Interpersonal influence as psycho social stressor, stress, and impulsive buying : an empirical study in the perspective of Islamic guidelines on consumption

Abstract EN

Stressors are a real concern for the literature relevant to marketing in view of the implications they have for individual consumers.

This study explores the efecf psychosocial stressor ‘interpersonal influence’ on impulsive buying behavior with moderating role of consumers’ emotional intelligence and mediating role of stress.

The study also looks into the Islamic perspective of consumption as prescribed by Qur’¯an and Sunnah.

The results are discussed while comparing the practice by Muslim consumers in Pakistan with the relevant tenets provided by Islamic Shar¯ı‘ah.

Data were collected through survey questionnaires from 202 consumers living in the Capital city of Pakistan.

PROCESS (Hayes, 2012) was used to check the main e ects and moderated mediation for the study variables.

The study results reveal that people who faced high interpersonal influence depicted more impulsive buying due to the stress generated by the psychosocial stressor, but consumers with high emotional intelligence were less prone to stress which, in turn, led to low impulsive buying.

Findings of the study have great implications for psychologist, market- ing researchers and practitioners who could help stressful consumers, push them to develop alternative mechanisms to handle the problem or engage them into coping mechanisms relevant to impulsive buying.