دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی نقش توانمند سازی روانشناختی در رفتار مصرف کننده محافظ اقلیمی - امرالد 2017

Abstract

Purpose – This paper aims to address the role of psychological empowerment in proenvironmental consumer behaviour, focussing on climate protection. Design/methodology/approach – Study 1 analyses the interaction of the effects of psychological empowerment and personal norms on two environmental behaviours with a sample of 600 individuals drawn form a representative online panel of the Australian population. Study 2 addresses the reinforcing influence of empowerment with a quasi-experimental design comparing 300 consumers of green electricity with 300 conventional electricity clients. Findings – Psychological empowerment moderates the effects of personal norms on climate-protective consumer behaviour in a value-belief-norm (VBN) framework. Personal norms have a stronger influence for consumers experiencing high psychological empowerment than for disempowered feeling consumers. Furthermore, psychological empowerment experienced as an outcome of actual proenvironmental behaviour mediates the relationship between prior climate protection and future climate-protective intentions. Research limitations/implications – Future research should focus on the experimental manipulation of psychological empowerment with communicational claims, studying how perceived empowerment can be enhanced. Practical implications – To promote climate friendly products and behaviours, marketers should use communication claims aimed at enhancing consumer’s subjective experience of empowerment. Social implications – Public policy aimed at climate protection should focus on consumer education increasing consumers’ awareness of their potential influence. Originality/value – Psychological empowerment has not been studied previously as either an antecedent or outcome of proenvironmental behaviour. This is the first study to show that psychological empowerment moderates normative influences on climate-protective consumer behaviour. This research further reveals a novel behavioural reinforcement process, in which psychological empowerment intervenes as a behavioural outcome as well as an antecedent of climate-protective consumer behaviour. Findings contribute to the development of the VBN framework as well as to the consumer-empowerment perspective on proenvironmental behaviour.

Discussion

Findings and theoretical contribution

This research addresses the role of psychological empowerment in proenvironmental consumer behaviour, focussing on climate protection. Study 1 showed that introducing psychological empowerment as a moderator of the behavioural effects of PN into an empirical model based on the VBN framework (Stern et al., 1999; Stern, 2000), significantly increased the predictive power of the model. Findings constitute the first empirical confirmation of previous theoretical proposition in the literature, arguing that psychological consumer empowerment may also play a relevant role as a motivational factor in proenvironmental consumption (Barr et al., 2011; Geller, 1995; McGregor, 2005; Spaargaren and Mol, 2008; Spaargaren and Oosterveer, 2010; Thøgersen, 2005). Psychological empowerment had not previously been studied empirically as either an antecedent or outcome of proenvironmental behaviour. The scarce prior literature on the subject did also not propose integrating empowerment into VBN.

The observed significant behavioural effect of psychological empowerment is in line with the extant literature confirming empowerment as an important antecedent of employee behaviour (Carless, 2004; Chiang and Hsieh, 2012; Seibert et al., 2011; Siegall and Gardner, 2000; Spreitzer et al., 1999; Thomas and Velthouse, 1990; Yoo, 2017) and a motivational factor in consumer decision processes (Fuchs and Schreier, 2011; Füller et al., 2009; Labrecque et al., 2013; Pires et al., 2006; Shaw et al., 2006; Wathieu et al., 2002). In particular, the fact that psychological empowerment moderated normative influences on behavioural intentions supports previous research studying psychological empowerment as a moderator of the relationships between variables such as leadership influences and follower’s innovative behaviour, transformational leadership and job satisfaction, role ambiguity/ conflict and employee’s affective commitment, as well as leader-member-exchange relationship and job outcomes (Ackfeldt and Malhotra, 2013; Fuller et al., 1999; Harris et al., 2009; Pieterse et al., 2010).