---
title: "Playing on Your Phone at the Store Could Make You Buy More Junk"
description: "A shopping study found that people who use their phones for non-shopping related tasks while at the store make more unplanned purchases."
date: "2019-05-06"
modified: "2019-05-06"
authors:
  - name: "Kristin Houser"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/kristin"
url: "https://futurism.com/shopping-study-using-phone-buy-junk"
categories:
  - "Future Society"
tags:
  - "mobile devices"
  - "shopping"
  - "smartphone"
---

# Playing on Your Phone at the Store Could Make You Buy More Junk

![A shopping study found that people who use their phones for non-shopping related tasks while at the store make more unplanned purchases.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/shopping-study-using-phone-buy-junk.png>)
*\<em\>Image: Victor Tangermann\</em\>*

## Cellular Hang Up

Want to leave the store with exactly what you planned to buy? You might want to consider setting your smartphone to "Do Not Disturb."

A new study has found that shoppers who use phones for tasks unrelated to retail tend to purchase items they didn't plan to buy or forget ones they did — a startling example of how the ubiquity of mobile devices may be impacting the decision making of entire populations.

## Grocery List

For the shopping study, which was [published](<https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11747-019-00647-9>) in the *Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science* on Monday, an international team of researchers surveyed 2,520 shoppers as they left a "mass merchandiser" and found that those who used their phones for shopping-unrelated tasks while in the store bought 9 percent more unplanned items.

The researchers then conducted an experiment in which they asked 231 participants to watch a video recorded from the point of view of a grocery shopper who placed nine items in their cart, but picked up and put down several others.

Some participants listened to a shopping-unrelated phone conversation while watching some or all of the video, and others received push notifications in the corner of the screen. Another group didn't encounter any distractions.

## Shopping While Distracted

The researchers found that the participants who completed the task without any shopping-unrelated phone use did a better job of noting which items from a list of 15 actually made it into the cart than those who listened to the phone call or saw the push notifications.

Additionally, participants who self-identified as being more dependent on their phones also performed worse on the task.

"Mobile phones are quickly becoming the principal distractor for many consumers and they offer a unique form of interruption," researcher Michael Sciandra said in a [press release](<https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/05/190506080836.htm>). "Our findings may influence consumers' attitudes towards mobile phone use while shopping and persuade them to reflect on how these devices impact our lives, both positively and negatively."

**READ MORE:** [Using a mobile while browsing the shelves may make shoppers buy more](<https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/05/190506080836.htm>) \[*Science Daily*\]

**More on shopping:** *Five Ideas That Could Save Shopping Malls From Becoming Obsolete*

### Author social links  
[LinkedIn](<https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristinjhouser>)