The Role of Digital Social Media in the Formation of Attitudes towards Green Products among Information Literate Youth

Abstract

Purpose: This article aims to know to what extent the practice of using social media in Indonesia can influence the attitudes of young people, who already have digital technology literacy, towards current global issues, especially environmentally friendly products.
 Design/Method/Approach: The research design is a quantitative approach using a survey method with a questionnaire to find out the opinions of respondents. Using structural equation modeling (SEM), the research will test a number of hypotheses developed in this article. A sample size for this research is 137 respondents.
 Findings: According to SEM analysis using AMOS, green product knowledge does not affect attitudes towards green products, but communication through social media marketing and value consciousness of products are proven to affect consumer attitudes. Furthermore, attitude is proven to affect intention to purchase green products positively and significantly.
 Theoretical Implications: In conclusion, it turns out that product knowledge has no effect on determining consumer attitudes. It shows the need for other relevant variables in the research model as there is an interesting phenomenon of products that are classified as unique among young people in developing countries.
 Practical Implications: Social media activists and big companies in Indonesia can influence their young followers to care about the environment and promote affordable green products.
 Originality/Value: It includes awareness of the importance of using green products among young people, as well as a research model to determine buying behavior while purchasing green products.
 Research Limitations/Future Research: This research has several limitations. Most importantly, the sample in this study was limited by selecting a sample of the younger generation in Indonesia. It would be more useful for future studies to use a wider sample of income levels. In addition, for future empirical research it is more useful to add many independent variables, such as product quality and the country of origin of the product.
 Paper Type: Empirical
 The use of social media as part of social interaction activities in society and at the same time as a medium for companies to promote their products is increasing. This condition opens opportunities for companies engaged in environmentally friendly products or often called green products to take advantage of social media in disseminating their products to consumers. This study aims to test whether understanding of green products, communication through electronic social media and value consciusness when buying a product will influence consumer behavior to buy environmentally oriented products. For the purposes of the survey, a questionnaire was designed using Google Form. The questionnaire was socialized to 200 students. The results obtained show that Green Product does not affect Attitude, but Social Media marketing and Value Consiouness are proven to affect consumer Attitude. Attitude is proven to affect Purchase Intention.