The rapid growth of mobile payments has made changes in the way people spend their money, bringing in notable psychological and behavioral changes. This paper aims to analyze the theoretical perspectives on mobile payment applications, and most importantly how these applications affect people’s spending habits, financial consciousness and parental discipline. The ‘pain of paying’ model and decoupling theory are the two approaches used in this study that seek to understand the ways in which mobile payment systems encourage spending by eliminating the psychological costs associated with spending and why such reckless spending behavior is encouraged. When one uses cash, the money is physically removed, which maintains discipline because loss is felt. In contrast, mobile payment systems are seamless and encourage the risk of overspending. This theoretical discussion carries practical implications for people, policy makers and mobile money services in light of the need to cater for financial education and restraint during spending through their applications. The results of this research represent a starting point for more advanced empirical investigations of these behavior alterations, that are necessary for adjusting the financial behavior in the conditions of scarcity of cash.