The impact of personal values on attitude toward consequences of purchase and environmental commitment in green consumption

--- Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2014 Tran Que Khanh THE IMPACT OF PERSONAL VALUES ON ATTITUDE TOWARD CONSEQUENCES OF PURCHASE AND ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITMENT IN GREEN CONSUMPTION MASTER OF

-

Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2014

Tran Que Khanh

THE IMPACT OF PERSONAL VALUES

ON ATTITUDE TOWARD CONSEQUENCES OF PURCHASE AND ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITMENT

IN GREEN CONSUMPTION

MASTER OF BUSINESS (Honours)

-

Ho Chi Minh City – Year 2014

Tran Que Khanh

THE IMPACT OF PERSONAL VALUES

ON ATTITUDE TOWARD CONSEQUENCES OF PURCHASE AND ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITMENT

IN GREEN CONSUMPTION

ID: 22120126

MASTER OF BUSINESS (Honours) SUPERVIOR: Dr Le Nhat Hanh

I would like to extend my appreciation to the other members of committee for their contributions which helped me to improve this research

Thank you to all of people who spent their time and effort for my survey Last but certainly not least, I am deeply appreciative of the endless love and good conditional support from my family to complete this work

ABSTRACT

Facing with environmental problems all over the world, more and more people turn their talk into walk In other words, consumers are not only concerned but also getting the idea of being greener According to this, by buying the ecologically friendly products, they want to reduce their impact of purchase on environment Hence, the aim of this research is to examie the impact of personal values on attitude toward consequences of purchase and environmental commitment in green consumption

A convenience sampling method was employed In total, 150 Vietnamese consumer responses were collected and used for analysis to test the model The results show that people who commit with environment are collectivistic oriented; so these consumers usually pay attention to environmental consequences of their purchasing

On the other hand, individualistic consumers are more likely not to be environmental commitment people because they are concern for themselves too much rather than others, included: welfares and society

This study provides useful information for businesses who are developing friendly products which are not only good for the environment but satisfy consumer’s personal needs also The result of this study might attract attention of consumer behavior researchers, as well as the firms that care about environmental commitment and pursue the green strategy Consumers who used to buy green products can be considered as informants in future research in order to explore the underlying reason why they buy the environmentally responsible products

eco-Key words personal values, consumer attitude, environmental commitment, green

consumption

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgement

Abstract

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION - 1

1.1 Research background - 1

1.2 Research problems - 2

1.3 Research objective - 4

1.4 Research methodology and scope - 4

1.5 The significance of the study - 5

1.6 Research structure - 5

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW AND HYPOTHESES - 7

2.1The concept of personal values - 7

2.2 Value – attitude towards consequences of the purchase - 8

2.3 Attitude toward consequences of purchase and environmental commitment - 12

2.4 The proposal model - 13

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY - 15

3.1 Research design - 15

3.2 Sample size - 15

3.3 Measurement - 15

3.4 Research process - 17

3.5 Data analysis method - 19

CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND DATA RESULTS - 22

4.1 Sample characteristics - 22

4.2 The reliability test: The Cronbach’s alpha test - 23

4.3 Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) - 25

4.4 Multiple regression analysis (MRA) - 27

4.4.1 MRA: to define the impact of collectivistic values and individualistic values on the attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase - 28

4.4.2 MRA: to evaluate the impact of collectivistic values and individualistic values on the attitude toward the environmental consequences of the purchase - 32

4.4.3 Multiple regression analysis: to justify the influence of the attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase and the environmental consequences of the purchase on environmental commitment - 36

CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION, CONCLUSION, MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS AND LIMITATIONS - 44

5.1 Discussion - 44

5.2 Conclusion - 46

5.3 Managerial implications - 46

5.4 Limitations and future research - 48

References - 50 Appendix

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

In this chapter, the important of being green to adapt to changing natural environment which are caused by human activities is demonstrated The situation of Vietnam is also mentioned in order to identify the same circumstances involved environmental problems that any countries on over the world are currently facing Moreover, factors influencing consumers’ motivation are briefly presented, as well as the relationship between them Last one, the purpose, method, significance and structure of this study are also introduced

1.1 RESEARCH BACKGROUND

Natural environment is extremely important to the survival and growth of all living on the Earth Unluckily, environment has been deteriorated by human through increasing utilization natural resources and worldwide consumption, because of the rapid economic growth (Chen & Chai, 2010) It leads to many negative results For example, global warming, depletion of stratospheric ozone layer, pollution of rivers and sea, light and noise pollution, acid rain and desertification, are consequences of environmental degradation, among other things (Ramlogan, 1997) All of them are called environmental problems which the world is currently facing

Environmental problems have been concerned by more and more people But the underlying reasons why human begin to be environmental conscious are not the same due to different personal point of view about the human-nature relationship According to the first perspective, human depend on nature environment And the relationship between human beings and natural environment is interactive Human activities impact on environment, and then, in turn the environment, it will reactively affect to human being It represents the utilitarian view Beside, from ecological-

balance perspectives, human, as well as water, land and etc are a part of a whole system in which each element must be balanced with each other It is a balanced

relationship Although personal point of views may be different from each other, helping the environmental problems society faces today is extremely necessary to human and nature also So therefore, some of consumers turn their talk into walk by buying ecologically friendly products or products from companies which commit with environment; because being green consumers is one of the ways which can reduce the impact on the environment

In addition, people have not the same personal perspective as each other because of the differences in cognitions, as well as personal values All of them lead

to their own behaviors Fraj and Martinez (2006) stated, “Values are considered as the criterion that individuals use to select and justify their actions” (p 134) In this way, there are many factors involved personal values that best explain consumers’ ecological behavior

From the marketing point of view, business ethics and corporate social responsibility (CSR) are become the awareness of society nowadays On the other hand, understanding psychographic variables is very useful to companies for identifying the market segment, such as: the segment of consumers who commit with environment in this case It is also extremely important to facilitate business through diverse strategies To pioneer research into new green products is one of sample These new eco-friendly products are expected to be good for environment and serve for personal needs; because it is necessary to satisfy more and more consumers, not the ecological consumer segment only

1.2 RESEARCH PROBLEMS

Comparing with developed countries, environmental topic in developing countries is nearly new, and environmental problems are concerned in recent years Vietnam is the developing country with an economic growth rate of about 5.5 percent and a population growth rate of about one percent annually In addition, Vietnam is an

under-investigated transition economy (Tsang, 2005), especially in the developing period and globalization, it is very necessity to aware of natural environment For the reason, environmental problems can be directly or indirectly linked not only to the patterns of production by industries but also to the patterns of consumption and

behavior of consumers (Tsen et al., 2006) It is anticipated that if the consumers and

producers continue irresponsible consumption and production, the environment will

be worsen and worsen day by day

More and more consumers have realized that and they have turned their environmental concern into action (Kangun et al., 1991) And purchasing green products is a specific action among others Consumers express their value of environmental protection through goods and services they purchase However, generally, there are two reasons which interrelated motivate green purchase, included individual benefits which accrue directly to consumer and environmental benefits which accrue to environment The second reason is take account into environmental consequences, which is at best long-term and future-oriented But, it may in fact be rarely realized by almost consumers Organic foods are an example that consumers buy because of good for their own health rather than for environment (Bonini and Oppenheim, 2008) These consumers have a weaker green consumption value, and not actually commitment with environment For marketers, understanding factors driven consumer’s green purchase is one of the key in green strategies in order to satisfy customers and lead them being loyalty It is also useful in predicting consumer preference for environmentally friendly products

According to Webster (1975), socially conscious consumer is defined as a consumer who takes public consequences into consideration of his or her private consumption Likewise, consumers who concern environment will evaluate environmental consequences associated with purchase decision In other words, these consumers commit to environment in consumption And the products they buy not

only meet their current needs, but also are good for environment Even they are willing to be inconvenienced in order to take more environmentally friendly actions

Several studies have indicated that the environment concern of individuals have influenced their purchase behavior (Chan, 1996; Donaton and Fitzgerald, 1992; Kerr, 1990; Ottman, 1993; Schlossberg, 1992; Wall, 1995) Furthermore, a number of the studies have considered personal values to understand what motivate people to buy green products (Kim and Choi 2005; Kim, Choi and Rifon, 2009; Stern, Dietz, and Kalof, 1993) through environmental beliefs (McCarty and Shrum, 2001) or environmental attitude (Grunert and Juhl, 1995; Kim, 2011; Kim and Chung, 2011) However, little attention has been paid to customers who have actually commit to environment in consumption are primarily driven by separated attitude toward products, including individual’s personal consequences and environmental consequences These consequences can be seen as two group attitude which are affected by personal values So, the research question is: Do consumers concern for environment when they purchase products? In other words, do they actually commit to environment in consumption?

1.3 RESEARCH OBJECTIVE

The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of personal values on the attitude toward consequences of purchase and environmental commitment in consumption

1.4 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND SCOPE

The research was conducted on consumers in Vietnam It centralizes all gathers and trading activities people come from different social level, as well as provinces and town in our country

This study just focused its scope on consumers who have already known about the ecologically friendly products, involved: green components, green process and less packing And it is well defined at the beginning of survey

The researcher handled the collected data and performed them by applying data analysis tools (Microsoft Excel and SPSS) Next step, the author used Cronbach’s alpha to test the reliability of the scale; doing exploratory factor analysis to identify which item is belong to others and to group them into a fairy large set After that, the author used multiple regression analysis to check the relationship between independent variables and dependent variables

1.5 THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

After this research, it is hopeful that its founding will play an important role in predicting environmental commitment in consumption in order to develop the suitable strategies to encourage, as well as educate consumers to choose and buy the eco-

friendly products instead of the non-responsible alternative ones; and to research & develop more new green products which not only are friendly with environment but satisfy consumers also

 Chapter 2: Literature review and hypotheses

This chapter presents the fundamental theories and concepts which invloved in The proposal model and hypotheses are also presented in this chapter

 Chapter 3: Research methodology

This chapter mentions about the sample and sample size; mesurement of the constructs and data analysis method

 Chapter 4: Data analysis and data results

The author summeries the collected sample characteristics and presents the research results after analyzing the collected data After that, the author

gives the conclustions for the hypotheses which proposed in chapter 2 from that

result

 Chapter 5: Dicussion, conclusions, managerial implications and limitations

This chapter dicusses about the main results, draws the conclusions and indicates the contribution of the study in management theory, as well as in

pratice Besides, limitations are also mentioned for future research direction

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW AND HYPOTHESES

In this chapter, the author presents definition of each mentioned concept, fundamental theories, and draws the theoretical modeling with the proposed hypotheses

2.1 THE CONCEPT OF PERSONAL VALUES

Personal values or individual values are considered as the frame of reference that individuals use to select, evaluate and justify their behaviors which are ordered by relative important/unimportant, good/bad In other words, personal values can be understood as “desirable goals, vary in importance, that serve as guiding principles in people’s lives” (Schwartz, 1994, p.88) And every individual has a specific value structure which forms the standards to lead personal behavior towards other people or objectives (Anana and Nique, 2007)

Aspect of a value is the type of goal or motivation that it concerns, Schwartz and Bilsky (1987, 1990) proposed that human values represent three universal requirements of human existence:

(a) Needs of individuals, (egoistic concerns)

(b) Requisites of coordinated social interactions, (altruistic concerns)

(c) Survival and welfare needs of groups (biospheric concerns)

Schwartz (1992) developed a universal value structure which is grouped into four dimensions, based upon collective-individual dichotomy, included: self-

transcendence, self-enhancement, conservation and openness

2.2 VALUE – ATTITUDE TOWARDS CONSEQUENCES OF THE PURCHASE

The value-attitude-behavior hierarchy has served as conceptual framework for many studies According to this, it illustrates that values influenced attitudes and in turn, these attitudes influenced behaviors Several researches have applied this model

to predicting a wide range of behaviors such as in a study of environmentally responsible purchase (Follows & Jobber, 2000), in recycling behavior (McCarty & Shrum, 1994), or in a study of natural food shopping (Homer & Kahle, 1998) Likely, Koo et al., (2008) showed that personal values have an impact on the evaluation of

consumer towards the service before the buying decision is made And, Fulton et al.,

(1996) predicted attitude toward hunting and fishing which was based on two wildlife value orientations

Collectivistic values promote the interests of other persons and the nature

world The definition of collectivism is characterized by: “(1) emphasis on the views, needs, and goals of the in-group rather than on the self, (2) emphasis on behavior determined by social norms and duties rather than by pleasure or personal advantage, (3) common beliefs that are shared with the in-group, and (4) willingness to cooperate with in-group members” (Triandis, 1995, p 6) In this way, according to Triandis (as cited in McCarty & Shrum, 2001), people are more collectivistic respect to interaction with others, give priority of group goals, emphasizes conformity and in-group harmony In other words, collectivistic values reflect an active concern for the welfare of others and desire to improve society It covers biospheric and altruistic

value orientation (Stern et al., 1995)

Individualistic values promote own interests regardless of others’ interests and

motivate people to enhance their own personal interests People are more individualistic tend to give priority of personal goals over group ones (Triandis, 1989), self-oriented (Hofstede, 1980) They emphasize individual rights over duties and analysis cost-benefit in determining behavior (Triandis, 1995) A more specific

definition of individualism indicate individuals who: “(1) view themselves as independent of collectives, (2) are primarily motivated by their own preferences, needs, rights, and the contracts they have established with others, (3) priority to their person goals over the goals of others, and (4) emphasize rational analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of associating with others” (Triandis, 1995, p 2) It is

named as egoistic value orientation (Stern et al., 1995)

Hsu et al (2010) stated that attitude toward a specific object can be determined by one’s expectation of object

Environmental consequences of the purchase can be understood as

environmentally responsible attitude in consumers’ purchase It means they have concerned for environment whenever they buy something According to this, Schwepker and Cornwell (as cited in Follows and Jobber, 2000) stated that an environmental attitudinal measurement is combined by statements which reflect concern for the variety of environmental issues Similarly, in the study of understanding green purchase, Kim (2011) also mentioned that consumers’ conscious concern for the environmental consequences related to their private consumptions lead them to be more favorable toward the environmentally responsible products They have a part in protecting and helping the environment become friendlier day by day It seems to be long-term objective of society

Individual consequences of the purchase can be understood as consumers are

priority concern for themselves when they purchase something Kim (2011) discussed about individual consequences of the purchase that likely the purchase driven by assessment of the product’s benefits would accrue directly and immediately to the private individual, even sacrificing additional others They do not care about the others too much, included environment… And consequences of their purchase belong

to individual’s personal satisfaction and serves for individual’s personal benefits, such

as how convenient for them It is short-term benefits and often relative to the assessment of costs For example, although encourage to use friendly bags when

shopping in supermarket in order to prevent the nylon bags which are harm to environment But, it may be inconvenient for them to bring friendly bags whenever they go to supermarket Moreover, the cost of friendly environmental bags always higher than the nylon ones If consumers buy the other friendly environmental bags in the case of forgetting bring them, they will spend amount of money instead of free for nylon ones Likewise, in the research of Follows and Jobber (2000), the results showed that consumers who took a importance placed on individual consequences of using diapers were more likely not to intent to buy cloth ones

According to McCarty and Shrum (2001), environmentally conscious behaviors will be influenced by basic value orientations consumers hold with respect

to their interaction with others In other words, the different personal values result in their own different behaviors Specifically, individualism focus on self whereas collectivism emphasis on group goals

People oriented collectivistic value are tend to more concerned with the potential impact of their actions on the society, as well as the environment That is, a strong underlying awareness of welfare result in a higher attention to the environmental consequences of the products which they intent to purchase In so doing, a product’s environmental consequences is one of important conditions which collectivistic consumers consider before making purchase decision Therefore, there is

a positive relationship between collectivistic values and attitude toward the environmental consequences of the purchase This relationship has supported in many studies Thøgerson and Grunert-Beckmann’s (1997) in a study of recycling and waste prevention found that altruistic value (collectivistic value) has a positive relationship with beliefs about the beneficial consequences (environmental consequences) Beside,

in study of the recycling of solid wastes, McCarty and Shrum (1994) indicated that collectivistic value has positive relationship with importance of recycling (environment consequences) It is hypothesized that:

Hypothesis 1: Collectivistic values will relate positively to attitude toward the

environmental consequences of the purchase

On the other hand, collectivistic people give priority of group over personal ones They always take account environment into their actions Furthermore, they are also willing to be inconvenienced in order to help environment be greener and friendlier For example, collectivistic consumers prefer to buy green products rather than alternative ones, although the eco-friendly products’ prices are higher Or when shopping in the supermarket, they are very please to take the reused environmentally friendly bags, instead of using the non-responsible ones which are provided for free It

is consistent with the recycling and waste prevention study (Thøgerson and

Grunert-Beckmann’s, 1997) The finding indicated that altruistic value (collectivistic value) has a negative relationship with beliefs about cost consequences (individual consequences) So, the hypothesis is:

Hypothesis 2: Collectivistic values will relate negatively to attitude toward the

individual consequences of the purchase

In contrast, the characteristics of individualism are tend to stress personal rights (for their own) over duties (for others) That is, a strong individual benefits’ enhancement lead to a less concern for their behaviors’ impact to others These consumers place an importance on their own needs; so they just only concern about what products directly bring to them, even expense of others For instance, the eco-

friendly products are clearly good for environment than the non-responsible ones However, the alternative products are usually chosen by individualistic consumers due

to lower price; so as that they can save amount of money at the present for their own They do not care about the potential environmental impact when consuming the non-

responsible alternative products Likewise, in the study of solid wastes’ recycling, McCarty and Shrum (1994) determinate that individualistic value was positively related to inconvenience of recycling (individual consequences) Given these diversifying results, it is hypothesized that:

Hypothesis 3: Individualistic values will relate positively to attitude toward the

individual consequences of the purchase

Hypothesis 4: Individualistic values will relate negatively to attitude toward

the environmental consequences of the purchase

2.3 ATTITUDE TOWARD CONSEQUENCES OF PURCHASE AND ENVIRONMENTAL COMMITMENT

Environmental commitment (in green products version) or engaging in green

products can be understood as a promise to be loyal to green products Commitment is similar to loyalty (Hennig et al., 2004) According to Gounaris and Stathakopoulos (2004), the attitudinal approve which is one of three primary different perspectives of loyalty is based on psychological commitment, purchase intention, and word-of-

mouth recommendations In addition, a distinct difference between commitment and loyalty is that loyalty emphasizes on past actions (Bowen and Chen, 2001; Zins, 2001) through satisfaction, whereas commitment indicates on future ones

On the other hand, according to Oliver (1980), customer satisfaction was established when post purchase expectations match with actual performance In other words, to satisfy customers is the same as to meet their expectations And, Namkung and Jang (2007) showed the significant impact of customer satisfaction on commitment, including revisit, recommendation, and positive word-of-mouth Moreover, Pura (2005) found that customer-perceived value significantly influences commitment through customer satisfaction But there has the conflict between customer-perceived value from the environmental consequence of purchase and individual personal’s benefits when consumer purchases environmentally responsible products For example, when using friendly reusable bags and refillable containers, the environmental consequences are reductions in amount of raw materials used and garbage generated However, there are individual consequences, such as the

inconvenience of bringing a bag or container to the store That may be significant enough to override the importance placed on the environmental consequences As a result, consumers may be purchase non-responsible products if the responsible ones are affect an individual’s personal satisfaction It is negative consequences of environmentally responsible behavior And they are not called be an environmental commitment person In addition, there are many studies in investigating recycling behavior indicated that an increase in perceived inconvenience or personal effort led

to the reduction of recycling intention (Dahab et al., 1995) and recycling behavior (Kok and Siero, 1985; McCarty and Shrum, 1994; Thøgerson and Grunert-Beckmann, 1997) Thus, it is hypothesized that:

Hypothesis 5: Individual consequences of the purchase negatively affect to

H1 + H2 - H4 -

H3 + Individualistic values

Figure 2.1: The proposal model

H1 Collectivistic values will relate positively to attitude toward the environmental consequences of the purchase

H2 Collectivistic values will relate negatively to attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase

H3 Individualistic values will relate positively to attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase

H4 Individualistic values will relate negatively to attitude toward the environmental consequences of the purchase

H5: Individual consequences of the purchase negatively affect to environmental commitment

H6: Environmental consequences of the purchase positively affect to environmental commitment

Summary

This chapter mentions about definition of each concept in the model, as well as the theoretical background which involved in From previous literature, consumers’ attitude toward consequences of their purchase, which includes environmental consequences of purchase and individual consequences of purchase, is impacted by two main personal values: collectivistic values and individualistic values And in turn, environmental commitment is influenced by attitude toward environmental individual consequences of purchase To sum up, there are six hypotheses in this research

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The ways to find the answer for research question are mentioned in this chapter, included: research design, sample and sample size, measurement, data analysis method

3.1 RESEARCH DESIGN

To dress a research design, the kind of model and measures of the constructs were considered in order to make sure they were suitable The focus of this research was examining the impact of personal values on attitude toward consequences of purchase and environmental commitment in green consumption The operation model was presented in Chapter 2 This research used primary data which was collected by using convenience sampling method with a survey questionnaire And informants were customers in Vietnam

3.2 SAMPLE SIZE

In this study, the model includes 5 factors with 19 items, so that the minimum sample size should be 19*5 = 95 observations And the researcher collected 150 observations

3.3 MEASUREMENT

Based on the literature, the researcher set up the survey, using scales that were already validated in previous studies All these scales, which were translated into Vietnamese using a translated and back translated procedure, used a five-point Likert scale varying from 1 (completely disagree) to 5 (completely agree)

Personal values comprised two environmental value orientations: collectivistic

values (CV) and individualistic value (IV) The items measuring value orientations were based on MCCarty and Shrum (2001)

CV1 I am working hard for the goal of a group, even it does not result in my

personal recognition

CV2 I am a cooperative participant in group activities

CV3 I am readily helping others in need of help

CV4 I am doing what is good for most of the people in the group, even if it

means that individual will receive less

CV5 I am sharing with others

IV1 I am unique, different from others in many respects

IV2 I am competitive with others

IV3 I am working independently from others

Consumers’ attitude toward individual consequences of the purchase (ICP)

was measured by 3 items which was adapted from scale of Follows and Jobber (2000)

ICP1 If green products do not fit my need properly, I will choose the

ECP2 I consider the potential environmental impact of my purchase when

making many of my decisions

ECP3 My purchase habits are affected by my concern for the environment

ECP4 I am willing to be inconvenienced in order to take actions that are more

environmentally friendly

Environmental commitment (EC) is, in this study, mentioned above that

commitment indicate on future actions through expectation, whereas loyalty emphasize on past actions through satisfaction So, the measuring commitment scale was adjusted from Zeithaml et al., (1996)

EC1 I would like to purchase green products in the future

EC2 I would like recommend green products to friends or others

EC3 I would say positive things about green products to others

EC4 I would encourage others to buy green products

3.4 RESEARCH PROCESS

Based on literature from many previous studies, the author proposed six hypotheses which were presented in Chapter 2 After that, the researcher drew the proposal model indicating the relationship among personal values, consumers’ attitude toward consequences of purchase, environmental commitment

Next step, the preliminary scale were selected for measuring constructs, as well

as conducting main survey of questionnaire The author adjusted the questionnaire again in order to make it easier to understand and more suitable with Vietnam market After finishing the properly final questionnaire, the survey was conducted by using convenience sample which collected from consumers in Vietnam

The process of the quantitative research was followed these below steps:

- Step 1: The researcher composed the questionnaire for the research:

After the author designed questionnaire in English, it was translated into Vietnamese so as to deliver to respondents.(see in Appendix A and Appendix B)

- Step 2: The researcher defined the sample size of the study:

In general rule, according to Hair et al (2010), the minimum sample is

at least 5 observations for each scale; and the sample size should be 100 or greater In so doing, the model in this study consists of 5 factors with 19 items,

so that the minimum sample size should be 19*5 = 95 observations

For standard multiple regression analysis, Tabachnick and Fidell (1991) recommended the required sample should be n > 50 + 8m (m: number of independent variables In this research, there are 4 independent variables Therefore, to run multiple regression requires the minimum sample n > 50 + 8*4 = 82 observations

The researcher used the sample size at 150 observations which was appropriate for both EFA and multiple regression analysis

After that, data was conducted based on convenience sampling method

- Step 3: The researcher delivered the questionnaire to the respondents at the time the research was deployed

The hard copies of questionnaires were directly delivering to respondents Besides, the online questionnaire was also broadcasted by Google docs The link of the online survey was sent to informants via email and facebook After clicking on the link, the respondents could answer the survey

by keying their answers and submitting them to the researcher

Data collection was conducted during 12 days

- Step 4: The research checked again the received questionnaire in order

to make sure suitable results

3.5 DATA ANALYSIS METHOD

For analyzing collected data in this study, researcher used the Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) software version 22.0 Moreover, for sample description, Microsoft Excel was used besides SPSS in order to statistic the sample, compare the results Next steps, the reliability and validity of scales were checked by using Cronbach’s alpha and exploratory factor analysis (EFA) After that, Multiple Regression was used for testing the relationship between independent variables and dependent variables as proposed hypotheses

Literature review

Preliminary Scale

Quantitative research

- Compose questionnaire

- Define sample size

- Delivery questionnaire and collect data

- Multiple Regression Analysis

Writing the report

Figure 3.1: The research process

3.5.1 Cronbach’s alpha

The acceptable value of Cronbach’s alpha for internal consistency reliability is above or at least equal 0.6 (Nunnally & Burnstein, as cited in Nguyen, 2011) And when the value of Cronbach’s alpha is very high (greater than 0.9), it means that there are more items than necessary or the items are repetitious in the scale (Leech et al., 2005)

The Corrected Item – Total Correlation also need to be considered, beside the value of the Cronbach’s alpha If the correlation of each specific item with the sum of the other items in the scale is moderately high or higher than 0.4 (Leech et al., 2005), the item is probably at least moderately correlated with the most of the other item and will make a good component of this summated rating scale Items with lower item-

total correlation (negative or less than 0.3) do not fit into the scale as well It needs to

be considered by modifying or deleting these items

3.5.2 Exploratory factor analysis (EFA)

The purpose of EFA is to define which set of items go together as a group or are answered similarly by respondents (Leech et al., 2005)

3.5.3 Multiple regression analysis

According to Hair et al (2010), the purpose of multiple regression analysis is

to help the researcher to predict the level of impact of independent variable on dependent variable

It is necessary to test these following main assumptions in order to make sure the multiple regression preforms exactly analysis result:

- Assumption 1: There was the linear relationship independent variables and dependent variable

- Assumption 2: The residual or error was distributed normally

- Assumption 3: No multicollinearity This assumption is important because multicollinearity could lead to misleading and/ or inaccurate results

According to Leech et al., (2005), when there are high inter-correlations among some set of the predictor variables, multicollinearity occurs

Multicollinearity could be checked from a correlation matrix and coefficients results

Summary

This chapter presented the sample and sample size, measurement scale of

constructs, research process and research method used to analyze the collected data

Both the online questionnaire and paper questionnaire were applied to distribute to

respondents After collecting and cleaning the data, 150 questionnaires could be used

for final analysis And these cleaning collected data were coded for input into SPSS

software Finally, the researcher introduced the method applied for analyzing,

included: checked the reliability and validity of scales and used multiple regressions

The next chapter will report data analysis and data results of the research

CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND DATA RESULTS

In this chapter, the researcher presented the result of the research The descriptive of the collected data was reported at first Next, the author tested the reliability of the scales by Cronbach’s alpha reliability and the validity of the scales by exploratory factor analysis (EFA) After that, the model was evaluated by multiple regression analysis

4.1 SAMPLE CHARACTERISTICS

A sample of 150 respondents included 58 men (occupied 38.7 percent) and 92 women (occupied 61.3 percent) from under 18 years old to over 45 years old Most of respondents were being in the age group of 18 to 25 years old (78 respondents, occupied about 52 percent) And according to education, bachelor’s degree occupied the most, at nearly 85 percent; the second group was master’s degree, with 8 percent Regarding to present career, most of respondents are office staffs who accounted for 70.7 percent; 31 students were counted, with approximated 20.7 percent; the smallest group was teacher/lecture/professor, with around 1.3 percent In term of income per month, it was ranged from less than 5 million VND to over 10 million VND And the majority of respondents had from 5 million VND to 10 million VND per month, with approximated 62 percent of total sample

Education Master

Bachelor High school Under high school

Career Teacher/Lecturer/Professor

Office Staffs Students Others

4.2 THE RELIABILITY TEST: THE CRONBACH’S ALPHA TEST

The Cronbach’s alpha of scales for each construct is obligated to test in order to make sure that all items in one scale were reliable in the use of measuring the research concept In other word, this measure indicates the consistency of a multiple item scale According to theory, to qualify internal consistency reliability, the value of Cronbach’s alpha should be above or at least equal 0.6 (Nunnally & Burnstein, as cited in Nguyen, 2011) In addition, if the correlation of each specific item with the sum of the other items in the scale (Corrected Item-Total correlation) is moderately high or higher than 0.4 (Leech et al., 2005), the item is probably at least moderately correlated with the most of the other item and will make a good component of this summated rating scale Items with lower item-total correlation (negative or less than 0.3) do not fit into the scale as well It needs to examine the item for wording problems and conceptual fit

The results of Cronbach’s alpha test for each construct were summarized in below

table:

Table 4.2:

The results of Cronbach’s alpha

Scale Mean if Item Deleted

Scale Variance if Item Deleted

Corrected Item-Total Correlation

Cronbach’s alpha if Item Delected CV1

8.668 8.907 8.979 8.935 9.107

0.701 0.713 0.696 0.709 0.665

0.843 0.840 0.844 0.841 0.851

Collectivistic Values Cronbach’s alpha 0.871

IV1

IV2

IV3

6.740 6.727 6.573

4.690 5.274 4.985

0.664 0.627 0.660

0.717 0.755 0.720

Individualistic Values Cronbach’s alpha 0.803

ICP1

ICP2

ICP3

6.473 6.573 6.820

5.177 5.092 5.115

0.719 0.754 0.724

0.813 0.781 0.809

Individual Consequences of Purchase Cronbach’s alpha 0.858

7.433 6.878 7.040 6.573

0.708 0.750 0.762 0.763

0.863 0.847 0.842 0.843

5.637 5.499 5.781 5.740

0.694 0.774 0.703 0.772

0.859 0.826 0.854 0.828

Environmental Commitment Cronbach’s alpha 0.877

The result performed that five scales had the result of Cronbach’s alpha above 0.6 The highest was 0.882 (environmental consequences of the purchase), and the lowest was 0.803 (individualistic values) Moreover, the corrected item-total correlation of each item is above 0.4 This indicates that all scales fit the requirement

of reliability Therefore, these measures were used in establishing the main survey to test to the study hypotheses

4.3 EXPLORATORY FACTOR ANALYSIS (EFA)

After analyzing the Cronbach’s alpha, the author evaluated the measurement scales by conducting exploratory factor analysis The purpose of EFA is to define which set of items go together as a group or are answered similarly by respondents (Leech et al., 2005) In this study, EFA was run through the Principal Axis Factoring with Varimax rotation method There are five factors in the conceptual model: collectivistic values, individualistic values, individual consequences of purchase, environmental consequences of purchase, environmental commitment The author examined if the items belonging to one concept actually are in the same group

Based on the test of assumption, the KMO was 0.921 presenting sufficient items for each factor The Bartlett test was significant (0.000 less than 5%); this means that the variable are correlated highly enough to provide a reasonable basic factor analysis

Table 4.3:

KMO and Bartlett's Test

Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin Measure of Sampling

the first five factors occupied for 64.166 percent of variance This indicated that nearly 64 percent of variance could be explained by five initial items

Cumulative

% of Variance

Cumulative

% of Variance

The Rotated Factor Matrix showed the items and factor loading for rotated factors with loading higher than 0.6 are significant as requirement The items clustered into five groups that they belong to

0.684 0.673 0.630 0.672 0.628 Individualistic

Values

IV1 IV2 IV3

0.667 0.617 0.701 Individual

consequences of

purchase

ICP1 ICP2 ICP3

0.655 0.741 0.643 Environmental

consequences of

purchase

ECP1 ECP2 ECP3 ECP4

0.664 0.628 0.675 0.705

Environmental

Commitment

EC1 EC2 EC3 EC4

0.617 0.757 0.711 0.735

4.4 MULTIPLE REGRESSION ANALYSIS

After testing the Cronbach’s alpha analysis and EFA, the author conducted the multiple regression analysis in order to define the relationship between five factors mention above The purpose of multiple regression analysis is to help the researcher to predict the level of impact of independent variable on dependent variable (Hair et al., 2010) Basing on the proposed conceptual model, the researchers ran three times of multiple regression analysis The first time was to define the impact of collectivistic

values and individualistic values on the attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase The second time was to evaluate the impact of collectivistic values and individualistic values on the attitude toward the environmental consequences of the purchase The last time was to justify the influence of the attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase and the environmental consequences of the purchase on environmental commitment

It is necessary to test these following main assumptions in order to make sure the multiple regression preforms exactly analysis result:

- Assumption 1: There was the linear relationship independent variables and dependent variable

- Assumption 2: The residual or error was distributed normally

- Assumption 3: No multicollinearity This assumption is important because multicollinearity could lead to misleading and/ or inaccurate results According to Leech et al., (2005), when there are high inter-correlations among some set of the predictor variables, multicollinearity occurs Multicollinearity could be checked from a correlation matrix and coefficients results

4.4.1 Multiple regression analysis: to define the impact of collectivistic values and individualistic values on the attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase

Results of testing assumptions

Assumption 1:

This assumption could be checked by using Curve Estimation Graphs and Scatter Graphs to define the relationship between the individual consequences of the purchase and each predictor As the plot shown in Appendix H, the relationship

between the individual consequences of the purchase and each predictor was linear regression Therefore, this assumption was satisfied

Assumption 2:

The normal distribution of dependent variable was test by histogram and scatter plot, which shown in Appendix H So, the collected data was met requirement of this assumption

Assumption 3:

Multicollinearity happens when two or more predictors contain much of the same information In other word, there are the high inter-correlations among some composite of the independent variables According to the correlation matrix below, correlations among predictors were low and Pearson test indicated the value lower than 0.7 This means that there is a low possibility with multicollinearity

ICP: Individual consequences of the purchase)

In other hand, assumption about multicollinearity is also tested by evaluating two collinearity diagnostic factors: Tolerance and the Variance Inflation Factor – VIF) The Variance Inflation Factor (VIF) performs the influence of collinearity among the variables in a regression model When Tolerance value is less than 0.1 or VIF higher than 10, there is high possibility of mutlicollinearity If VIF less than 4, there is no multicollinearity In this research, as table 4.7, the result showed that

tolerance value was 0.803 and VIF was 1.245 As a result, there was not multicollinear Thus, this assumption is satisfied

Table 4.7:

Coefficients Matrix

Model

Unstandardized Coefficients

Standardized Coefficients

T Sig

Collinearity Statistics

1 (Constant)

CV

IV

2.560 -.321 583

.518 099 068

-.215 568

4.943 -3.235 8.529

.000 002 000

.803 803

1.245 1.245

a Dependent Variable: ICP

(IV: Individualistic Values

CV: Collectivistic Values

ICP: Individual consequences of the purchase)

In brief, collected data was satisfied with 3 main assumptions to run multiple regression test

After checking all assumptions, the result of running multiple regression was reported to determine how well the model fit

Watson

a Predictors: (Constant), CV, IV

b Dependent Variable: ICP

(IV: Individualistic Values

CV: Collectivistic Values

ICP: Individual consequences of the purchase)

According to the Model Summary table, the multiple correlation coefficient (R) was 0.691, R Square was 0.477, and adjusted R Squared was 0.470 R Square was 0.477; this is showing that 47.7% of the variance in individual consequences of purchase could be predicted from two independent variables: collectivistic values and individualistic values

Table 4.9:

ANOVA

Model

Sum of Squares df

Mean

Residual Total

85.079 93.291 178.370

2

147

149

42.539 653

ICP: Individual consequences of the purchase)

The value of F was 67.030 and sig was 0.000 (less than 0.05) This indicates the combination of these variables significantly predicts the dependent variable

H3: Individualistic values will relate positively to attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase

According to Coefficients matrix (Table 4.7), the factor of individualistic values had sig value around 0.000 which was less than 0.05 as requirement This meant individualistic values impact on attitude toward the individual consequences

And the results showed that individualistic values were positively related to attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase because its Standardized Coefficient was positive (beta was 0.568) This implied that this factor which investigated in this research was a meaningful factor to consumers’ attitude toward the individualistic consequences of the purchase Therefore, the hypothesis 3 was well confirmed

H2: Collectivistic values will relate negatively to attitude toward the individual consequences of the purchase

In order to evaluate the impact of collectivistic values, the result showed that the sig value of this factor was significant (0.002 which less than 0.05) This meant collectivistic values impact on attitude toward the individual consequences Moreover, this relationship was negative because beta was -0.215 This finding was the same as hypothesis Thus, the hypothesis 2 was supported

ECP: Environmental consequences of the purchase)

Moreover, assumption about multicollinearity is also tested by evaluating Tolerance and the Variance Inflation Factor – VIF) In this research, as table 4.11, the result showed that tolerance value was 0.803 and VIF was 1.245 As a result, multicollinear really dit not happen in the collected data Thus, this assumption is satisfied

Table 4.11:

Coefficients Matrix

Model

Unstandardized Coefficients

Standardized Coefficients

T Sig

Collinearity Statistics

1 (Constant)

CV

IV

1.465 674 -.179

.404 077 053

.573 -.221

3.627 8.719 -3.358

.000 000 001

.803 803

1.245 1.245

b Dependent Variable: ECP

(IV: Individualistic Values

CV: Collectivistic Values

ECP: Environmental consequences of the purchase)

In brief, collected data was satisfied with 3 main assumptions to run multiple regression test

Next, the result of running multiple regression was reported to determine how well the model fit

Watson

c Predictors: (Constant), CV, IV

d Dependent Variable: ECP

(IV: Individualistic Values

CV: Collectivistic Values

ECP: Environmental consequences of the purchase)