LUẬN văn THẠC sĩ factors affecting customer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping

This study explores the factors affecting consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping by using theory of planned behavior.. The constructs of theory of planned behavior: attit

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

TRINH NGOC HONG ANH

FACTORS AFFECTING CUSTOMER PURCHASE INTENTION OF CLOTH

BAGS FOR SHOPPING

MASTER’S THESIS

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Hanoi, 2019

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

TRINH NGOC HONG ANH

FACTORS AFFECTING CUSTOMER PURCHASE INTENTION OF CLOTH

BAGS FOR SHOPPING

MAJOR: BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

I would like to express my gratitude to all those who gave me the possibility to complete this thesis I have received extensive help, suggestions and encouragements at each step along the way, and I am very grateful to my beloved and dedicated professors, family and friends for their time and support

First and foremost, I would like to thank my two supervisors, who are not only

my guide throughout the completion of this thesis but also my lecturers, Associate Professor Vu Anh Dung and Professor Tohru Inoue, for their whole-hearted guidance and help as well as invaluable feedbacks, which enable me to complete this paper

Furthermore, during this work I have received remarkable help and encouragement from my beloved professor in Business Administration Department – Professor Tran Thi Bich Hanh for her thoughtful support and advice during my time of generating ideas and finalizing the topic

Besides, I would like to say thank-you to all of the participants who helped me answer my questionnaire when I did the survey, without you there will not be the results for this research

Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to Vietnam Japan University and Yokohama National University for creating a wonderful study environment for

me to develop myself and study which encourage me to finish my thesis

Student, Trinh Ngoc Hong Anh

ABSTRACT

Plastic shopping bags are a daily use product of everyone, which is not only harmful

to environment but also to people’s health Environmental terms such as global warming, green house effects are becoming more and more popular in the media channel People seem to be more aware of the negative effects of using plastic shopping bags, which leads to a need for an alternative Cloth bags are a typical option for changing in everyday life of customers, which is recyclable and is made with more eco-friendly materials compared to plastic bags This study explores the factors affecting consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping by using theory of planned behavior The constructs of theory of planned behavior: attitude, subjective norms, perceived availability and perceived consumer effectiveness are tested to check if they have a positive significant relationship with consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping or not Moreover, since media exposure seems to make a certain influence on the relationships between constructs

of theory of planned behavior and purchase intention, it is used as a proposed moderator The study uses convenient sampling and distributes questionnaire adopted from previous researches to 120 respondents both offline and online 113 results sent back to analyzed by SPSS 20 The results found that attitude and subjective norm have a significant positive impact on purchase intention while perceived availability and perceived consumer effectiveness do not Media exposure

to environmental message also does not show a moderating effect to the relations

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENT i

ABSTRACT ii

LIST OF TABLES vi

LIST OF FIGURES viii

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Background and necessity of the research 1

1.1.1 Why is environment degrading gradually? 1

1.1.2 Plastic bags versus cloth bags 3

1.1.3 Green marketing and customer purchase intention 5

1.2 Statement of the problems 8

1.3 Research objectives 9

1.4 Research questions 10

1.5 Research scope 10

1.6 Structure of the research 10

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 12

2.1 Green consumptions and related definitions 12

2.1.1 Sustainable consumption 12

2.1.2 Green consumption 13

2.1.3 Green products and related researches 16

2.1.4 Eco-friendly shopping bags and cloth bags 17

2.2 Consumer behavior and purchase intention 22

2.3 Theory of Planned behavior 25

2.3.1 Attitudes towards behavior 26

2.3.2 Perceived behavioral control 27

2.3.3 Subjective norms 28

2.4 Media exposure to environmental messages: 28

2.5 Final proposed research model 30

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 31

3.1 Research process 31

3.2 Sampling and data collection 32

3.3 Designing questionnaire 33

3.4 Analyzing data plan 38

CHAPTER 4 DATA PRESENTATIONS AND FINDINGS 47

4.1 Data description 47

4.2 Reliability analysis 51

4.2.1 Reliability of ATTITUDE-ATT scale 51

4.2.2 Reliability of SUBJECTIVE NORM – SN scale 52

4.2.3 Reliability of PERCEIVED AVAILABILITY - PA scale 53

4.2.4 Reliability of PERCEIVED CUSTOMER EFFECTIVENESS scale 54

4.2.5 Reliability of PURCHASE INTENTION scale 57

4.2.6 Reliability of MEDIA EXPOSURE TO ENVIORNMENTAL MESSAGE

scale 58

4.3 Exploratory factor analysis 59

4.3.1 Exploratory factor analysis of TPB scale 59

4.3.2 Exploratory factor analysis of PURCHASE INTENTION SCALE 62

4.3.3 Exploratory factor analysis of MEDIA EXPOSURE TO ENVIORNMENTAL MESSAGE Scale 64

4.4 Regression analysis 66

4.5 Moderation analysis via PROCESS model 1 SPSS 72

4.5.1 Moderation analysis between MEDIA EXPOSURE to the relationship of ATTITUDE and PURCHASE INTENTION 73

4.5.2 Moderation analysis between MEDIA EXPOSURE to the relationship of SUBJECTIVE NORM and PURCHASE INTENTION 75

4.6 Hypothesis tested results 78

CHAPTER 5: RESULT DISCUSSION 80

5.1 Result discussion and implications 80

5.2 Contributions of the research 85

5.3 Limitations and future research direction 86

REFERENCES 88

APPENDIX 1 QUESTIONNAIRE 94

LIST OF TABLES

Table 3.1 Measuring items for survey 35

Table 3.2 Likert scale of Agreement extent 37

Table 3.3 Likert scale of Frequency extent 38

Table 3.4 Encoded terms for data testing 38

Table 4.1 Descriptive Statistics of 113 participant 47

Table 4.2 Gender distributions among 113 participants 48

Table 4.3 Income distributions among 113 participants 50

Table 4.4 Reliability statistics of ATT scale 51

Table 4.5 Reliability statistics of SN scale 52

Table 4.6 Reliability statistics of PA scale 53

Table 4.7 Reliability statistics of PCE scale – 1st test 54

Table 4.8 Reliability statistics of PCE scale – 2nd test 55

Table 4.9 Reliability statistics of PCE scale – final test 56

Table 4.10 Reliability statistics of PI scale 57

Table 4.11 Reliability statistics of ME scale 58

Table 4.12 Exploratory factor analysis for TPB scale 59

Table 4.13 Exploratory factor analysis for PI scale 62

Table 4.14 Exploratory factor analysis for ME scale 64

Table 4.15 Pearson correlation statistic 66

Table 4.16: Collinearity Statistics 68

Table 4.17: Regression analysis summary 69

Table 4.18 Regression analysis summary 71

Table 4.19 Hypotheses tested results 78

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 2.1 Five stages of consumer buying process 23

Figure 2.2 Conceptual framework 25

Figure 2.3 Theory of reasoned action and theory of planned behavior 26

Figure 2.4 Proposed theoretical model 30

Figure 3.1 Research process proposed by the author 31

Figure 3.2 Conceptual Model of simple moderatio 44

Figure 3.3 Statistical Model of simple moderation 45

Figure 4.1 Age distribution among 113 participants 49

Figure 4.2 Education level distribution among 113 participants 50

Figure 4.3 Regression Standardized Residual 68

Figure 4.4 Proposed conceptual moderating effect of ME 73

Figure 4.5 Statistical diagram with ME moderates the relation 74

Figure 4.6 Moderation analysis statistic for ATT*ME 75

Figure 4.7 Proposed conceptual moderating effect of ME 76

Figure 4.8 Statistical diagram with ME moderates the relation 76

Figure 4.9 Moderation analysis statistic for SN*ME 77

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background and necessity of the research

1.1.1 Why is environment degrading gradually?

It is undeniable to say that the 21st century has been marked as the period of economic, technological, and scientific achievements Under the impact of major developments, the world economy as a whole and especially Vietnamese economy, have maintained an exceptional growth with remarkable achievements According

to world economic forum, Vietnam is “one of the stars of the emerging markets universe” with its economic growth 6-7% rivals China (Vanham, 2018) In fact, in

2017, the economy of Vietnam grew by an impressive 6.81% laying an important foundation for its plan towards the future This ASEAN nation, recently, seems to become an attractive environment for giant brands’ manufacturing and foreign investment due to their infrastructure, human resources and market-friendly policies from the government

However, along with the good sides of economic growth, nations will usually face some challenges in regard to stimulate a sustainable development, which in terms of developing countries, involves environmental problems and protection In a common sense, in order to create such noticeable performances, a certain amount of resources must be exploited and there will be consequences and impacts on nature

These are inevitable results of a quick development process and minor attention to the nature while not covering every aspect of development in one country Talking about Vietnam, one typical example is that economic growth means more foreign investment which results in building many more factories and plants in the country

According to a study conducted by researchers at Harvard University and the University of Colorado Boulder, by 2030 when comparing ten countries in ASEAN region, Vietnam will be the most affected by coal pollution with a rate of premature

environment is being heavily damaged and affecting the condition of people’s lives

as a whole and especially their health Vietnam is finding itself in a crossroads in terms of its future economic development model The most important thing is the need for a way of balancing the conflicts between environmental issues and sustainable development, climate change vulnerability, natural disasters, pollution, ecosystems and biodiversity (Achim Steiner, 2018)

In recent years, Vietnamese government are taking steps by steps towards a sustainable future Vietnam’s Comprehensive Poverty Reduction and Growth Strategy mentioned creating an environment for sustainable development is one of the major development goals, which integrate with different types of government’s strategies to face the challenges of environmental problems In addition, frequent efforts have been made and put into policies and programs trying to transform the industrial structure and made the production process cleaner, more efficient and effective However, the concerns for environmental issues and their catastrophic impacts are not only recognized by the government but also by the mass media, environmentalists, non-profit organizations, by many business and customers – the people Many businesses can reduce the impacts on environment caused by production activities but it is not enough; the damage to environments caused by the customers with their selection, usage and disposal of products also is also a major behavior that need changing With the environmental problems that are visible day

by day, customers are more and more concerned about the immediate and gradual consequences of those problems while receiving alarming news from the public, environmental activists and environment protection organizations (Agyeman, 2014)

Why customers perform a central part in the environmental protection process?

According to Gardner and Stern (2002), environmental problems for example global warming or climate change, basically, relate to human behaviors When there is an increasing demand of greener products among customers, suppliers will respond to that and offer them to them However, in order to do that, businesses need to have

an in-depth look into the customers’ behaviors, understand what drives them to have

that type of needs or what influences them to shift their behavior from traditional to green consumption In the end, for a business to fulfil their social responsibility and achieve a competitive advantage over competitors, there is a need to review the circumstances and consumers purchase behaviors for green products

In fact, in the world, green consumption is formed as a new trend in the field of customer behavior although it seems that the action is done better in developed countries than developing ones (Vietnam for example) In the context of Vietnam, polluted environment, contaminated food and water and such environmental issues are becoming more and more noticeable, many businesses decided to join in the trend to produce and sell more green products aiming at helping the environments steps and steps However, towards consumers, in order for them to change from cognitive thoughts and sole awareness to actions depend on various factors subjectively and objectively In reality, Vietnamese consumers are aware of what should be done to help the environment but they still hesitate to act and follow the trends completely This also claims for business to look into Vietnamese consumers behaviors

1.1.2 Plastic bags versus cloth bags

Using plastic bags in Vietnam is very popular among individuals, households and community This behavior is a habit of Vietnamese people all ages Nylon bags/plastic bags are used every day from local markets, stores to supermarkets or shopping malls because of their convenience and cheap cost According to I S Zen

et al (2013), customers perceive receiving and using plastic bags for free is an appropriate right and an important factor to help their shopping become easier

Without reliable public information to the people, plastic bags are believed to be a traditional kind of consumption product which are safe to the environment and human’s health Because plastic bags are a daily and common product that used so frequently and thoughtlessly everywhere, their damage to environment are sometimes overlooked (Akulian et al 2007) However, the damage caused by their

nature will cause severe damage to the soil and water Surprisingly, the soil and water environment contaminated by plastic bags will both directly and indirectly affect human health There are no official statistics on the number of plastic bags used in Vietnam yet but there are some surveys and estimates of these numbers

Although there are differences in numbers, the overall impression of the figures is very large, this claims for a change in consumption behavior

One of the ways to reduce the damage coming from plastic bags dumping into environment is by reducing the number of trash and garbage relating to plastic bags

So, one of reasonable solution to decrease the number of plastic garbage is using eco-friendly bags in daily activities instead of plastic ones The current trend of customers preferred eco-friendly shopping bags can be divided into the following categories: plastic, paper and fabric/cloth bags In searching for an alternative of plastic bags in this context, fabric or cloth bags is used (generally called cloth bags)

This is because paper bags are also considered eco-friendly bags but their life span

is not long and not as reusable and recyclable as cloth bags In terms of availability, cloth bags are also seen to be sold more frequently compared to paper bags because

of its convenience and mainly Vietnamese customers use motorbikes to travel so using cloth bags will be more suitable for them

Companies offer green products like cloth bags which is not only friendly and less harmful for the environment but also good for their brand image and reputation, show their social responsibility Cloth bags in particular, and eco-friendly bags in general are normally treated as a means of storage for goods and products when consumers when shopping rather than just a plain consumption product This relates

to the idea of plastic bags as a means of storage, usually given as a free complementary with the any goods bought in stores However, cloth bags in these days can be seen displayed at stores like normal products and in supermarkets, cloth bags nowadays can be offered for customers to purchase at the end of checkout counters as a complementary good and to raise environmental protection awareness

Hence, in this research, cloth bags are be considered as a type of green product for

customers to buy at any store, supermarkets or shopping malls, and as an alternative

to plastic shopping bags

1.1.3 Green marketing and customer purchase intention

In the world, there are many researches looking into the concept of green consumption in general and consumer purchase intention in particular using different variety of theories However, the main subjects for these types of researches normally involve recycling, green energy and other common types of green products Moreover, many authors doing research in this field have chosen

theory of planned behavior to explore this psychological aspect of customers –

behavioral intention with some new type of green products or services such as green hotel in researches by Heesup Han et al or eco-friendly restaurants by Yong Joong Kim et al Others tend to focus on conducting researches relating to products in a broader term like “green product consumption”

Few researches involving the concept of eco-friendly shopping bags or choosing it

as the unit of analysis, especially cloth bags so it claims for more studies exploring about this type of products since it is normally ignored comparing to other types of alternatives for plastic bags, both in the world and in Vietnam Some example of a

typical research about shopping bags is: “Applying Ethical Concepts to the Study

of “Green” Consumer Behavior: An Analysis of Chinese Consumers’ Intentions

to Bring their Own Shopping Bags” (Chan, R Y., 2007) In this research Chan and

associates focuses mostly on general ethics and social psychology to present a model to decide the main factors affecting consumer’s intention to bring their own shopping bags when visiting a supermarket Another research also investigated the ethical behaviors of customer as “bring your own shopping bags” named “BYOB:

How Bringing Your Own Shopping Bags Leads to Treating Yourself and the Environment” by Uma R Karmarkar et al Both studies concerned about the factors that can affect customers to change to green behaviors in order to minimize the negative impacts of pollution and climate change, however, the aspects of providers

when considering reusable shopping bags for customers to bring from their homes, their materials, original sources or seller have not been mentioned In the context of recent years, since providing green products seem to be a promising business and more and more startups or businessmen want to get access to this niche, the need for doing more researches about a new type of green products for companies is high

Some other researches such as: “Consumer identity and moral obligations in

non‐plastic bag consumption: a dialectical perspective” (Hélène Cherrier, 2006)

studies about green consumption behavior with their use of non-plastic bags, but the author looks into the problem with a different perspective, philosophical view

Hence, there are not a large number of studies explore this particular green consumption product With the aim at predicting purchase intention of customers psychologically to help business develop in a sustainable way with the offering of a green product, especially in Vietnam’s context and in order to fill in this gap of research and contribute an appropriate approach for further studies as well as consider the current situation of damages caused by plastic bag user, it is necessary

to study about an alternative of plastic bags, in this case cloth bags for shopping is chosen

According to Vicki Morwitz (2012), purchase intention are normally considered one

of the primary inputs for marketing managers to measure consumer demand, forecast future sales, assess and decide which actions to takes to favorably impact the consumer purchase intentions Hence, it is reasonable to consider cloth bags as a type of green product and look into their consumer purchase intentions in the favor

of both businesses and government in general and especially for consumer themselves As mentioned above, theory of planned behavior is normally used to predict behavioral intentions of customers, consider the widespread popularity of this theory and the amount of previous studies have used it for researching the same green marketing and green consumption, this research also adopts this theory for looking into the factors affecting customer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping

1.1.4 Media exposure to environmental messages as additional variables

Theory of planned behavior is normally used with three constructs named: Attitudes, Subjective norms and Perceived Behavioral control to determine customers’

intentions However, previous studies suggest that not only these three factors can have influence on intentions of customers and there should be some other specific factors that can be included in this model (Armitage, 2001) Especially in recent years, the amount of evidences in previous studies also build up when researchers continue adding additional constructs to strengthen the predictive power of theory

of planned behavior (for example adding self-identity; habit or past behaviors etc.)

Ajzen also recommended that besides adding direct constructs to three original ones

of the theory, changing the path of variables by adding moderators is one of the good way to create depth for the model Baron and Kenny (1986) described that a moderator variable can be a quantitative or qualitative depending on the nature of the researches, in which the moderator can change the direction or strengthen the relationship between dependent and independent variables

This study uses media exposure to environmental messages as a moderator to theory

of planned behavior, for the following reasons:

 The fact that recently in all types of official media such as social media, television, newspapers etc the negative impacts of pollution and environmental problems are spreading more and more Governments and non-governmental organizations are trying to raise awareness of people about protect natural resources and environments Thus, Vietnam’s economy is developing rapidly (described by GDP increased by 7.08% in 2018 - the highest figure since 2008;

the economic structure of Vietnam continues to shift positively according to the trend of reducing the proportion of agriculture, forestry and fisheries; increase the share of industry, construction and service industry) is a rationale behind the high consumption level of Vietnamese However, media also points out that behind the successful economy and consumption growth, the environment is

This also bring the green products producers a chance to help change the behavior of customers from using plastics to alternatives One of them is cloth bags for shopping instead of traditional low-cost free plastic bags

 In academic aspects, media exposure is used in some previous researches such

as “The moderating effect of media exposure on the purchase intention of generic drugs: an application of the theory of planned behavior” by Reynaldo A

Baustista, Jr There are some other moderators considered when researchers extended theory of planned behavior in green marketing filed, for example: in a study named “Exploring purchase intention of green skincare products using theory of planned behavior: testing the moderating effects of country of origin and price sensitivity” by Chia Lin Hsu et al Others study in the same field did not explore moderating effects much so there is a lack of research expanding the theory using this approach For this specific case, cloth bag for shopping is a common consumption products when offered to customers to raise their environmental protection awareness, its price can be higher than plastic bags but due to its reusability; and the fact that consumers normally do not care for the country of origin (because cloth bags is used for more environmental protection rather than fashionable and expensive high-end products as long as their materials is good), price sensitivity and country of origin is not very suitable to add to this study Meanwhile, media exposure is usually a good means of communication to encourage people to develop green behaviors, it is more advisable to use Media exposure to environmental messages as an additional variable of this model

1.2 Statement of the problems

The problems of plastic bags dumping to environment from daily use is a threat to people’s lives In the world, government and different companies and organizations coming with various solutions to help deal with this such as: banning plastic bags’

uses or put a restriction to different entities, switching plastic bags used in business

to alternatives In Vietnam, the Government is taking some first step to prevent the

negative effects of using plastic bags The project to enhance the environmental pollution control due to people using difficult-to-decompose plastic bags states that those types of plastic bags are banned from manufacturing and used Similarly, many companies and organizations also undertake campaigns to help educate people about the impact of using plastic bags and partly help shift the consumer’s preferences to use alternatives of plastic bags With great efforts, Vietnamese people seem aware of those consequences of their usage of plastic bags However, they are somehow unconcerned and due to the convenience of plastic bags, still reach to use them In the case of more and more eco-friendly bags are produced and promoted for daily uses, in particular cloth bags, it is necessary to investigate what can influence the intention to purchase cloth bags in order to control this phenomenon and also help the business investigate what actions to take to shift the consumer’s preferences to green consumption Moreover, the lack of researches in this subject, especially in Vietnam also a more recent and newer look into this field

of study

1.3 Research objectives

First, based on the literature on theory of planned behavior and customer purchase intention, identifying and investigating if the components of theory of planned behavior can be considered as factors affecting customer purchase intention for one

of green products known as cloth bags for shopping, which means these constructs

are seen as units of analysis Second, this research aims at finding a moderator that

can make an influence on the relationship between the constructs of theory of planned behavior and customer purchase intention In addition, these relationships are be explored to find out how they are affected and from that, this thesis gives several solutions to help improve the situation dedicated to the context of Vietnam

1.4 Research questions

Together with the objectives and necessity of the research, this thesis answers the following questions:

1 What factors affect consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping?

2 Are there any variables moderate the relations between these factors and customer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping?

1.5 Research scope

This study is conducted in Hanoi City which is the capital of Vietnam where there is

a considerable amount of population with strong purchasing power and high level of concern for green products and green consumption behavior with the time range from the end of 2018 to 2019

1.6 Structure of the research

This thesis is divided into six chapters, as presented as follow:

 Chapter 1: Introduction This part introduces briefly about the research, the necessity of it, research objectives, research questions and scope

 Chapter 2: Literature review This chapter provides theoretical framework for the research It includes fundamental concepts about green marketing and green consumption behavior as well as theory of planned behaviors and explanation on research model and the hypotheses used in this research

 Chapter 3: Research Methodology This chapter describes the data collection and analyzing process which are methods based on previous literature

 Chapter 4: Data presentation and findings This chapter gives description of data collected, and then show analysis results from SPSS software, version 20 and then test the proposed hypothesis

 Chapter 5: Discussions and conclusion This chapter answers the research questions, discuss research findings as well as giving some suggestions or any solutions to the found results, limitations and further research direction

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Green consumptions and related definitions

2.1.1 Sustainable consumption

Due to the rapid growth of every aspect all over the world, the scientific community started to realize that unsustainable development was a crucial issue which led to the collapse of the environment and the economy The Club of Rome first mentioned the term “sustainable consumption” in their article named “the growth limits” (Meadows et al., 1972)

From that point of view, sustainable development is assumed to help mankind survive in the long run after decades of economic development, which is undeniable the solution without any alternative (Seiffert and Loch, 2005) Moreover, in the area of sustainable development research, consumption has appeared to play a key role and also the priority position Consumptions in economics can be understood as the use of production products such as goods and services in order to satisfy human’s needs In common sense, when a person considers their consumption, their behavior relates to that household’s income and savings However, consumption is not only important to economic concepts but also vital to society and the environment Many researchers stated that consumption along with production system is a crucial necessity to establish sustainable development (Akenji and Bengtsson, 2014)

From that, sustainable consumption is, therefore, contributing to and leading the world towards a more sustainable development goal In 1994, Oslo Symposium on Sustainable Consumption proposed a definition on sustainable consumption as "the use of services and related products which respond to basic needs and bring a better quality of life while minimizing the use of natural resources and toxic materials as well as emissions of waste and pollutants over the life cycle of the service or product so as not to jeopardize the needs of future generations." (Norwegian

Ministry of the Environment, 1994) The global development research center, on the other hand, explained the term as the following: “Sustainable consumption is the consumption of goods and services that have minimal impact upon the environment, are socially equitable and economically viable whilst meeting the basic needs of humans, worldwide Sustainable consumption targets everyone, across all sectors and all nations, from the individual to governments and multinational conglomerates.” (Hari Srinivas, 2005)

In the end, different researchers have come up with numerous definitions for the term “sustainable consumption”, their meaning all contains the following points:

1 Human’s uses of goods and services which satisfy their needs

2 Minimizing the influence on the environment including reduce the use of natural resources or limit environmental pollution

3 The concern for the next generation’s future

4 Consider the products or services life cycle as a whole

In this research, with the idea of finding out what factors can affect the intention of customer to purchase cloth bag for shopping is one of the solution to help reduce the negative impacts on the environment and help customers towards a more sustainable lifestyle, knowing the true meaning of what sustainable consumption is important

2.1.2 Green consumption

The concept of green consumption was first mentioned in 1970 and from that time, many studies have expanded this concept So far, green consumption is still a relatively new concept and is defined in many ways The term itself seems to bring two opposite definition into one “Green” normally is associated with conservation

of natural resources while “consumption” going with exploiting those kinds of resources and at the same time destroy the environment Traditional consumption

is closely linked to the notions of sustainable development or sustainable consumption behavior, leading to inconsistency and clarity in the concept in research materials

That being said, it emphasizes the environmental factors both in short and long terms The concept of green consumption normally assign responsibility or co-responsibility to consumers who address environmental issues by adopting green or environmental-friendly actions such as using green products (organic goods, renewable natural energy for example) or avoiding products which are harmful to environment (Prothero, 2008) Nguyen Huu Thu (2014) also explained that: Green consumption behavior is the act of finding, buying and using personal and group products and services with the aim of reducing waste causing environmental pollution, ensuring safety for public health, expressed through their awareness, attitudes and actions Sisira (2007) also offers a fairly comprehensive definition of green consumption with the view that this is a process involves social behaviors such as buying biological foods, recycling, reusing, and limiting excess consumption or use friendly transport system According to Lee (2010), green consumption is an act of consuming products that can be preserved, useful to the environment and meet environmental concerns These are products that facilitate the long-term goal of environmental protection and conservation Green consumption involves not only consumer unused goods that damage the natural environment, but also decides to buy environmentally friendly products and recycled products

In this research, green consumption is considered and approached in terms of the following point:

- Buying green products

- Adopting environmental-friendly behaviors: recycle the green products

- Promote green behaviors

In Vietnam, researches about green consumption are not a significant amount

However, there are some should be mentioned, such as “Evaluation of the impact of green consumption in sustainable development in Vietnam” (2015) which belongs

to “For the cause of environmental protection” program of Ministry of natural resources and environment This research showed that green consumption plays an important part to sustainable consumption - a pillar of green growth and sustainable development This is also a strategy that many countries in the world including Vietnam are pursuing Green consumption will encourage the development of green goods and services markets, contributing to reducing waste generation, greenhouse gas emissions, conserving natural resources and moving towards a sustainable economy There are also some studies of green consumption from the perspective of social psychology such as "Green consumption behavior of Hanoi people by Nguyen Huu Thu (2014) The author studied the factors affecting green consumption behavior, from that providing psychological-educational measures to enhance green consumption behavior, contributing to preventing and reducing environmental pollution and climate change Another one is the study by Pham Thi Lan Huong (2013) on "Predicting the purchase intention of young consumers"

surveyed the cultural and psychological factors affecting the green consumption behavior of young people From these studies, it can be said that green consumption

is a prominent topic among Vietnamese researchers, however, the studies mostly focus on macro general issues rather than any specific cases such as: a type of green product or a single behavior related to green consumption of consumers Therefore, this study will serve as a case looking into a typical type of green product – cloth bags for shopping

2.1.3 Green products and related researches

The definitions of green products seem to bring out controversies among researchers Though there are numerous studies exploring aspects related to green products, its definition is unclear and the literature is lacking a well and commonly accepted explanation

One of the comprehensive definitions of green products given by Ottoman (1998) is

presented in the following: “Green products are typically durable, non-toxic, made

of recycled materials, or minimally packaged Of course, there are no completely green products, for they all use up energy and resources and create by-products and emissions during their manufacture, transport to warehouses and stores, usage, and eventual disposal So green is relative, describing products with less impact on the environment than their alternatives.” Green products can also be defined as the

products which do not pollute the earth and can be recycled or reserved Any products whose content or packaging can lessen or limit the impact on environment can be called green products as well (Elkington and Makower, 1990) In another research by Krause (1993), the results found that the consumers became more concerned about their daily habits and the associated environmental impacts Those consumers did not just form awareness or intention, but actually transformed their concern into active purchases of green products However, there were still a significant amount of people who were aware of the fact that their everyday behaviors could harm the environment, still remained refusing to adopt the intention

to buy any green goods

In short, mentioning green products, their characteristics must consider both these points: production and usage This means a product can be said to be “green” when both how it is produced and used afterwards do not harm the environment There are ones still be considered green products though one of the related process can do something to the nature, but the extent to which is certified and can be limited as much as possible

In the context of this research, cloth bags for shopping can be seen as a green product since both of their production and using process meet the requirements of a typical green product

In research aspect, there are numerous studies focusing on green products Cherian and Jacob (2012) studied attitudes of consumers towards products that are environmental-friendly They proposed a conceptual framework in which different attributes of consumers made impacts on consumer behaviors and gradually affected consumer green buying patterns The author concluded that there was a strong need for a shift in customer behavior and their associated attitude towards a greener one and also implied for further researchers to investigate factors that motivate consumers to use environmental-friendly products Sheikh, Mirza, Aftab, and Asghar (2014) explored the behavior of customers towards green products by investigating which factors affect green behavior and decision-making process The authors conducted a survey with 200 respondents via questionnaire and tested their hypotheses using Pearson correlation They found that the relationship between brand and gender difference and consumer green behavior was quite weak at the same time price, quality and green marketing show a positive relationship

However, the above-mentioned studies focused more on the general term of green products without specifying one Considering cloth bags are one of the environmental-friendly shopping bags and a green product, there are few studies looked into what could drive customers to shift their behaviors relating to this type

of green goods

2.1.4 Eco-friendly shopping bags and cloth bags

Since the reason why improving environment and limit pollution related to plastic shopping bags is quite clear, what alternative should be considered for consumers instead of plastic bags which are available everywhere with minimal cost still remains a debatable question According to citizensustainable.com, one plastic bag

is used only for around 12 minutes on average while its life span can last up to 1000

years People usually argue that breaking them down to micro-plastic can help reduce the life expectancy, they seem not realize the fact that if plastic bags are not completely biodegraded well, the overall impact of dumping plastic bags into environment will continue exist for a long time It is undeniable that using an alternative to get rid of one time use plastic bag is necessary

According to Md Abdul Jalil et al (2013), while there are numerous alternative choices for plastic bags, it is possible to categorize them into four following groups:

jute, paper, biodegradable and reusable bags

 There are many types of jute bags, which all biodegradable and quite compostable In addition, they do not adversely affect the environment and their production process is pretty straightforward and do not involve toxic chemicals

However, in Vietnam, the availability of jute bags is not common and the cost of production is quite high (because rather than made by machines in the factory, lots of jute bags are hand-made with experts taking time with trivia work) This facts lead jute bags to be considered an expensive item, a fashionable item rather than an everyday life use for shopping and storage purpose

 Before jute bags, paper bags are the most heard and well-known option to replace plastic bags in shopping purpose It is normally presented as a much friendlier to environment than plastic bags Its image of using recycled materials and easy to dispose or send to landfill make paper bags the number one choice in many supermarkets or stores However, most people don’t consider them as a perfect choice instead of plastic bags due to their inconvenience to recycle and their durability The materials make it is not handy to use paper bags in the second time In Vietnam, paper bags seem not a suitable option to travel with while shopping since Vietnamese most popular vehicle is motorbikes

 Biodegradable plastic bags are claimed to be a healthier option compared to traditional plastic bags Though marketers want to make consumers believe that biodegradable plastic bags is a better choice, researches showed that it does not

only improve environment, but also add more harms and reduce environment functions

 Regarding reusable bags, there are not only one type People can consider different materials, which all reusable and suitable for storing with this type of option Plastic or cane woven baskets are claimed to be alternatives since they are reusable and produced to be used for a long time, however, due to their nature of materials and production, these types are not mentioned here This leads to the other option – cloth bags These types are easy to carry, with cheap cost and production, available pretty everywhere and can be washed and reused

in a quick time There are many different types of fabric can be used to make cloth bags (for example: cotton, canvas etc.), however in this research context, the term “cloth bags” refer to all types of fabric with no differences The aim for cloth bags to be eco-friendly is (1) the time they are used is multiple, so life expectancy is long (2) the production process is also simple, no harmful waste causing pollution is produced (3) they also is easy to find and the price is not high in order to spread among everybody

In terms of researches about eco-friendly bags or related matters, researchers seem

to divide into two types: first is studying directly the issues around eco-friendly bags and second is studying plastic bags, which cause environmental problems and call for alternative like eco-friendly bags Since the context of this research focuses

on cloth bag – a type of reusable environmental-friendly shopping bags, the studies following summarized the related researches only

Jalil et al implemented theory of planned behavior to study on reusable shopping bags in Indonesia The authors showed in the results that using attitude to predict consumer intention to use environmental-friendly product was accurate, however, it was necessary to observe other factors that could affect attitude such as:

environmental knowledge, product appearance, perceived price and perceived value

Another noticeable study named: “Consumer intention toward bringing your own

shopping bags in Taiwan: an application of ethics perspective and theory of planned behavior” was conducted by Sheng-Hsiung Chang and Ching –Hsien Chou

in 2018 This study explored intention of consumer to bring their own shopping bag, with the idea of switching plastic bags with consumer’s own shopping bags (reusable ones), by combining two theories: Hunt and Vitell’s ethic perspectives and theory of planned behavior Testing by distributing questionnaires to respondents, the authors also found some surprising result Though three main constructs of theory of planned behavior was normally considered strong predictors for consumer’s intention, in this research, while attitude and perceived behavioral control made strong effects on bring your own shopping bags intention, subjective norm did not By integrated two theories, they also showed the effect that only one variable of this ethical perspective had positive impacts on three of them from theory of planned behavior, and the other influenced directly on only perceived behavioral control From these literatures, it can be concluded that the trend to investigate the issues regarding eco-friendly bags are becoming more and more popular in the developing countries, but still not a significant amount, the situation

is the same in Vietnam

2.1.5 Assumptions on using alternatives of plastic bags

The negative effects of plastic bags to environment and human health are no longer

a disputable question among people, however, which alternatives to limit the usage

of plastic bags really help the environment still put many scientists to doubt Some

of the solutions to this challenges which are being used by both developed and developing countries are charging extra fee for using plastic bags; encouraging customers to use alternative – reusable eco-friendly shopping bags; imposing additional taxes for using plastic products; holding educated events and classes for people with different age ranges; and using media channels to spread instructive information to as many people as possible to help improve awareness and change behavior (Ari et al, 2017)

However, among these alternatives, using alternative reusable cloth bags are bring into questions by some researchers, they want to explore more if “Cloth bags are really better for the earth than plastic bags” One report by Denmark’s Ministry of Environment and Food published in 2018 mentioned the opposite It is said that plastic bags, according to some criteria, are far better than organic cloth bags for environment Another study “Life cycle assessment of supermarket carrierbags: a review of the bags available in 2006” published in 2011 the UK Environment Agency also reached the same conclusions Is this really true? In order to understand these results, it is necessary to consider under what perspectives and criteria these researchers investigating the impact of cloth bags and plastic bags

First of all, these studies assessing the life cycle of those types of bags: from the very first process and raw materials the bags are made until they are disposed The criteria the bags are assessed also falls into some categories like following: climate change, toxicity and climate changes Secondly, David Tyler – a professor in the department of Chemistry and Biochemistry emphasized that it is impossible for only one alternative such as cloth bags to have better scoring and ranking than plastic bags in every single categories and criteria mentioned in above researches

(Alessandra, 2018) He also said that in order to clarify the best alternative for plastic bags, the customers need to consider which aspect of the negative impact they want to reduce In this context, the environmental problems caused by plastic bags in Vietnam mostly is being processed in a wrong way or discarded directly into the seas and oceans Therefore, in this case, the author considers cloth bags for shopping as the best alternative for plastic bags relating to mitigating the amount of plastic waste are being thrown into the oceans by reusing the shopping bags made from cotton as many as possible As far as the Danish study goes, the authors does not include marine life endanger as an impact factor At the end, it is the priority of what the country needs most at the time of conducting research And for Vietnam’s government’s goals until 2020 is to reduce 65% of non-biodegradable plastic bags used by that time, it is reasonable to consider an alternative that can last for much

longer time and limit the amount of related plastic garbage and does not harm the marine life

2.2 Consumer behavior and purchase intention

Customers play a leading part in marketing management and therefore, the main purpose of marketing department in an organization is creating values for them, presenting those values in its products and services, satisfying customers by fulfilling their needs Customers are the foundation for the success of organizations since they are the ones who decide whether to buy the provided products and services, which affect the organization’s existence in the long run One organization does marketing successfully, this means it creates a loyal and satisfied customer base, knows its customers, and understands the customer behavior thoroughly

Customer behavior is a familiar concept, however, there are different views and explanations on this among researchers Depending on the field of study, researchers, economists or policy makers give us a variety of perspectives, both on the nature and functions of the concept

John C Mowen and Michael Minor (1997) wrote in their book that customer behavior is defined as the study of purchasing units and the exchange process involved in the acquisition, consumption and sale of goods, services, experiences and ideas Schiffman and Kanuk (2007) took a similar approach in determining consumer behavior: the behavior consumers express in finding, buying, selling, using, evaluating products and services that they believe will meet their needs

According to Kotler and Levy (1969), customer behavior is the behavior of decision-making units in the procurement, use and handling, disposal of goods and services

From these definitions, customer behavior can be identified with three main processes: purchase activities, consumption activities, and disposal activities

Consumer behavior combines elements from different scientific researches such as:

psychology, sociology, anthropology and economics since each field can form a

certain type of factor that can affect the decision-making process of customers

Because purchase intention is one step of consumer behavior when consider to buy

a certain product or service, it is important for us to understand the process of consumer behavior before going to the details of customer purchase intention

According to Swati (2010), consumer buying process includes five stages depicted

as the following figure:

Figure 2.1 Five stages of consumer buying process (Swati, 2010)

In which, towards the end of the thirst stage: when customers are considering the

alternatives, purchase intention will be formed However, there are a lot of factors

that can affect the customer to form the intention, which is one of the strongest

predictors for forming an actual purchase decision Purchase intention can be

understood as the extent to which a customer want to buy a certain product or service There are numerous factors that can make an impact on customer purchase intention, and since in order for a customer to actually make a purchase, he or she must form an intention to buy at first This leads to the importance of investigating the factors that can affect the intention

Purchase decision

Information search

Evaluation of Alternatives Problem recognition

Post purchase behavior

In academic world, the topic covers purchase intention is very common, especially

in green marketing area Investigating factors, determinants, antecedents affecting customer purchase intention or looking into a specific factor that make impact on intention such as demographical, psychological or environmental factors seem to be

a trending approach In this research, the variable purchase intention is explored according to the definition by Ajzen and Fishbein (1975), which is associated with theory of planned behavior

There are many researchers chose theory of planned behavior for their studies which is about green marketing and green consumption behavior, all of them can be

divided into three groups: first group focuses on explaining green consumption

intention (for example: Verma 2018 - An application of theory of planned

behavior to predict young Indian consumers' green hotel visit intention);

second group focuses on explaining green behaviors (for example: Carola Raab et

al, 2017 - Restaurant Managers’ Adoption of Sustainable Practices: An

Application of Institutional Theory and Theory of Planned Behavior); and third

group explain both intentions and behaviors of consumers (for example: A Model

of Green Consumption Behavior Constructed by the Theory of Planned Behavior – Shwu-ing Wu 2014) However, in this research, consumer purchase

intention is investigated because cloth bags are treated in this case as a normal consumption product, and in the view of companies offer more and more types of cloth bags to the market, managers need to look at customer’s intention as a first input to have an assessment of the product in the market

According to a research named: “Sustainable food consumption among young adults in Belgium: Theory of planned behaviour and the role of confidence and values” by Iris Vermeir et al (2008), the author proposed the following model:

Figure 2.2 Conceptual framework based on Ajzen (1985) and Jager (2000) by

Iris Vermeir et al (2008)

In this model, the author chose “intention to purchase sustainable dairy products” as the final dependent variable In the context of this study in particular, the final dependent variable will be adopted as “Consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping” This change is reasonable to make since cloth bags in this case is considered the same consumption products as dairy products One note that is in this study, the term “consumer” is referred as the final customer who consume the cloth bags for shopping after purchasing them, removing all of the customers who are business (B2B model) So, customers are treated as final users – consumers of the green product

2.3 Theory of Planned behavior

Ajzen and Fishbein (l975) defined behavioral intention as the expression of each person's willingness to perform a specified behavior, and it is considered a premise that directly leads to behavior With reasonable action theory (TRA), the authors pointed out that: the most important factor determining human behavior is the intention to carry out that behavior Intention to implement behavior is governed by two factors: one's attitude towards behavior and subjective norms related to that behavior Ajzen afterwards added another element (perceived behavioral control)

and perceived behavioral control Below is the figure showing theory of reasoned action and theory of planned behavior with their determinants and relationship:

Figure 2.3 Theory of reasoned action and theory of planned behavior In which the broken arrow represent the added determinant for extending TRA

to TPB (Aijen et al, 1991)

Since then, TPB model has become one of the theoretical foundations and has been applied to many different areas of research in term of behavioral intention,

especially in green marketing and green consumption behavior

2.3.1 Attitudes towards behavior

According to Ajzen (1991), attitudes that lead to behavior are an individual's assessment of the results obtained from performing that behavior It also is the degree to which that individual judges the behavior to be positive or negative

Therefore, consumer attitudes affect behavioral intentions Developing on the basis

of this concept, Chaniotakis, Lymperopoulos, and Soureli (2010) showed that the attitude toward behavior is the judgment of the individual of whether the action is worth the money spent or not De Matos, Ituassu, and Rossi (2007) also mentioned that attitudes that lead to consumer behavior are due to consumers believe that using the product will bring a lot of benefits and that is the best choice for them These studies show that there is always a connection between attitude and behavioral

intention The more positive the attitude, the easier it is for customers to generate behavioral intention, in this case is the purchase intention toward cloth bag for shopping The attitudes of individual person play a crucial role in enhancing environmental awareness and changing behavior Hence, the first proposed research hypothesis is:

H1: Attitude has a positive influential relationship with consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping That means the higher/lower consumers form an attitude toward purchasing cloth bags for shopping, the higher/lower level of consumers forming intention to buy them

2.3.2 Perceived behavioral control

Perceived behavioral control factor was added later by Ajzen (1985) to adjust the TRA model This factor plays an important role as an individual's self-assessment

of how difficult or easy it is to perform a behavior The more resources and opportunities they have, the less they think there will be obstacles and the greater they can control the behavior In an article by Spark et al (1997), the author pointed out that perceived behavioral control includes the control factors both external and internal to a person, in which perceived product availability can be considered an external factor and perceived consumer effectiveness be internal factor In this context, “Perceived availability” is understood how easily a person feel that he/she can get a certain product, and “perceived consumer effectiveness” is the level to which a person feels that his contribution to use that product can help to solve a certain problem This means if a person is motivated to buy a product, the more available that product is, the more likely he/she can form an intention to make a purchase; and the more he/she feel that using a product is useful, the more chances he/she will buy it afterward Therefore, this is a relationship between both control factors and behavioral intention This is the same proposals from research by Iris Vermeir et al From this point of view, the following hypothesis is generated:

H2 Perceived consumer effectiveness has a positive influential relationship with consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping That means the higher/lower consumers perceive the effectiveness of cloth bags for shopping, the higher/lower level of consumers forming intention to buy them

H3 Perceived availability has a positive influential relationship with consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping That means the higher/lower consumers perceive the availability of cloth bags for shopping, the higher/lower level of customer forming intention to buy them

2.3.3 Subjective norms

Ajzen and Fishbein (1975) defined subjective norms as perceived pressure from society to conduct or not to conduct certain behaviors According to a research by Taylor and Told (1995), this pressure comes from family, friends and other important people who support or not that specific behavior The above studies show

a positive correlation between subjective norms and behavioral intention, in this case is purchase intention of cloth bag for shopping Therefore, the more support consumers receive from their influential sources, the more likely it is that the intention of behavior will arise On that basis, the hypothesis is proposed as following:

H4 Subjective norms have a positive influential relationship with consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping That means the higher/lower of pressure/support consumers receive from their influential sources, the higher/lower level of consumers forming intention to buy them

2.4 Media exposure to environmental messages:

Most people agree on the importance of media towards spreading important message to affect a community In a research by Iman Khalid A Qader, the author proposed that media exposure has a significant positive relation on consumer’s purchase intention, in his case the green electronic product He also used theory of planned behavior to explain his hypothesis on the problem Media exposure in this

case is defined as the media coverage on environmental issues to community This thesis will adopt the same definition for media exposure, however, take another approach with the model Since Qader pointed out that there is a relationship between media exposure and consumer purchase intention of green product, it is possible that media exposure can interacts with consumer to moderate their intention to buy a green product This idea goes the same direction with Reynaldo et

al (2017), when the author treated media exposure, not as an independent variable but a moderator which moderate the relations between constructs of theory of planned behavior and consumer purchase intention of generic drugs In the case of cloth bags for shopping, it is likely that the more a person is exposed to environmental message, the more intention he/she can form to purchase cloth bags for shopping Thus, the following hypothesizes are proposed:

H5 With greater media exposure to environmental messages:

(a) The positive relationship between attitude and consumer purchase intention of cloth bags when shopping will be strengthened

(b) The positive relationship between perceived consumer effectiveness and consumer purchase intention of cloth bags when shopping will be strengthened

(c) The positive relationship between perceived availability and consumer purchase intention of cloth bags when shopping will be strengthened

(d) The positive relationship between subjective norm and consumer purchase intention of cloth bags when shopping will be strengthened

2.5 Final proposed research model

Figure 2.4 Proposed theoretical model

H4 H3 H2

H1

H5c H5b

H5a

H5d Attitude

Perceived consumer effectiveness

Perceived availability

Subjective Norms

Purchase Intention of cloth bags for shopping

Media Exposure

to environmental message