Culture and Sampling Issues With “Green” Attitude Research

Abstract

Research on environmental attitudes may be affected by three methodological issues. First, country culture can influence green attitudes. This research found that environmental attitudes in countries with distinctive power distance, individualistic, or indulgent cultures tended to differ from the attitudes in other countries. Second, many green studies use convenience samples of students. Student responses often differ from the general public’s responses. The problem of relying on student samples is illustrated by the second study of cultural effects. Third, social desirability bias can inflate self-reported green attitudes and needs to be controlled. Although the consequences of social desirability bias may not be appreciated by some researchers, many businesses understand the effects and are waiting for consumer behaviors to catch up with their self-reported attitudes. By improving survey methodologies, green researchers can provide better insights to businesses and policy makers about the state of the gap between consumer attitudes and behaviors.

Do gender identities of femininity and masculinity affect the intention to buy ethical products?

“…Further, some could argue that women and others with high feminine traits will recognize how they are “supposed” to answer and answer accordingly, given that feminine traits are associated with pleasing others and being sensitive to others. Future studies could take into account social desirability bias and account for its potential to influence the findings and inflate the attitude‐behavior gap in ethical consumption (Larson & Kinsey, ). Specifically, it would be good to measure social desirability bias and, for instance, include it as a covariate in the model to control for its effects.…”

Cross-cultural perspective on sustainable consumption: implications for consumer motivations and promotion

“…To address these gaps in our understanding, we present a conceptual H/V I-C sustainable consumption model by conceptualizing the role of an alternative and a multilevel cultural perspective (Milfont and Markowitz, 2016;Cho, Thyroff, Rapert, Park, and Lee, 2013;Rahman, 2019;Larson and Kinsey, 2019;Rahman and Luomala, 2020) the horizontal/vertical individualism-collectivism value orientations (H/V I-C) in shaping consumer motivations for sustainable consumption. Further, it translates these findings into persuasive advertising appeals tailored to particular consumer's H/V I-C cultural background.…”

“…An alternative to that can accommodate this complexity of sustainable consumption is offered by the multilevel perspective (Milfont and Markowiz, 2016;Cho et al, 2013;Rahman, 2019;Larson and Kinsey, 2019;Rahman and Luomala, 2020), providing a refined approach to the individualism-collectivism and construct and expands the independenceinterdependence dimension from Hofstede's model (1980). The new dimension, i.e., vertical-horizontal dimension takes into account the hierarchical relationships, i.e., power distance (equality vs. hierarchy) within society (Singelis, Triandis, Bhawuk, & Gelfand, 1995;Triandis, 1995;Triandis & Gelfand, 1998).…”

Ulos Sustainability Towards Green Brands to Improve Marketing Performance Based on a Co-Creation Solution

“…According to Larson and Kinsey (2019) companies that ignore green business processes will lose market share. The "green branding" is expected to affect production, manufacturing, distribution and retail.…”