How Chinese Consumers’ Intentions for Purchasing Eco-Labeled Products Are Influenced by Psychological Factors

Jie Jin, Qiuhong Zhao and Ernesto DR Santibanez-Gonzalez
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Jie Jin: School of Economics and Management, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan 030000, China
Qiuhong Zhao: School of Economics and Management, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China
Ernesto DR Santibanez-Gonzalez: Department of Industrial Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Talca, Curico 3340000, Chile

IJERPH, 2019, vol. 17, issue 1, 1-17

Abstract: This paper studies how consumers’ psychological factors influence their intentional purchasing behavior towards eco-labeled products and investigates why consumers choose eco-labeled products. Based on the Theory of Planned Behavior, we develop an extended model including six constructs. Among these constructs, consumers’ intentional purchasing behavior, attitude towards the behavior, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control are applied from the original theoretical framework. Health consciousness and environmental awareness are integrated additionally to reflect consumers’ concerns about the natural environment and their health. Next, we conduct and analyze a survey-based empirical study with 336 samples using the Structural Equation Modeling. Our findings show that consumers’ attitude towards the behavior is positively influenced by environmental awareness, but the effects of it on intentional purchasing behavior are insignificant. Also, subjective norm has a positive influence on intentional purchasing behavior, but its effects on attitude towards the behavior are not significant. Moreover, the results also show that the total effects of health consciousness on intentional purchasing behavior are significantly higher than the effects of environmental awareness. Our results can provide a reference for business managers to attract consumers through eco-labeling as well as government policymaking.

Keywords: theory of planned behavior; eco-labeling; environmental awareness; health consciousness; structural equation modelling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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