What is the Limit between Collecting and Hoarding?

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Imagine that you are going to go over to your friend’s house to have dinner for the first time. You pull into their white picket fence lined driveway and realize their white house looks nice with their blue shutters and their bright red front door. As you smell their fresh flowers outside, you can only imagine how lovely the inside of their house looks like. You walk into the front door and are immediately greeted by a wall covered in antique doilies. You think that it’s odd but still continue to walk into their living, which is also covered in doilies. There aren’t just a few doilies here and there; the walls are covered top to bottom with doilies. What is that strange material on their couches? - Doilies! Small doilies, large doilies, rug doilies, and lamp shade covered doilies everywhere. What have you gotten yourself into? Your friend comes in and starts to tell you about her “collection”. You wonder how it could be a collection when it has taken over her whole house. At this point you think that she is more of a doilie hoarder rather than a collector. When is having a collection something more serious like being a hoarder? Why do people even start collecting things and what makes an object collectible? These are just some of the questions I will analyze in this paper. Before going any further, the definition of the topic should be discussed to understand the problems with it. The meaning may be obvious to most people, but when looked at in the dictionary, many flaws arrive. A collection means the act or process of collecting; a group of objects or works to be seen, or kept together ("American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2003"). The definition causes a problem because i... ... middle of paper ... ...of Mental Health and Addiction (2014) ProQuest. 26 Apr. 2014. Maycroft, Neil. "Not Moving Things Along: Hoarding, Clutter and Other Ambiguous Matter." Journal of Consumer Behaviour 8.6 (2009): 354-64. ProQuest. 28 Apr. 2014 . Anderson, s, H Damasio, and A Damasio. "A neural basis for collecting behaviour in humans.." Brain: A Journal of Neurology. 128.1 (2005): 201-212. Print. Belk, Russell W. "Collecting as Luxury Consumption: Effects on Individuals and Households." Journal of Economic Psychology 16.3 (1995): 477-90. ProQuest. 26 Apr. 2014 . Feller, Ray. Collecting Away their Suffering: Meaningful Hobbies and the Processing of Traumatic Experience. Order No. 3493085 Antioch University New England, 2011 Ann ArborProQuest. 29 Apr. 2014 . Lehman, H, and P Witty. "The present status of the tendency to collect and hoard." Psychological Review. 31.1 (1927): 48-56. Print.

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