Applying an Extended Theory of Planned Behavior to Sustainable Food Consumption

Abstract

The objective of this research is to identify factors affecting sustainable food consumption behavior among Malaysians. An extension of the theory of planned behavior (TPB) is used as the framework of the study. Perceived value is also added to the framework to gain an understanding of consumer’s personal factors’ effect on sustainable food consumption. This study tested eight hypotheses on sustainable food consumption behavior with empirical data from a sample of 220 adults. The regression analysis results show that social norm, perceived value, perceived consumer effectiveness, and attitude have significant impacts on intention to consumer sustainable food. Perceived availability, perceived consumer effectiveness and intention also have significant impacts on actual behavior. The findings of this study can provide certain grounds for understanding sustainable food consumption intention and behavior. Research limitations and some guidelines for further lines of research are presented. In a global context the findings of this study is important, as consumption patterns need to be changed to meet the climate challenge.

Food Consumption Behavior of Pakistani Students Living in China: The Role of Food Safety and Health Consciousness in the Wake of Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic

“…The emergence of COVID-19 has placed a revolutionary strain on the global food system, which has caused changes in the way food is prepared, sold, obtained, and consumed (Leone et al, 2020 ). With these uncertainties, the sustainable food consumption is perceived as a major issue, particularly in a migrated context (Alam et al, 2020 ). The frequent food safety incidents and scandals in the Chinese food market, including the emergence of COVID-19, have increased greater concerns of the sojourners with regard to food safety and health consciousness (Qi et al, 2020 ).…”

“…In the second part of the questionnaire, the food consumption behavioral intention of the targeted population during Covid-19 based on the classical TPB components was measured. The ATT of the participants was evaluated through four items derived from the proposed scale by Qi et al ( 2020 ) and Alam et al ( 2020 ), whereas the adoption of five items from the proposed scale by Ali et al ( 2018 ) and Singh and Verma ( 2017 ) measured the SN. The PBC was measured by seven items adapted from Bonne et al ( 2007 ) and Ting et al ( 2016 ).…”

“…Based on an extensive literature review, since the emergence of COVID-19, none of the studies in the field of the food preferences of sojourners have examined the associations among food safety, ATT, SN, and PBC. Few studies on the literature of tourism and hospitality (Maclaurin, 2004 ; Yeung and Yee, 2019 ) and on organic food consumption (Lobb et al, 2007 ; Alam et al, 2020 ; Qi et al, 2020 ) highlighted that food safety through attitude has a positive relationship with intentions and behavior. Capitalizing on the mentioned results concerning the link between food safety and attitude, we hypothesize that:…”

Intentions to Consume Sustainably Produced Fish: The Moderator Effects of Involvement and Environmental Awareness

“…The theory of planned behavior (TPB) is one of the most widely researched models for predicting behavioral intentions by social psychologists [29][30][31][32]. In the domains of food consumption and pro-environmental behavior, the TPB is used as an important theoretical basis to understand consumers' environmentally friendly behavior [7,16,17,19,20,33,34]. Within consumer behavior research, behavioral intentions are an accepted predictor of actual behaviors [35][36][37][38] and frequently used as a proxy for consumer behavior [34,37].…”

Determinants of Fast-Food Consumption in Romania: An Application of the Theory of Planned Behavior

“…TPB was successfully applied to explain a large variety of behavioral intentions and actual behaviors, from recycling, travel, technology adoption, protection of privacy to smoking, drinking, the use of health services, breastfeeding, and drug use [27,29]. Healthy eating behaviors [20], genetically modified food consumption [30], organic food consumption [31], consumption and purchasing of halal food [32,33], sustainable food consumption [34,35] food neophobia and ethnic food consumption [36], functional food purchasing [37], and fast-food consumption [7,11,38,39] are food-related applications of the TPB.…”