Are Ethical Consumers Happy? Effects of Ethical Consumers' Motivations Based on Empathy Versus Self-orientation on Their Happiness

被引:0
|
作者
Kumju Hwang
Hyewon Kim
机构
[1] Chung-Ang University,Department of Business Administration, College of Business and Economics
来源
Journal of Business Ethics | 2018年 / 151卷
关键词
Empathy; Fair-trade coffee; Guilt; Happiness; Narcissism; Repurchase intention; Self-actualization;
D O I
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中图分类号
学科分类号
摘要
Studies on fair-trade consumption have concentrated on economic, demographic, and ethical issues, and research on consumers’ moral emotions and self-orientation is limited. Although consumers’ satisfaction with their consumption has been emphasized in consumer studies and marketing, little substantive empirical research has addressed ethical consumers’ emotional satisfaction and the link between their motivations and happiness. This study focused on ethical consumers who regularly purchase fair-trade coffee to understand their moral emotions and self-orientation as motivations for fair-trade consumption and determine whether empathy and self-oriented motivations led to their happiness. A survey was conducted on 471 regular purchasers of at least one cup of fair-trade coffee weekly or a pack of fair-trade coffee beans monthly. The survey data were analyzed using partial least squares. The results showed that guilt was positively associated with empathy, which positively influenced self-actualization. Contrary to the proposed hypothesis, empathy did not elicit consumers’ happiness. As expected, narcissism affected self-actualization, which in turn elicited happiness. Happiness was positively associated with customers’ repurchase intentions for fair-trade coffee. The results of this study demonstrate the strong associations of the paths from narcissism to self-actualization, self-actualization to happiness, and self-actualization to repurchase intentions compared to the paths from guilt to empathy, empathy to happiness, and empathy to repurchase intentions. Contrary to common expectations, the results indicate that self-oriented motivations focused on self-actualization rather than moral emotions (guilt and empathy) play key roles in ethical consumers’ happiness with fair-trade consumption.
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页码:579 / 598
页数:19
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