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Socio-Cognitive Determinants of Consumers’ Support for the Fair Trade Movement

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Abstract

Despite the reasonable explanatory power of existing models of consumers’ ethical decision making, a large part of the process remains unexplained. This article draws on previous research and proposes an integrated model that includes measures of the theory of planned behavior, personal norms, self-identity, neutralization, past experience, and attitudinal ambivalence. We postulate and test a variety of direct and moderating effects in the context of a large scale survey study in London, UK. Overall, the resulting model represents an empirically robust and holistic attempt to identify the most important determinants of consumers’ support for the fair-trade movement. Implications and avenues for further research are discussed.

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Notes

  1. The non-rationality of such motives has been disputed elsewhere, such as in game theory advancements (e.g. Camerer et al. 2011) and the work of the philosopher Bernard Williams (e.g. Smart and Williams 1973; Williams 1972).

  2. This correlation, which based on the work of Lindell and Whitney (2001), provides a stringent test.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, UK

    Andreas Chatzidakis

  2. ESCP Europe, London, UK

    Minas Kastanakis

  3. Birkbeck University of London, London, UK

    Anastasia Stathopoulou

Authors
  1. Andreas Chatzidakis
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  2. Minas Kastanakis
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  3. Anastasia Stathopoulou
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Andreas Chatzidakis.

Appendix: Excerpts from the Survey Instrument and Explanation of the Items

Appendix: Excerpts from the Survey Instrument and Explanation of the Items

Intention Following Francis et al.’s (2004) suggested format, we assessed general intention to support fair trade using three items:

  • “I expect to support the fair trade movement in the near future”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I want to support the fair trade movement in the near future”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I intend to support the fair trade movement in the near future”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”).

We used three additional items to measure intentions for specific behaviors:

  • “I would support the fair trade movement in the near future, by buying fair trade products”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I would support the fair trade movement in the near future, by signing a petition for fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I would support the fair trade movement in the near future, by donating to the fair trade organization”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”).

Attitudes We assessed attitudes by employing a semantic differential scale, as Ajzen (2002a) suggests. Respondents were presented with the statement, “Supporting the fair trade movement is …”, followed by seven pairs of adjectives: harmful/beneficial, good/bad, pleasant/unpleasant, worthless/valuable, enjoyable/unenjoyable, rewarding/not rewarding, and the right thing to do/the wrong thing to do. An additional question, “In general, my attitude towards fair trade is …” was followed by two pairs of adjectives intended to capture overall evaluation (Sparks and Shepherd 2002): unfavorable/favorable (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980) and negative/positive (e.g. Sparks and Shepherd 2002).

Subjective norms We measured subjective norms with five sentences following the recommendations of Ajzen (2002a):

  • “Most people who are important to me support fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “Most people who are important to me think that I should support fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “The people in my life whose opinions I value would not approve of my supporting for fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “The people in my life whose opinions I value support fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “It is expected of me that I support fair trade in the near future”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”).

Perceived behavioral control We measured perceived behavioral control with four statements (Ajzen 2002a):

  • “For me to support the fair trade movement in the near future would be difficult”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “If I wanted to I could support the fair trade movement in the near future”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “It is mostly up to me whether or not I support fair trade in the near future”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “How much control do you believe you have over supporting fair trade in the near future”? (“no control/complete control”).

Personal norms We measured personal norms with three questions:

  • “I feel that I have an ethical/moral obligation to support fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I personally feel I should support fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “Supporting the fair trade movement would be the right thing for me to do”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”).

The first question retained the suggested format of Sparks et al. (1995), while the second and third were of similar format to measures employed by Sparks and Guthrie (1998) and Davies et al. (2002).

Self-identity We constructed three questions to assess self-identification with fair-trade issues:

  • “To support fair trade is an important part of who I am”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I think of myself as someone who is concerned about ethical issues in consumption”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I am not the type of person oriented to support fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”).

The first two questions retained the suggested format of Terry et al. (1999), and the third was based on the wording used by Sparks and Shepherd (2002).

Neutralisation We measured neutralization with three questions meant to capture “justifiability” of not supporting fair trade, following Chatzidakis et al. (2007):

  • “For me, not supporting fair trade is justifiable”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I have many arguments against supporting fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”)

  • “I’ve got reasons for not supporting fair trade”. (“strongly disagree/strongly agree”).

Past behavior We assessed past behavior with a variety of differently worded questions, as Ajzen (2002a) recommends:

  • In the course of the past 3 months, how many times have you decided to support the Fair Trade movement? (please tick one statement)

    • Every time that I had the opportunity. ____

    • Almost every time that I had the opportunity. ____

    • Most of the time that I had the opportunity. ____

    • About half of the times that I had the opportunity. ____

    • Sometimes, but less than half of the times I had the opportunity. ____

    • Few times that I had the opportunity. ____

    • Not at all when I had the opportunity. ____

    • I have not had the opportunity. ____

  • How often do you support the Fair Trade Movement? (“never/always”)

  • How often do you purchase Fair Trade products? (“never/always”)

  • Have you ever bought Fair Trade products? (please tick one)

Yes __ No, but I have had the opportunity __ No, I have not had the opportunity __

  • Have you ever signed a petition for Fair Trade? (please tick one)

Yes __ No, but I have had the opportunity __ No, I have not had the opportunity__

  • Have you ever donated to the Fair Trade Organization? (please tick one)

Yes __ No, but I have had the opportunity __ No, I have not had the opportunity__

  • Have you ever supported Fair Trade through other ways? (please tick one)

Yes __ No __ If yes, please specify:__

Ambivalence We measured ambivalence with five questions

  • Regarding supporting the Fair Trade movement I feel that my attitude is…. (“not at all contradictory/very contradictory”)

  • Considering only the unfavorable qualities of Fair Trade and ignoring the favorable characteristics, how unfavorable is your evaluation of supporting the Fair Trade movement? (“not at all unfavorable/extremely unfavorable”).

  • Considering only the negative qualities of Fair Trade and ignoring the positive characteristics, how negative is your evaluation of supporting the Fair Trade movement? (“not at all negative/extremely negative”)

  • Considering only the favorable qualities of Fair Trade and ignoring the unfavorable characteristics, how favorable is your evaluation of supporting the Fair Trade movement? (“not at all favorable/extremely favorable”)

  • Considering only the positive qualities of Fair Trade and ignoring the negative characteristics, how positive is your evaluation of supporting the Fair Trade movement? (“not at all positive/extremely positive”).

The first question retained the format used in Castro et al. (2009); we adapted the rest of the questions from Conner et al. (2002).

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Chatzidakis, A., Kastanakis, M. & Stathopoulou, A. Socio-Cognitive Determinants of Consumers’ Support for the Fair Trade Movement. J Bus Ethics 133, 95–109 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-014-2347-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-014-2347-9

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