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Impacts of health and environmental consciousness onyoung female consumers’ attitude towards and purchase of natural beauty productsijcs_817 627..638 Soyoung Kim and Yoo-Kyoung Seock Dep

Impacts of health and environmental consciousness on

young female consumers’ attitude towards and purchase of natural beauty productsijcs_817 627 638

Soyoung Kim and Yoo-Kyoung Seock

Department of Textiles, Merchandising and Interiors, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, US

Keywords

Health consciousness, environmental

consciousness, natural beauty products,

importance of product attributes, product

attitudes.

Correspondence

Soyoung Kim, Department of Textiles,

Merchandising and Interiors, 315 Dawson

Hall, University of Georgia, Athens, GA

30602, US.

E-mail: soyoung@uga.edu

doi: 10.1111/j.1470-6431.2009.00817.x

Abstract

This study investigated young female consumers’ beauty product shopping behavioural patterns, their perceived importance of product attributes, and their attitude towards and purchase of natural beauty products This study also examines whether consumers’ product attitudes and shopping behaviours are influenced by their health and environmental con-sciousness Data were collected from a convenience sample of 210 female college students enrolled at a south-eastern university in the US In order to examine the impacts of both health and environmental consciousness on other selected variables, the respondents were divided into four groups based on their scores on the two variables, and a series of analysis

of variance were conducted to compare characteristics of the four groups The results showed that health and environmental consciousness significantly influenced the impor-tance placed on beauty product attributes Additionally, those with a high level of both health and environmental consciousness were significantly more positive in their evalua-tions than those with low scores on both variables in their percepevalua-tions of natural beauty products Those with low scores on both variables were significantly less willing than the other groups to pay more for natural beauty products Analysis of variance results also indicated that the two groups with a high level of environmental consciousness purchased natural beauty products more frequently than those with a low level of health and envi-ronmental consciousness, indicating a relatively stronger impact of envienvi-ronmental con-sciousness than health concon-sciousness on frequency of natural beauty product purchases Health and environmental consciousness were both significantly related to a respondent’s perceived level of knowledge of beauty products and ability to distinguish natural from conventional beauty products

Introduction

Researchers of consumer culture suggested that appearance, body

shape and physical control have become central to an individual’s

sense of self-identity in a highly visual consumer culture

(Feath-erstone, 1991; Domzal and Kernan, 1993; Shilling, 2003, 2007)

According to the corporal theory of body proposed by Domzal and

Kernan (1993), the human body is the most visible expression of

one’s self and bodily behaviour or maintenance is a means of

interpersonal presentation in social activities They suggested that

being well groomed, while yielding the personal satisfaction of

somatic well-being, reflect social motivations as well, as

evi-denced by the desire to be attractive to others (particularly in the

use of cosmetics and other beauty-related products and services)

More recently, Shilling (2003) suggested that the body is a

‘project’ that is worked on and accomplished as part of the

devel-opment of one’s self-identity He also noted that the body is often

considered as a form of physical capital in modern society Such concepts may help to explain such behaviours as eating, dressing and wearing make-up Furthermore, with the body being consid-ered as a visual self, a heightened concern with one’s body and appearance leads to an increase in consumption of beauty products (Gimlin, 2006) and the emergence of many new styles of body modification (Pitts, 2003) Existing evidence from the research also shows that perceptions of body and physical appearance

influ-ence people’s behaviour in their role as consumers (Debevec et al.,

1986; Bloch and Richins, 1992; Reingen and Kernan, 1993) and alter their behaviour in the use of make-up (Miller and Cox, 1982) and clothing (Solomon and Schopler, 1982)

As beauty and fame have increasingly been celebrated in American culture, the pressure to look stylish has become stronger than ever According to a survey by The Nielsen Company (2007), 30% of consumers worldwide spend more on beauty products and treatments today than they used to The report also indicates that

two-thirds of US consumers feel that the pressure to look good is

much greater now than ever before In 2007, three out of four men

aged 18–64 years in the US wore fragrance and 9 out of 10 women

aged 18 years and older used skin care, make-up or fragrance,

accounting for over 170 million beauty users in the US (The NPD

Group, Inc., 2008) The Nielsen Company (2007) also reported

that the largest beauty expenditure for US consumers is on hair

care, skin care and facial treatment products

Alongside a growing emphasis on external appearance and the

consumption of beauty products, concern both with the health of

the body and with the external physical environment has emerged

as a recent consumer trend (Shilling, 2007) Over the past few

years, consumers have turned their interests towards a more

natural way of living, often called ‘green living’, a trend that has

amplified concerns for overall health and wellness with an ever

increasing interest in protecting the environment as well as an

awareness of the potential harm caused by chemicals in products

(Invest in France Agency, 2007) People trying to pursue a

sus-tainable lifestyle are likely to consider the health and

environmen-tal impacts of their daily routines (Spaargaren, 2002)

From a sociological perspective, researchers have suggested

that consumers’ concern for socio-environmental goodness has

been the moral basis of some consumption practices (Ellen, 1994;

Minton and Rose, 1997; Shaw and Newholm, 2002) This can be

observed in the market by the proliferation of environmentally

friendly products, services, and package designs and the

commer-cialization of a fair-trade industry (Caruana, 2007) In earlier

research Baudrillard (1981) has framed consumption in

postmod-ern society in the context of a theory of sign value He viewed

consumption as an active manipulation of signs, indicating sign as

a representation of morality and ethics in the social context He

also noted that the sign value leads the consumer to a series of

complex choices and explains why particular commodities and

brands become alluring and desirable According to his theory of

sign value, environmentally friendly or sustainable consumption

turns out to be an outcome of a sign of morality in current society

In the marketing literature, such moral concerns that consumers

bring to their environmentally friendly consumption practices

were explained in the context of a theory of rational choice

behav-iours The theory posits that rational consumers maximize utility

from their preferences, anticipating the future consequences of

their choices (Becker and Murphy, 1988) Researchers consider

morality as a process of rational individual decision making,

focusing on ‘right’ and ‘good’ consumption for society and

indi-viduals (Carrigan and Attalla, 2001; Caruana, 2007)

Keeping pace with the trend of green living and sustainable

consumption, global sales of natural and organic cosmetic

prod-ucts grew to about $7 billion in 2007, according to a report by

Organic Consumers Association (2007) With the growing

con-sumer demand for healthy and environmentally friendly products,

consumers have become more interested in beauty product

ingre-dients (Invest in France Agency, 2007), causing the natural beauty

market to expand much faster than the beauty market as a whole

Today, the natural and organic beauty product market has

expanded significantly and is expected to reach $5.8 billion by

2008 from about $3.9 billion in 2003, with approximately 9% of

an average annual growth rate, according to a report by the US

Market for Natural Personal Care Products (Decision News

Media, 2004) Organic Monitor, the British consulting firm,

projects global natural cosmetics market revenues to surpass US

$10 billion by 2010, and the market share of natural and organic products of total cosmetics is projected to reach nearly 10% in some countries including Germany and the US (Organic Consum-ers Association, 2007) The NPD Group’s study showed that 42%

of US female skin care users 18 and older look for products that are made from natural ingredients and 28% of female skin care users 18 and older prefer brands that have a physician/doctor endorsement (The NPD Group, Inc., 2008) Moreover, the study also showed that 77% of female skin care users aged 18 years and older reported that they do not mind paying more for a skin care product that works

In fact, in response to the increased demands for natural and organic beauty products, many companies have been either in-creasing their use of natural ingredients in existing product lines or else creating new lines that specifically cater to this trend (Deci-sion News Media, 2005) For example, established cosmetic com-panies such as Estee Lauder and Revlon increasingly look to

‘organics’ as a new marketing concept (Phillabaum, 2003) Even large retailers like Wal-Mart Stores in the US have started to offer their own natural and organic product lines such as body scrub, face cleanser, lip balm and shampoo (Kolesnikov-Jessop, 2008) Despite the growing concerns for ‘green living’ and the demands for healthy and environmentally friendly beauty products, little research has been conducted to investigate consumers’ beauty product shopping behaviours and attitude towards natural beauty products Thus, this study attempts to investigate young female consumers’ beauty product shopping behavioural patterns, their perceived importance of product attributes, and their attitude towards and purchase of natural beauty products This study also examines whether consumers’ product attitudes and shopping behaviours are influenced by their health and environmental con-sciousness In the NPD study (2005), skin care products were the most used beauty product among young women (89%), followed

by make-up (84%), shaving products/hair removers (84%), bath products (82%) and fragrance products (77%) The beauty prod-ucts in this study included skin care and make-up items This study focused on consumers in their late teens and early 20s because teens and consumers in their 20s represent a substantial market for beauty products, spending more than older generations in this product category, according to Shuchi Sethi, vice president of Nielsen Customized Research (The Nielsen Company, 2007)

Environmental consciousness

Today, environmental consciousness is not only a political cause pursued by environmental organizations and activists but also an issue bearing significant impact on marketing and sales in the

corporate world (Arvanitoyannis et al., 2003) Consumers’

con-cerns about environmental issues influence their attitudes towards

a product and purchase behaviours, especially for ecological or

environmentally friendly products (Oude Ophuis et al., 1992; Bohlen et al., 1993) Such attitudinal and behavioural changes

towards environmentally friendly products have opened a strategic opportunity for companies to compete in this new market In response to a growing concern over environmental issues, a wave

of consumer products has recently appeared on both store shelves and on the Internet boasting eco-friendly or green labels However, eco-friendly, green and organic labels do not create automatic

sales opportunities despite the substantial rise in environmental

consciousness among consumers For some, environmental

concern has become a way of life guiding their consumption on a

daily basis For others, environmental concerns are not always

translated into green consumerism (Hussain, 2000) because of

the conflict between environmental soundness and other benefits

such as prices and convenience (Wandel and Bugge, 1997) In

other words, many consumers are not yet willing, or perhaps

cannot afford, to forego financial and other advantages offered by

conventional products to pursue environmental causes

Researchers found that consumers’ concerns for the

environ-ment influence their organic food consumption (Kyriakopoulos

and van Dijk, 1997) Studies have found that better-educated

con-sumers and female concon-sumers are both more interested than

less-educated and male consumers in purchasing food produced in an

environmentally sound manner (Wandel and Bugge, 1997;

Tiili-kainen and Huddleston, 2000) TiiliTiili-kainen and Huddleston (2000)

also found that those with a higher income and young to

middle-aged persons tend to be more environmentally concerned Wandel

and Bugge (1997) observed that younger respondents gave

envi-ronmental welfare a high priority in their evaluations of food

quality, whereas the oldest group of respondents, aged 60 years

and over, considered health to be the most prominent reason for

their purchase of ecologically produced food products While

con-sumers’ environmental concerns clearly influence their attitude

towards and purchase of environmentally friendly products, no

known research is available to date that investigates environmental

consciousness in the consumption of eco-friendly beauty products

Health consciousness

Health consciousness refers to ‘the degree of readiness to

under-take health actions’ (Schifferstein and Oude Ophuis, 1998, p 122)

Health-conscious consumers may adjust their consumption

pat-terns because they believe that their actions affect their health

(Schifferstein and Oude Ophuis, 1998) Consumers buy

eco-friendly or environmentally sound products not only because of

their concern for environmental conservation but also out of

concern for their own health (Wandel and Bugge, 1997; Padel and

Foster, 2005) Individuals’ concern for food safety and health

issues have often been discussed in relation to organic food

con-sumption As mentioned above, Wandel and Bugge’s (1997) study

revealed that older consumers purchase ecologically produced

food primarily because of concerns for their own health rather than

for environmental protection In a study of Greek consumers,

Arvanitoyannis et al (2003) found that the large majority of

organic food buyers believed that organic food is healthier than

conventionally grown food and that about half of them were

willing to pay more for the organic version Schifferstein and

Oude Ophuis (1998), in their study of Dutch consumers, also

found a significant level of health consciousness among organic

food buyers Among those who buy organic food at organic food

stores, health and environmental issues are mentioned equally

often as reasons for buying organic food Although several studies

have found health to be a more important motive than

environ-mental protection for organic food buying (Worner and

Meier-Ploeger, 1999; Chryssohoidis and Krystallis, 2005), the results

may be compounded by other factors such as consumers’ level of

organic food buying and age Schifferstein and Oude Ophuis

(1998) stated that health is a more important motive for incidental buyers of organic food, whereas heavy buyers consider both health and environmental issues equally important They further argued that both health and environmental consciousness often coincide and that it is therefore difficult to identify which is the more dominant motive for organic food buying

While a substantial number of studies have examined organic food buying in relation to health and environmental conscious-ness, no attention has been directed at exploring the consumption

of eco-friendly beauty products Considering that a significant portion of organic food buyers also buy other environmentally friendly or sound products such as green detergents and recycled paper towels (Chryssohoidis and Krystallis, 2005), it is reasonable

to expect that both health and environmental consciousness may serve as driving motivations for the purchase or selection of eco-friendly beauty products Given the scarcity of published informa-tion on the topic, this research was designed as an exploratory rather than a theoretical study to examine young female consum-ers’ perceptions and their purchase behaviour of eco-friendly beauty products and to identify and compare different determi-nants of their eco-friendly beauty product buying behaviour

Beauty products shopping behaviours

Purchasing beauty products may be a complex and thoughtful decision because these decisions affect the overall appearance of

an individual Researchers argue that the importance consumers place upon various product attributes reflects their personal atti-tude regarding consumption of the product (Spieker, 1988) Con-sumers use product attributes as the basis for evaluating a product, and those attributes promise benefits that consumers seek when

purchasing a product (Puth et al., 1999) An early study done by

Keller (1993) suggested that beauty product attributes, including the ingredients necessary for performing the product function, price, product appearance or packaging and usage information, are the most significant factors for increasing the purchases and con-sumption of a beauty product More recently, The Cosmetic Toiletry and Perfumery Association, LTD (2006) identified basic and enhanced product functions, ingredients, packaging design, fragrance and price as product attributes considered important

by consumers when choosing a beauty product The Nielsen Company (2007) report revealed that a product’s ‘promise’ is one

of the most important aspects that US consumers placed on beauty products Most consumers considering the purchase of a beauty product first smell the item, which is why many synthetic cosmet-ics contain synthetic fragrances In addition to smell, beauty prod-ucts can be characterized by unique features such as absorbency, moisturization, appearance on the skin when used, thickness and residue; its characteristics and performance are the result of the ingredients of the product and their physical formulation (Wortel and Wiechers, 2000) These attributes may offer motives to select one beauty product over another

With growing concerns about health and the environment, many consumers today are notably interested in what they put on their bodies They try to control their health by looking for healthy skin care and cosmetic products As people believe that natural ingre-dients make the beauty products better and healthier, the use of the term ‘natural’ on the label is becoming a key sales-driving force (Decision News Media, 2004) According to the consumer insights

report by Organic Monitor (2007) regarding consumer behaviour

towards natural and organic personal care products in the UK,

consumers’ concern about synthetic chemicals in beauty products

is the major driver of growth in the natural personal care market,

with 89% of beauty product buyers stating this as a critical factor

in their purchase decisions The report also indicated that more

than one-third of consumers answered that they look for symbols

and logos of certification, and 79% of consumers said that they

would be willing to pay more for certified products Retailers also

noted that many consumers already read the labels very carefully

because they want to know whether a product is 5% or 90%

natural This observation consequentially leads to a significant

adjustment in sales and marketing strategies (Decision News

Media, 2004) Labelling may reinforce the perception of product

quality, conveying messages from the company, and encourage

consumers to purchase a product As many consumers today

rec-ognize the differences between natural and conventional beauty

products and prefer to purchase natural products, differences in

natural ingredient compositions and labels may dampen consumer

confidence in beauty products

Product packaging has the power to draw consumers’ attention

as they browse the retail shelves and lead them to take a closer

look at the product (The Cosmetic Toiletry and Perfumery

Asso-ciation, LTD 2006) In the face of the evolution of green living

along with increased environmental awareness, ‘eco-friendly’ and

‘green’ packaging have become popular concepts in advertising

Existing evidence from the earlier study (Smith, 1990) shows that

people select one product over another because of its

environmen-tally friendly packaging Consumers’ interests in green living may

not be satisfied only with naturally derived ingredients Instead,

they are pursuing a new lifestyle through the choice of materials in

packaging and the appearance of products (Bird, 2008) As more

consumers are looking for products and brands that are positioned

to be as green as possible and explore more eco-friendly

alterna-tives in packaging, companies have begun looking beyond product

formulations and looking more at eco-friendly packaging using

biodegradable plastics or recyclable glass (Edgar, 2008)

Like-wise, increased concerns about health and the environment led

consumers to consider eco-friendly ingredients and packaging as

important features of beauty products as well In this vein, it is

necessary to explore the influence of consumers’ health and

envi-ronmental consciousness on their beauty product shopping

behav-iours and attitude towards and actual purchase behaviour of

natural beauty products

Perceived self-competence in

purchase decisions

Self-competence is defined as the evaluation of one’s ability to

successfully bring about desired outcomes, often being considered

as one of the important constructs of global self-esteem (Bosson

and Swann, 1999) According to Tafarodi and Swann (1995),

self-competence comprises an individual’s feelings of being

capable, competent, efficacious and in control They also noted

that self-competence results from the successful manipulation of

one’s environment and from the realization of goals It is internally

calibrated in that a person knows what he or she wants to do

through behaviour (intentions) and then sees what results from

that behaviour (outcomes) Researchers suggest that high

self-competence plays a major role in offering motives for purposive behaviour (White, 1959; Smith, 1968) Low self-competence, on the other hand, is associated with stunted motivation, anxiety and depression (Gecas, 1989; Mearns, 1989)

Perceived self-competence in purchase decisions reflects the self-perceived capability to recognize and understand the differ-ences of one product over another in order to make a choice (Kapferer and Laurent, 1983) Self-competent consumers may have greater subjective and objective confidence in their ability and capacity to treat information (Miled and Esparcieux, 1997)

In general, consumers with higher self-competence exhibit better recognition, analysis and logic abilities than those with lower self-competence

Choosing a new product may require a certain level of confi-dence Someone who has more confidence in his or her knowledge about the products and purchase decisions will choose a new product on the shelf instead of the product he or she already knows In other words, the reason for choosing a natural product might be that they know about the products Such perceived self-competence, which may differentiate the consumers who actually purchase natural beauty products from those who do not, can be influenced by what kind of psychological cues consumers use when making a purchase decision

Based on the literature, this study was designed to investigate how health and environmental consciousness were associated with beauty product shopping behaviours, importance of various beauty product attributes, attitudes towards natural beauty products and perceived self-competence in shopping for natural beauty products

Methods Data collection

The population for this study consisted of female college students

A structured self-administered questionnaire was distributed to a convenience sample of 250 female college students enrolled at

a south-eastern university in the US The convenience sampling method is defined as ‘a non-probability sampling procedure, involving selection of the most available subjects for study’ (Portney and Watkins, 2000, p 742) and often used in exploratory studies for cost and convenience reasons Although the use of student samples has sometimes been criticized, students are con-sidered valid respondents if the study involves a topic relevant to them (Shanahan and Hyman, 2003) Even with the recognition that the use of a non-random sample limits the generalizability of the results, a student sample was deemed acceptable for the current study, given the exploratory nature of the study and its topical relevance Additionally, college students correspond well in age to the target population for this study – late teens and young women

in their 20s, an age group representing a key consumer market for beauty products (The Nielsen Company, 2007) Besides, using a student sample from only one geographic area it was possible to maintain a relatively high degree of homogeneity for the sample, reducing the potential for random errors and variability in the findings

The researchers first contacted instructors in different majors on campus and a time was arranged to visit each class for the purpose

of administrating the surveys The students’ participation in the

survey was voluntary and no incentives were given to those who

completed the survey Of the 250 questionnaires distributed, 210

were returned and used in the data analysis, resulting in a response

rate of 84%

Survey instrument

Health consciousness was measured with the nine-item scale

developed by Schifferstein and Oude Ophuis (1998, p 131) Two

examples of the scale items included, ‘I think that I take health into

account a lot in my life’ and ‘I really don’t think often about

whether everything I do is healthy’ Responses were scored on a

five-point Likert scale ranging from strongly disagree (1) to

strongly agree (5) The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was 0.79

Environmental consciousness was measured using seven

ques-tions developed by Grunert and Juhl (1995) and three quesques-tions

created by the researchers Examples of Grunert and Juhl’s scale

items included the following: ‘I often discuss environmental issues

with my friends’ and ‘I become incensed when I think about

the harm being done to plant and animal life by pollution’

(1= strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree) (p 50) Three items

were constructed based on the description of environmentally

conscious consumers contained in articles written by Heimlich

(2008) and Wandel and Bugge (1997): ‘I am concerned a lot about

environmental problems’, ‘I prefer to buy products produced in an

environmentally sound manner’ and ‘I try to make

environmen-tally correct purchases’ (1= strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree)

The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was 0.89

Ten questions measuring involvement in the beauty product

purchasing process were adapted from Chryssohoidis and

Krys-tallis’s (2005, p 590) study of organic food purchase behaviour

The original scale, developed to determine the level of

involve-ment in organic purchasing process, was modified to reflect beauty

product shopping behaviours Examples of the scale are as

follows: ‘I prefer to examine various beauty products before my

final choice’, ‘I am very demanding regarding the beauty products

I purchase’ and ‘I’m willing to devote much time in beauty product

purchasing’ (1= strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree)

In order to measure the importance of natural beauty product

attributes, respondents were asked to rate the level of importance

attached to 11 product attributes such as ‘non-allergic reaction’,

‘pure organic ingredients’ and ‘recyclable or biodegradable

pack-aging’ (1= strongly disagree, 5 = strongly agree) The items were

either modified from Chryssohoidis and Krystallis’s (2005, p 590)

study or created by the researchers

Perceived self-competence in shopping for natural beauty

prod-ucts was measured by three questions (‘I know a lot about natural

beauty products’, ‘I know how to distinguish natural from

conven-tional beauty products’, ‘Before I purchase beauty products I

know how to look at the differences between products’) adapted

from Chryssohoidis’s (2000, p 722) study (1= strongly disagree,

5= strongly agree) The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was 0.86

Attitude towards natural beauty products was measured by 11

questions either adapted from studies by Soler et al (2002, p 682)

and Chryssohoidis and Krystallis (2005, p 590) or developed

by the researchers The scale items were designed to determine

a respondent’s perceptions of natural beauty products compared

with conventional products (e.g ‘I believe that natural beauty

products are better for health’, ‘I believe that natural beauty

products are more effective than conventional beauty products’, ‘I believe that there are substantial quality differences between natural and conventional beauty products’) Responses were scored on a 5-point Likert scale (1= strongly disagree,

5= strongly agree)

Finally, the respondents were asked two questions as to how often they purchased (1) natural beauty and skin care products and (2) natural colour cosmetics (1= never, 2 = occasionally, 3 = often, 4= regularly, 5 = always) The correlation between the two items was 0.62

Results Correlation results

Pearson’s correlation analyses were used to examine relations among the selected variables (Tables 1–4) The Pearson correla-tion coefficient is a common measure of the degree of linear relationship between two continuous variables (Howell, 1992) The results revealed that health consciousness was positively

cor-related with environmental consciousness (r = 0.15, P< 0.05) Both variables were also positively correlated with perceived

self-competence (r = 0.19, P < 0.01 for health; r = 0.34, P < 0.001 for

environmental) but not correlated with beauty product shopping patterns with one exception: the only item significantly correlated with the two variables was ‘reading articles and other materials

regarding beauty products to get informed’ (r = 0.15, P< 0.05

for health; r = 0.18, P< 0.01 for environmental) Both health and environmental consciousness were also significantly correlated

with frequency of natural beauty product purchases (r= 0.17,

P < 0.05 for health; r = 0.25, P < 0.001 for environmental).

As for the importance of product attributes, health conscious-ness was significantly correlated with ‘pure organic ingredients’

(r = 0.25, P < 0.01), ‘no use of chemical ingredients’ (r = 0.17,

P< 0.05) and ‘use of a relevant sign or mark on the label’

(r = 0.14, P< 0.05) On the other hand, environmental conscious-ness was significantly correlated with ‘pure organic ingredients’

(r = 0.48, P < 0.001), ‘no use of chemical ingredients’ (r = 0.15,

P < 0.05), ‘no use of preservatives’ (r = 0.21, P < 0.01), ‘use of a relevant sign or mark on the label’ (r = 0.14, P< 0.05) and

‘recy-clable or biodegradable packaging’ (r = 0.53, P< 0.001)

As for attitude towards natural beauty care products, health consciousness was positively correlated with seven items Health-conscious individuals were more likely to believe that there were

Table 1 Correlation analysis results (health consciousness,

environ-mental consciousness, perceived self-competence and frequency of natural beauty product purchases)

*Significant at P< 0.05 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

**Significant at P< 0.01 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

***Significant at P< 0.001 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

T

substantial quality differences between natural and conventional

beauty products (r = 0.15, P< 0.05) and that natural beauty

products are better for health (r = 0.16, P< 0.05), more

fashion-able (r = 0.20, P < 0.01), technologically advanced (r = 0.19,

P < 0.01), cause no secondary effects (r = 14, P < 0.05), and work

better than conventional products (r = 0.19, P< 0.01) They were

also more willing to pay more for natural beauty products

(r = 0.19, P< 0.01) On the other hand, environmental

conscious-ness exhibited a positive correlation with nine items of attitude

towards natural beauty care products: environmentally conscious

people were more likely to believe that there were substantial

quality differences between natural and conventional beauty

prod-ucts (r = 27, P< 0.001) and that natural beauty products were

more effective (r = 0.19, P < 0.01), better for health (r = 0.20,

P < 0.01), of higher quality than conventional products (r = 0.15,

P < 0.05), technologically more advanced (r = 0.25, P < 0.001),

cause no secondary effects (r = 0.26, P< 0.001), and would work

better than conventional products (r = 0.15, P< 0.05) They were

also more willing to pay more for natural beauty products

(r = 0.27, P< 0.001) Neither variable was correlated with the

belief that natural beauty products were environmentally more

friendly

Analysis of variance results

In order to examine the impacts of both health and environmental

consciousness on other selected variables, the respondents were

divided into four groups, using the median-split method, based on their scores on the two variables The four groups were named as follows: low health/low environmental, high health/low environ-mental, low health/high environmental and high health/high envi-ronmental (Table 5) In order to compare characteristics of the four groups, a series of analysis of variance (ANOVA) were conducted The purpose of ANOVA is to test for significant differences in average scores among independent groups (Howell, 1992) In this study, ANOVA was used to compare the four consumer groups for significance differences in group means for the following vari-ables: importance of beauty product attributes, attitude towards natural beauty products, and perceived self-competence and beauty product shopping behaviours

Importance of beauty product attributes

The high health/high environmental group placed a significantly higher level of importance on pure organic ingredients than the two groups with low health environmental consciousness (Table 6) The high health/low environmental group was signifi-cantly higher on that attribute than the low health/low

environ-mental group [F (3, 206) = 21.16, P< 0.001] The high health/ high environmental group assigned a significantly higher level

of importance to ‘no use of chemical ingredients’ than the two

groups with low environmental consciousness [F (3, 206)= 5.50,

P< 0.01] The high health/high environmental group was signifi-cantly higher than the low health/low environmental group in its

Table 4 Correlation analysis results (health consciousness, environmental consciousness and attitude towards natural beauty products)

V3: Substantial quality difference 0.15* 0.27*** 1.00

V10: Technologically advanced 0.18** 0.25*** 0.31*** 0.30*** 0.23*** 0.32*** 0.26*** 0.40*** 0.43*** 1.00

V11: Environmentally friendly 0.06 0.12 0.29*** 0.25*** 0.26*** 0.47*** 0.35*** 0.37*** 0.18* 0.30*** 1.00 V12: Willingness to pay more 0.21** 0.27*** 0.40*** 0.44*** 0.33*** 0.44*** 0.25*** 0.40*** 0.49*** 0.29*** 0.23***

*Significant at P< 0.05 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

**Significant at P< 0.01 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

***Significant at P< 0.001 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

Table 5 Comparison of health and environmental consciousness

F-value

Environmental

consciousness

***Significant at P< 0.001 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

a, bCell means that do not share a letter in their superscripts differ at P< 0.05 according to Scheffe test.

perception of the importance of ‘no use of preservatives’ [F (3,

205)= 4.12, P< 0.01] The two groups with high environmental

consciousness scored significantly higher than the two groups with

low environmental consciousness in the importance of recyclable

or biodegradable packaging [F (3, 206) = 20.12, P< 0.001]

Attitude towards natural beauty products

The two groups with high environmental consciousness perceived

more strongly than the low health/low environmental group that

there were substantial quality differences between natural and

conventional beauty products [F (3, 205) = 6.76, P< 0.001]

(Table 7) The high health/high environmental group believed

more strongly than the low health/low environmental group that

natural beauty products were fashionable products [F (3,

205)= 3.60, P < 0.05], were better for health [F (3, 205) = 0.3.95,

P < 0.01], did not have secondary effects [F (3, 204) = 3.78,

P < 0.05], would work better than conventional products [F (3,

205)= 3.36, P < 0.05], were technologically advanced [F (3,

205)= 3.89, P< 0.05] and were significantly different from

con-ventional beauty products [F (3, 205) = 3.01, P< 0.05] Finally, the low health/low environmental group was significantly less willing than the other three groups to pay more for natural beauty

products [F (3, 205) = 7.39, P< 0.001]

Perceived self-competence and beauty product shopping behaviours

The high health/high environmental group exhibited a signifi-cantly higher level of perceived self-competence than the low

Table 6 Comparison of importance of beauty product attributes

F-value

*Significant at P< 0.05 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

**Significant at P< 0.01 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

***Significant at P< 0.001 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

a, b, ab, cCell means that do not share a letter in their superscripts differ at P< 0.05 according to Scheffe test.

Table 7 Comparison of attitude towards natural beauty products

F-value

*Significant at P< 0.05 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

**Significant at P< 0.01 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

***Significant at P< 0.001 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

a, b, abCell means that do not share a letter in their superscripts differ at P< 0.05 according to Scheffe test.

health/low environmental group [F (3, 205) = 7.05, P< 0.001]

(Table 8) The two groups with high environmental consciousness

purchased natural beauty products significantly more frequently

than the low health/low environmental group [F (3, 205)= 4.56,

P< 0.01] The four groups did not significantly differ in any of the

selected beauty product shopping behavioural patterns

Discussions

Whereas a significant amount of attention has been directed

towards organic food buying in relation to health and

environmen-tal consciousness, there has been no academic research to date

that has shed light on how consumer concerns for health and

environmental issues are associated with their consumption of

eco-friendly beauty products The current study was designed as

an exploratory study to gain insight into young female consumers’

perceptions and their purchase behaviour of eco-friendly beauty

products, particularly with a focus on comparing the influences of

health and environmental consciousness on those variables

It should be noted that in this sample health and environmental

consciousness were not independent variables The two variables

were marginally and positively correlated, suggesting that

health-conscious individuals also tended to care about environmental

issues and to strive to make environmentally sound purchases In

previous studies of organic food buying (e.g Wandel and Bugge,

1997; Schifferstein and Oude Ophuis, 1998; Chryssohoidis and

Krystallis, 2005), health and environment were often mentioned

as two important reasons for buying organic Wandel and Bugge,

1997, for example, found that Norwegian consumers purchase

food produced in an environmentally sound manner not only for

reasons of environmental protection but also for their own health

A similar observation was also made among Dutch (Schifferstein

and Oude Ophuis, 1998) and Greek consumers (Chryssohoidis

and Krystallis, 2005) The results of the current study may suggest

that health and environment issues are often mentioned together as

motives for buying environmentally friendly products not only

because consumers perceive such products as both healthy and

environmentally friendly but also because health and

environmen-tal consciousness are significantly interrelated In other words,

environmentally conscious consumers are also health conscious to

some degree and therefore may often consider health and

environ-ment as two critical reasons guiding their consumption This

finding is understandable because as Schifferstein and Oude

Ophuis (1998) pointed out, concerns for the well-being of the

individual and the state of the environment are derived from the

same ideology

Health and environmental consciousness were both signifi-cantly related to a respondent’s perceived level of knowledge of beauty products and ability to distinguish natural from conven-tional beauty products Individuals who are concerned about health and environmental issues are aware that their consumption behaviours have a major impact on health and the environment and thus may actively seek information regarding product attributes that could potentially be harmful to health and the environment Their knowledge of and attention to different beauty product attributes naturally results in heightened confidence in their ability

to distinguish differences between natural and conventional beauty products It is interesting, however, that those who were health and environmentally conscious did not significantly differ from others

in their shopping patterns for beauty products, particularly pertain-ing to deliberate decision makpertain-ing and comparison shopppertain-ing It appears that health and environmental conscious consumers are not relatively more deliberate nor active comparison shoppers when it comes to beauty products In other words, those individu-als did not spend more time and effort than others on comparing alternative purchase options, perhaps because of their confidence

in their knowledge and ability to discern differences between products

While health and environmental consciousness were related to many of the same variables (perceived self-competence, frequency

of natural beauty product purchases, tendency to read about beauty products to get informed, importance of several product attributes, many items associated with attitude towards natural beauty care products, willingness to pay more for natural beauty products), a few variables appeared to be associated with only one of the two but not both For example, the importance given to the absence of preservatives and the use of recyclable or biodegradable packaging was related only to environmental consciousness Although both health and environmental consciousness were significantly corre-lated with the belief that natural beauty care products were better for health and work better than conventional products, only health consciousness exhibited a significant correlation with the belief that natural beauty products were more fashionable

In order to examine how a combination of health and environ-mental consciousness affected other selected consumer variables,

it was determined that the respondents should be divided into four groups based on their scores on health and environmental con-sciousness and that group differences should be examined using a series of ANOVA The results indicated that the two groups with a high level of environmental consciousness (the high health/high environment group and the low health/high environment group) purchased natural beauty products more frequently than those with

Table 8 Comparison of self competence and purchase behaviour

F-value

low environment low environment high environment high environment

**Significant at P< 0.01 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

***Significant at P< 0.001 (1 = strongly agree, 5 = strongly disagree).

a, b, abCell means that do not share a letter in their superscripts differ at P< 0.05 according to Scheffe test.

a low level of health and environmental consciousness It is also

noteworthy that among those with a low level of health

conscious-ness, individuals with a high level of environmental consciousness

purchased natural beauty products significantly more frequently

than those with a low level of environmental consciousness This

result indicates a relatively stronger impact of environmental

con-sciousness than health concon-sciousness on frequency of natural

beauty product purchases This finding was also confirmed by the

correlation results revealing a stronger association of

environmen-tal consciousness with natural beauty product purchases The

finding that environmental consciousness was a better indicator of

natural beauty product purchases is particularly interesting, given

prevalent marketing efforts by natural beauty product companies

emphasizing health benefits such as absence of chemical

ingredi-ents and preservatives such as paraben Although it is difficult to

come to a general conclusion based only on one study, the results

from this study suggest that concerns about environmental issues

may serve as a more enduring motive for changing consumption

patterns of beauty products than health consciousness In order

to provide better insights into the relative importance of the two

motives, future studies may compare incidental buyers and heavy

users of natural beauty products for their dominant motives

Additionally, ANOVA results showed that health and

environ-mental consciousness significantly influenced the importance

placed on beauty product attributes Significant impacts were

shown for pure organic ingredients, absence of chemical

ingre-dients and absence of preservatives It is particularly interesting

to observe that the low health/low environment group considered

use of organic ingredients significantly less important than the

other three groups Although no clinical studies have proven that

use of organic ingredients results in improved medical or

cos-metic benefits, health-conscious consumers may believe that

organic ingredients in beauty products are healthier, just as with

organic food Not surprisingly, only environmental

conscious-ness was associated with the importance given to recyclable or

biodegradable packaging Health and environmental

conscious-ness were not related to such attributes as ‘no scent’, ‘no allergic

reaction’, ‘dermatologist tested’, ‘free of skin irritants’,

‘appro-priate appearance’ and ‘appro‘appro-priate scent’ The results suggest

that health- and environment-conscious consumers do not pay

particular attention to hypoallergenic labels nor seek for a

par-ticular kind of product appearance or scent They are mostly

interested in organic or natural ingredients without the presence

of chemicals This finding is consistent with the observation

made in a previous survey of UK consumers, conducted by

Organic Monitor (2007), that consumers’ major concern in their

purchase decision on natural and organic beauty products is the

absence of synthetic chemicals

Overall, those with a high level of both health and

environmen-tal consciousness were significantly more positive in their

evalu-ations than those with low scores on both variables in their

perceptions of natural beauty products Additionally, those with

low scores on both variables were significantly less willing than

the other groups to pay more for natural beauty products This

finding is in line with the observation of Arvanitoyannis et al.

(2003) that both health and environmental consciousness resulted

in a willingness to pay more for organic food among Greek

con-sumers The researchers also suggested that healthiness must be

combined with environmental consciousness to serve as a strong

motive to purchase organic food, a finding that appears to be supported in the current study of natural beauty products The finding also supports previous studies that indicated that consum-ers who are concerned about the environment are more willing to

pay a premium for green products (Bang et al., 2000; Tanner and

Kast, 2003)

The significant group differences, as revealed by the ANOVA results, suggested that health and environmental consciousness could be used as effective segmentation variables for the natural beauty product market When studied in conjunction with other consumer characteristics such as favourite shopping venues (e.g health food stores, traditional grocery stores, department stores, Internet), price sensitivity and loyalty behaviours, a market seg-mentation based on health and environmental consciousness can help marketers construct meaningful consumer profiles and sub-sequently help them develop effective sales and promotional strategies

It is interesting to note that environmental consciousness was not significantly correlated with the belief that natural beauty products were more environmentally friendly This finding may

be because most people believe that natural beauty products are undoubtedly more environmentally friendly In other words, you

do not have to be environmentally conscious to believe that these products are more environmentally friendly and sound As dis-cussed earlier, however, environment- and health-conscious con-sumers believed more strongly than their counterparts in other benefits of natural beauty products, including their fashion value The growing population of health- and environment-conscious consumers and their positive attitudes towards natural beauty products as well as their willingness to pay higher prices for these products may prompt companies to aggressively market natural beauty products through misleading labels and unsupported claims about their health and environmental benefits Recently, under the constant pressures from consumer advocate groups such

as the Organic Consumers Association (OCA), the US Department

of Agriculture has acknowledged that there are problems with its monitoring and reinforcement of the national organic certification programme Additionally, a recent study commissioned by the OCA indicated that many leading natural and organic branded products contain toxic ingredients that may cause cancer, a finding that partly contributed to a lawsuit filed by the state of California against several leading beauty care companies (OCA, 2008) Alongside such efforts to influence consumer and marketing poli-cies and practices, consumer advocate groups need to find efficient ways to educate consumers about current labelling policies and regulations and also to make them aware of common myths and misconceptions about the benefits of different ingredients used in natural beauty care products Through such efforts, consumers will become less vulnerable to inaccurate and misleading information and marketing tactics used by beauty care companies

This study had several limitations that should be considered when interpreting its results First, this study used a convenience sample and was limited to female college students at a single university in the US Therefore, the results of this study cannot be generalized to women of different age groups and in different geographic locations Second, because there was no published research on natural beauty products to guide the development of a systematic research model, this study was designed simply to be exploratory in nature Based on the findings from the current