The Green Choice with a Guilty Conscience: Exploring Consumer Guilt and Moral Disengagement in Organic Purchase Decisions

Tien Anh Tran and Minh Thi Ngoc Phan ()
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Tien Anh Tran: International University, Vietnam National University HCMC, School of Business
Minh Thi Ngoc Phan: International University, Vietnam National University HCMC, School of Business

A chapter in Vietnamese Business and Sustainable Development in a Globalized and Digitalized Era, 2026, pp 550-576 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract Consumers frequently face dilemmas when choosing green products, as moral intentions often conflict with practical barriers, resulting in cognitive dissonance and guilt over actions misaligned with their environmental values. This study aims to consider such dissonance, consumer guilt, and the role of moral disengagement in their green purchasing. Using a quantitative method, data were collected from 267 consumers living in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam with experience purchasing organic products, then analyzed through Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM). The main findings prove that barriers to organic purchasing can cause cognitive discomfort and lead to consumer guilt. The results also find moral disengagement an important mechanism for coping with consumer guilt. This provides insights into the psychological processes behind purchasing decisions and enforces the growing understanding of consumer behavior toward green products, which furnishes important implications for marketers, policy makers, and environmental organizations for developing strategies in promoting sustainable consumption.

Keywords: Health Consciousness; Environmental Justification; Price Justification; Purchase Intention; Actual Purchase Behavior; Consumer Guilt; Moral Disengagement; Green Products; Sustainable Consumption; Vietnam (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:prbchp:978-3-032-24745-2_28

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-032-24745-2_28

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