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The holiday season can bring incredible joy as well as considerable pressure to spend money — lots of it — on gifts. For some people, holiday gift-giving can cause anxiety and even prompt compulsive behavior.

In the blog “‘Tis the Season to Buy (and Buy): Understanding the psychology of gifts and overspending,” Peter Jackson, M.D., a child and family psychiatrist and medical director of the Addiction Treatment Center at the University of Vermont Medical Center, and Marlene Maron, Ph.D., chief psychologist and manager of psychological services for UVM Medical Center, discuss the psychology of gift-giving, share tips for “shopping smarter” and offer advice when holiday gift-giving becomes a “year-round problem — a compulsion to shop in order to fill emotional needs.”