Green Product Types Modulate Green Consumption in the Gain and Loss Framings: An Event-Related Potential Study

Guanfei Zhang, Mei Li, Jin Li, Min Tan, Huie Li and Yiping Zhong ()
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Guanfei Zhang: Department of Psychology, School of Education Science, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China
Mei Li: Department of Psychology, School of Education Science, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China
Jin Li: Department of Psychology, School of Education Science, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China
Min Tan: Department of Psychology, School of Education Science, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China
Huie Li: Department of Psychology, School of Education Science, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China
Yiping Zhong: Department of Psychology, School of Education Science, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 17, 1-17

Abstract: People show a separation of intention and behavior in green consumption, and promoting actual green purchase behavior is more important than purchase intention. This study adopted a conflicting environmental decision paradigm to investigate behavioral and neural processes during actual green consumption decision-making involving different types of green products and message framing, according to construal level theory. Participants were instructed to make green consumption decisions involving green products with different psychological distances (self-interested green products vs. other-interested green products) under gain (e.g., buying green products brings positive results) or loss framing (e.g., not buying green products brings negative effects) while electroencephalograms were recorded. The behavioral results demonstrated that participants tended to purchase green products under loss framing more than under gain framing. The event-related potential results showed that under gain framing, decision-making for self-interested green products was associated with larger P3 than decision-making for other-interested green products. While under loss framing, decision-making for other-interested green products has a larger P260 than for self-interested green products. These findings suggest that under gain framing, self-interested green products elicit more cognitive resources than other-interested green products, while under loss framing, other-interested green products elicit stronger negative emotions than self-interested green products. The research has managerial implications for promoting consumers’ actual purchase behavior.

Keywords: green product type; green consumption behavior; gain framing; loss framing; event-related potential (ERP); P3; P260 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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