Factors Contribute to Irrational Consumption Behaviors of College Students under New Consumption Environment

Abstract

From the beginning of human society, economy is always the most vital component and principle of this society. It is well-known that the troika for economy growth is “consumption, investment, and export”. For most countries, consumption is the prior in these three factors. For the biggest economy, United State, consumption occupies ranging from 76.68% to 85.13% from 1960 to 2020 for the total GDP growth. Under the rapid development of society and technology, there are more and more factors contribute to people’s decision making, especially in consumption: advertisement, social media, education, peer comparison, etc. For college students, who is in a phase that their view towards consumption and decision is forming and developing rapidly, they would be easily influenced by some extroverted factors and make irrational decisions.Irrational decision would lead to problems in different extent. From individual perspective, irrational decision may lead to impulse consumption and regrets afterward. From macro perspective, irrational consumption would make people overconsume the products they do not really need, and further cause under allocation of resources.