Mindfulness and gender differences in ethical beliefs

Tavleen Kaur Dhandra and Hyun Jung Park

Social Responsibility Journal, 2018, vol. 14, issue 2, 274-286

Abstract: Purpose - This paper aims to examine the ethical beliefs of consumers with regards to their levels of mindfulness. Furthermore, it aims to investigate if mindfulness is related to gender differences among respondents in their ethical beliefs about consumer unethical practices. Design/methodology/approach - University students in India were surveyed with self-administered questionnaires comprising the consumer ethics scale and mindfulness attention awareness scale. Mediation analysis was conducted to test whether gender differences in ethical judgements are due to the different levels of mindfulness. Findings - The results indicate that mindfulness is not only a predictor of ethical beliefs but also a mediator of the relationship between gender and ethical beliefs. Individuals with greater mindfulness reported greater acceptance towards the five dimensions of consumer ethics scale. Indian male participants were found to be more mindful and lenient in ethical judgements than female participants. Originality/value - The present work is a novel attempt in examining the effect of mindfulness on the relationship between gender and ethical beliefs of consumers. The results of this study can have positive implications for organizations, managers, public policy makers and consumers.

Keywords: Gender; India; Consumer ethics; Mindfulness; Ethical beliefs (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (text/html)
https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.110 ... d&utm_campaign=repec (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eme:srjpps:srj-05-2016-0067

DOI: 10.1108/SRJ-05-2016-0067

Access Statistics for this article

Social Responsibility Journal is currently edited by Prof David Crowther

More articles in Social Responsibility Journal from Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Emerald Support ().