Consumer Awareness of Fashion Greenwashing: Insights from Social Media Discussions

Muzhen Li, RayeCarol Cavender and Min-Young Lee ()
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Muzhen Li: Department of Retailing and Tourism Management, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA
RayeCarol Cavender: Department of Retailing and Tourism Management, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA
Min-Young Lee: Department of Retailing and Tourism Management, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 7, 1-22

Abstract: Greenwashing, the phenomenon of companies misleading consumers about their sustainability practices, is prevalent in the fashion industry. This study explores consumer opinions on greenwashing through analysis of social media discourse. Cognitive dissonance theory served as the theoretical framework, explaining how consumers reconcile conflicting information about brands’ sustainability claims. In Study 1, 446 comments on 12 Reddit posts were collected using the search term “fashion greenwashing”. Using the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) algorithm and manual review, we identified three major themes: the phenomenon of fashion greenwashing, consumer empowerment in sustainable fashion, and skepticism towards fast fashion brands’ marketing strategies. In Study 2, using the search term, “#fashiongreenwashing”, two researchers collected and analyzed 76 Instagram posts with 370 comments. A manual review was employed to extract major themes, and network graphs of caption tags within the same theme were constructed. Three major themes emerged: strategies to combat fashion greenwashing, examples of fashion greenwashing, and advocacy and regulation in sustainable fashion. Findings from Studies 1 and 2 revealed that consumers are increasingly aware of brands’ deceptive practices and advocacy for sustainable practices to resolve this dissonance when they see greenwashing information. This study underscored the need for fashion brands to provide transparent and authentic information.

Keywords: fashion greenwashing; green marketing; fashion sustainability; social media; apparel and textile industry; cognitive dissonance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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