Page 43 - LSR vuosikertomus 2020

LIIKESIVISTYSRAHASTON VUOSIKERTOMUS 2020

Understanding the Journey
of Recovery from Compulsive
Consumption with Practice Theory

Tulevaisuuskestävä ympäristö 15 000 €

Larissa Braz Becker, PhD
Turun yliopiston kauppakorkeakoulu
Markkinoinnin ja kansainvälisen liiketoiminnan laitos

VÄITÖSKIRJAN JÄLKEINEN TUTKIMUS

Marketing activities typically aim at increasing the consumption ”Consumer
of economic offerings. However, extreme forms of consumption, journeys are defined
such as gambling and alcohol abuse, can be harmful to consu-
mers, their networks of relationships and society as a whole. In as continued
this particular project, I focus on the journey of recovery from engagement
compulsive consumption using the consumer journey metaphor. with a practice or
Consumer journeys are defined as continued engagement with a set of practices
practice or set of practices and subsume interactions with mul- and subsume
tiple service providers. Considering that consumption is embed- interactions
ded in consumers’ everyday practices, the purpose of this project with multiple
is to analyze how consumers reconfigure the system of practices service providers.”
that support and/or hamper the journey of recovery from com-
pulsive consumption. To achieve this goal, I collected qualitative
data with recovering alcoholics.
With this project, co-authored with Dr. Hope Schau (University
of Arizona), Dr. Melissa Akaka (University of Denver), and Dr.
Elina Jaakkola (University of Turku), I expect to understand how
consumers disengage from unsupportive practices and the ripple
effects on the systems of practices. The work can contribute to
consumer research by extending knowledge on disengagement of
consumption practices. I expect the results to generalize to other
forms of compulsive consumption, such as gambling, a known
problem in Finland. The results can also offer implications for
professionals involved in compulsive consumers’ journeys, such
as self-help groups and health service providers.

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