The Psychological Roots Of Shoplifting
Of course, there are people who steal out of need but this usually involved theft of food, or childcare items and rarely the more common ‘mall shoplifting’ scenario. When somebody steals a tooth brush from a drugstore or takes a T-shirt from The Gap, it is almost never somebody who is impoverished, or living on the streets, or living below the poverty line and stealing something for their kids. In my experience, it is much more likely to be somebody who is experiencing some underlying psychological trauma. They can’t explain why they stole the item when they come to my office. They don’t know why they did it, but they do know that it’s going to cost them much more to get out of the charge than the item was ever worth. They come in to our office and say, “I’m guilty. Help me out.”
Commonly, what we see in the shoplifting scenario are people who shoplift just for the sake of shoplifting. There are many interesting psychological studies on shoplifting and we do read them in order to understand our clients better. Some people feel compelled to steal to get a daredevil thrill. They enjoy the rush of getting away with it. We see clients all the time who have hundreds of dollars or credit cards in their pockets. They are not in a bad financial situation and they were actually making purchases at the store. Even though they pay for a number of items, they will walk out with one item for $10. That is the classic shoplifting scenario that we see all the time. It seems completely and utterly irrational and yet it is well defined by psychologists and psychiatrists. The people committing this crime are excellent candidates for the shoplifting courses that address this motivation for theft.
Another contributing factor to shoplifting is depression. There is definitely a correlation between people suffering from depression and shoplifting. We see this in our practice and it’s also noted in the medical literature.
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If you, or someone you care about, is dealing with criminal law issues in the Toronto,Ontario Region, contact Adler Bytensky Prutschi for a consultation.
