Attitude-Behavior Gap in Green Consumption Behavior: A Review

Abstract

Although consumers are willing to purchase green products to prevent or alleviate environmental degradation, their positive attitude towards green products does not always translate into action. This phenomenon is called the attitude-behavior gap/consistency in the context of green consumption. In the era when sustainable development has become a critical social and economic trend, the research on this issue is of great significance. However, the existing research has not given an extensive explanation for how the phenomenon occurs, nor has a summary of the various factors that lead to the phenomenon and how they affect the purchase behavior of environmental protection. This article reviews the underlying mechanisms of attitude-behavior gap in green consumption behavior, and summarizes the empirical studies at individual level since 2010 from three aspects: 1) the formation and change of consumers' demand for green products, 2) the change of consumer behavior in the process of green demand being satisfied and 3) the influence of consumer's psychological cognition on attitude-behavior gap, and integrate them with the relevant researches in the fields of marketing and social norms. This paper also proposes some future research opportunities, such as attitudinal ambivalence, learning and trust mechanisms, the scope of behavior subject, cross-cultural issues, uncertainty factors, and measurement methods.