Value-Action Divide in sustainable consumption behaviour: an experimental approach
Student name: Ms Surbhi Chetwani
Guide: Dr Soumendu Sarkar
Year of completion: 2016
Host Organisation: TERI University
Abstract: In the constant frenzy of running after high growth figures, we forget that the earth, being finite, has a limited capability to supply resources and absorb pollution. This has led to serious environmental degradation. Consumer behaviour is a key to the impact that society has on the environment. Re-orientation of consumer choices and lifestyles through the use of ecolabelling schemes is one of the ways through which the objective of sustainable consumption could be met.
The success of a labelling scheme, however, lies on the assumption that consumers are environmentally conscious and they successfully carry their concerns over the environment to the supermarket. This assumption does not hold when there exists a ‗value-action gap‘ in consumption of eco-friendly goods.
This study uses the experimental approach to first verify the existence of such hurdles (the value-action divide) in making sustainable purchase decisions and then to specifically look at the impact of a social persuasion video as means to overcome these hurdles. In order to capture the ‗Value‘, a questionnaire survey methodology is used to capture the subjects‘ environmental consciousness. The ‗Action‘ is captured by the means of the change in the premium that the subjects are willing to pay for eco-friendly products (i) post ecolabelling information, and (ii) post screening of a persuasive video.
It has been found that while the majority of the sample was willing to pay a positive premium on eco-friendly products, this did not depend on their environmental consciousness thus indicating towards a value-action divide. The impact of the persuasive video fell stronger on the low conscious consumers.
KEYWORDS: Sustainable consumption and production, Value-action divide, laboratory experiment, persuasion
