with the question whether wealth is "neurotic", he quotes the major analyst, Fenichel, as proposing that amassing wealth may not satisfy emotional needs.

Therefore, it becomes more clear that possessiveness and its compulsive behavior is an emotional issue far more than it is one of "showing off" wealth. One can distinguish between "collecting", even amassing everything from art to real estate or personal goods to an obsession for ownership. The gulf between collecting and amassing "things" for showing off and an obsessive compulsive behavior may turn into "hoarding". Frost and Hartl (1999) define hoarding as "the acquisition of and failure to discard possessions that appear to be useless or of limited value". Of course, this might lead us into a totally different direction to find a good usable definition of "value". Instead of being concerned with the "value" of things (at least their value to the hoarder) we are far more interested in the behavior that implements, supplements, or initiates hoarding and compulsive-obsessive behavior.