They analysed cases of people, usually women, who were not able to control their excess of purchasing and they considered this behaviour to be a symptom of other psychological diseases: depression, obsessive compulsive disorder, problems with control of impulses, etc. The clinical approach is also followed by the psychoanalytic theories that interpreted this behaviour as close to kleptomania and these would be manifestations of internal conflicts. Until the 1980s, this clinical approach was the predominant one in psychology and psychiatry. Shopping addiction was considered an individual disorder of impulse control or obsessive compulsive disorder, and its higher incidence rate in women and its relations with depression problems were emphasised.