Green consumption: Closing the intention‐behavior gap

Abstract

Green consumption has become an important academic and practical topic. However, a recurring theme in the literature has been the attitude-behavior gap in green consumption. Taking the cognitive view in studying consumer behaviors, this study theoretically developed and tested two key moderators to the relationship between green consumption intention and behavior, namely green product availability and perceived consumer effectiveness. Under high levels of the moderators, the relationship between the intention and the behavior were hypothesized to be stronger. Our data sample of 416 consumers in two large cities in Vietnam provided support for the hypotheses. Our study results thus contribute to the green consumption literature by explaining the attitude-behavior gap. Our study also contributes to the broader literature by explaining the inconsistency in consumer behavior. Implications and recommendations for further research are also discussed.

Diagnose barriers to sustainable development: A study on “desensitization” in urban residents' green purchasing behavior

“…The first is to arouse public sense of the urgency of environmental crisis, which can be achieved by frequent exposure to the information about environmental crisis (Kronrod et al, 2012;Lee, 2010). The second is to advocate a green lifestyle and suggest that every pro-environmental act of individuals in daily life can contribute to environmental improvement (Dagher & Itani, 2014;Lee, 2008;Nguyen et al, 2019;Trivedi et al, 2018). This has already been practically adopted by the government, environmental organizations, and enterprises, aiming to enhance PEEB and attract deliberately more residents to participate in environmental protection activities (Hanss et al, 2016;Lee, 2008).…”

“…Our world is suffering from severely environmental deterioration because of intricate causes. Green consumption, a typical pro‐environmental behavior, has been advocated as an effective response to the environmental crisis (Nguyen, Nguyen, & Hoang, ; Pagiaslis & Krontalis, ; Yan & Spangenberg, ). However, it is difficult to alter consumers' attitudes and behaviors (Nguyen et al, ), so that strategies are required to intervene and guide people to accept and adopt green consumption concept.…”

“…Green consumption, a typical pro‐environmental behavior, has been advocated as an effective response to the environmental crisis (Nguyen, Nguyen, & Hoang, ; Pagiaslis & Krontalis, ; Yan & Spangenberg, ). However, it is difficult to alter consumers' attitudes and behaviors (Nguyen et al, ), so that strategies are required to intervene and guide people to accept and adopt green consumption concept. Social media has been regarded as one of the strategies to persuade residents to go green and promote sustainable development (He, Zhao, Zhu, Darko, & Gou, ; Kronrod, Grinstein, & Wathieu, ; Persaud & Schillo, ; Trivedi, Patel, & Nidhi, ).…”

“…Different from other consumption behaviors, GPB is influenced by both personal and public interests (Li, Sinha, Kim, & LeeY, 2019;Yang et al, 2015). The transitions from green consumption attitude to GPB is constrained and moderated by egoistic appeals (Lin, Lobo, & Leckie, 2017;Yang & Peterson, 2004), further determining the gap between green attitude and actual behavior (Liu, Qu, Lei, & Jia, 2017;Nguyen et al, 2019;Shaw, McMaster, & Newholm, 2016).…”

“…In general, stronger perceived effectiveness makes individuals more likely to believe the proenvironmental behavior is beneficial to the ecological environment (Hanss, Böhm, Doran, & Homburg, 2016;Nguyen et al, 2019). However, excessively strong perceived effectiveness of environmental behavior (PEEB) may lead to overconfidence, namely, blind confidence regarding the environmental or social effects generated by going green (Cain, Moore, & Haran, 2015).…”