Sustainable consumer behavior in China: an empirical analysis from the Midwest regions

Abstract

In 1992, the “environment-friendly” concept was first put forward through Agenda 21 in United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio. Today the concept of “environment friendly” is better understood and more widely practiced and used. In 2005, Chinese government clearly pointed out that China needs to construct a resource-efficient and environment-friendly society, a “two-type” society as referred by Chinese. This paper expounded the connotation of sustainable consumer behavior, identified a series of crucial variables that influence such behavior, and then established hypotheses based on relevant theories and created a citizen consumption behavior model. The model and hypotheses were further tested and validated using SEM (Structural Equation Modeling) and regression analyses of data collected from Chinese Midwest regions. Results from analyses suggested that sustainable consumer behavior is affected by variables including two-type attitude, two-type knowledge and skills, life values, age, gender and so on. There exists a significant correlation between two-type knowledge & skills and two-type attitude. Relationship between two-type attitude and sustainable consumer behavior is regulated by contextual factors such as social norms and so on. The individual's sustainable consumption behaviors are greatly diverse owing to various demographic factors like age, gender and so on. Implications of the research findings to policy makers in China for the “two-type” society construction and to those developing countries engaged in the promotion of sustainable consumption were also discussed.