Is Digital Hoarding a Mental Disorder? Development of a Construct for Digital Hoarding for Future IS Research

By the time you finish reading this paper, approximately in 90 minutes, over 150,000 TB of new data will be created in the world (IBM 2017). The advent of digital devices such as smart mobile phones, wearables, the engagement in social media networks and content sharing platforms, the growth of digitized personal and business interactions and the access to free or affordable digital storage have increased the propensity of an individual to acquire and store digital content without carefully considering its repercussions. This research posits that this increasingly common behavior can lead to a condition that parallels the hoarding disorder, called digital hoarding. The study defines digital hoarding as the acquisition of and failure to discard or effectively manage digital content regardless of its use, leading to the accumulation of digital clutter. The paper conceptualizes digital hoarding as a composite construct. Using a sample of 846 individuals, the study makes valuable insights on digital hoarding and how it could lead to personal stress.