Marketing Intelligence & PlanningThe effect of environmental concern and scepticism on green purchase behaviourTahir Albayrak #afak Aksoy Meltem Caber

Article information:To cite this document:Tahir Albayrak #afak Aksoy Meltem Caber, (2013),"The effect of environmental concern and scepticism ongreen purchase behaviour", Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Vol. 31 Iss 1 pp. 27 - 39Permanent link to this document:http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/02634501311292902

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Users who downloaded this article also downloaded:Yi-Chun Huang, Minli Yang, Yu-Chun Wang, (2014),"Effects of green brand on green purchaseintention", Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Vol. 32 Iss 3 pp. 250-268 http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/MIP-10-2012-0105(2013),"From concern to consumption: Influencing the purchase behavior of green consumers", StrategicDirection, Vol. 29 Iss 8 pp. 26-28 http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/SD-06-2013-0037Gary Akehurst, Carolina Afonso, Helena Martins Gonçalves, (2012),"Re-examining green purchasebehaviour and the green consumer profile: new evidences", Management Decision, Vol. 50 Iss 5 pp.972-988 http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/00251741211227726

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The effect of environmentalconcern and scepticism on green

purchase behaviourTahir Albayrak

Faculty of Tourism, Akdeniz University, Antalya, Turkey

Safak AksoyFaculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences, Akdeniz University,

Antalya, Turkey, and

Meltem CaberFaculty of Tourism, Akdeniz University, Antalya, Turkey

Abstract

Purpose – The aims of the study are: to compare the environmental concern and scepticism levelsof the participants and whether or not they display green purchase behaviour; to investigatethe influence of environmental concern and scepticism on green purchase behaviour by utilizing theTheory of Planned Behaviour.Design/methodology/approach – The data were collected from participant and non-participantcustomers of the e-invoicing program of Turk Telecom. Customers were clustered into four groupsaccording to their environmental concerns and scepticism levels.Findings – Research results show that those customers who have a high level of environmentalconcern and less sceptical reflect a positive attitude, have a high positive subjective norm andperceived behavioural control that motivates them to have stronger intentions to become e-invoicesubscribers in the near future.Originality/value – The results found in the paper provide clear evidence supporting the Theory ofPlanned Behaviour in Turkey. Moreover, while most previous studies have employed undergraduatesamples which are not representative of common customers, the present study employed a large andreal customer sample which strongly represents customers in general.

Keywords Environmental concern, Scepticism, Theory of Planned Behaviour, Green purchase,Consumer behaviour, Turkey

Paper type Research paper

IntroductionEspecially over the last four decades, marketing practitioners and academics have triedintensively to identify the determinant factors of the environmentally sensitivebehaviour. During the first phase of these studies, mostly demographic characteristicsof environmentally sensitive consumers were examined by the academics. These earlystudies profiled the environmentally sensitive consumer as a pre-middle-aged femalewith a high level of education and above average socio-economic status (Anderson andCunningham, 1972). However, the consistency of these studies was very limited. In thefollowing phases, psychographic variables and their influences on green purchase

The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available atwww.emeraldinsight.com/0263-4503.htm

Received 6 March 2012Revised 15 July 2012

Accepted 23 July 2012

Marketing Intelligence & PlanningVol. 31 No. 1, 2013

pp. 27-39r Emerald Group Publishing Limited

0263-4503DOI 10.1108/02634501311292902

The authors would like to thank Turk Telecom Directorship of Antalya for their support on thisstudy. A special report was presented to Turk Telecom authority that shows the results in detail.Besides, a research note was published on Akdeniz Business journal which is a local publicationfor the business professionals so that both the professionals and public could be acknowledgedabout the results of the study.

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behaviour were widely investigated. Amongst these variables, environmentalknowledge (Barr, 2007), perceived consumer effectiveness (Roberts, 1996),environmental concern (Tilikidou, 2007) proved to be the most popular. However,researchers rarely investigated variables such as scepticism, which may have had orstill have negative influences on green purchase behaviour. Moreover, some attitudeformation theories like the theory of reasoned action (Fishbein and Ajzen, 1975) andthe theory of planned behaviour (TPB) (Ajzen, 1991), from the literature of socialpsychology, were employed by the researchers for identifying environmentallysensitive purchase behaviour. However, previous studies are generally limited by the“Euro-American” context (Cheah and Phau, 2011). A literature review of paperspublished between 1993 and 2003 by Chamorro et al. (2009) shows that 74.74 per centof the relevant work was from this area. Thus, more research is needed on other areasof the world.

The specific objectives of the present study, which aims to examine the influences ofenvironmental concern and scepticism in relation to being an e-invoice subscriberare as follows: first, to compare the environmental concern and scepticism levels ofthe participants and whether or not they display green purchase behaviour; second, toinvestigate the influence of environmental concern and scepticism on green purchasebehaviour by utilizing the TPB.

In order to show how these objectives were achieved, the paper was structured asfollows; first, the authors reviewed the existing literature in the context of somevariables (demographics, environmental concern, and scepticism) and their influenceson green purchase behaviour. This is here followed by a brief explanation of the TPBwhich was employed to understand the green purchase behaviour of the customers inthis study. Then, an empirical study that investigated how environmental concern andscepticism levels affected green purchase behaviour was presented. In the final sectionof the paper, the implications of the findings are discussed.

Environmental concern and scepticism as the determinants of greenpurchase behaviourOver the course of many years, environmental concern has increasingly become asubject of interest for academics and marketing practitioners. The cause underlyingthis interest is that individuals who are more concerned about the environment are alsomore likely to display environmentally friendly behaviour (Czap and Czap, 2010). Manyresearchers assume that people with high levels of environmental concern, are morelikely to exhibit environmentally conscious consumer behaviour (Roberts and Bacon,1997; Czap and Czap, 2010). For example, Bang et al. (2000) found in their study thatconsumers who were more concerned about the environment expressed a willingnessto pay more for renewable energy than those who were less concerned about theenvironment. Opposed to some positive results in the literature, many of the researchresults on the effects of environmental concern on environmentally sensitive behaviourare mostly insignificant. The majority of studies which measure the direct effects ofenvironmental concern on environmentally sensitive behaviour show that therelationships between these variables are low to moderate. For example, in his study,Bamberg (2003) states that general attitudes are important indirect determinants ofspecific behaviours, so environmental concern has no direct effect on behaviour andintentions; however, it has a direct effect on the perception and evaluation of situation-specific cognition, especially when the individual faces personal consequencesaccording to his/her own behaviours. Because of the previous research results which

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reflected a low relationship between environmental concern and behaviour, it isadvisable that some other variables and situations be taken into account during themeasurements; this may enable researchers to obtain more accurate relationship levels.One of these variables is scepticism; this may decrease the effects of the environmentalconcern of consumers on their green purchase behaviours.

Scepticism is not a kind of a mood, and it appears only under certain circumstances.Sceptics entertain doubts about what other people say or do. But he or she can beconvinced when proofs are shown. Scepticism is a cognitive reaction that varies inaccordance with the occasion and content of the communication (Mohr et al., 1998).If the customers feel sceptical about a company’s claims, the effects of theadvertisements decrease. Obermiller et al. (2005) note that when it comes to advertisingclaims, the expected link between the advertisement and purchase intention does notoccur in sceptical consumers. For this reason, scepticism needs to be taken into accountwhen environmentally sensitive consumer behaviour is examined. Unfortunately, instudies where green purchase behaviour is investigated, the effects of scepticism arewidely ignored, and the studies which relate green purchase behaviour to scepticismare very limited.

The TPBResearchers who view environmental behaviour as self-interested behaviour often relyon rational choice models, like the TPB (Ajzen, 1991). The basic hypothesis of the TPBwhich was generated in the field of social psychology is that intention is the only directpsychological determinant of behaviour. On the other hand, intention is influenced bypeoples’ perceived control, their attitude towards displaying a particular behaviour,and their subjective norms. Attitude towards the behaviour refers to a person’s overallevaluation of behaviour, while subjective norms refer to the perceived social pressureto perform or not to perform the behaviour. Perceived behavioural control (PBC)indicates whether the consumer can easily consume a certain product or whether itsconsumption is difficult or impossible.

The TPB has been applied to a wide range of research topics about behaviouralintentions and actual behaviours, such as leisure participation (Ajzen and Driver,1991), sexual behaviour (Wilson et al., 1992), unethical behaviours (Man, 1998),and recently pro-environmental behaviours (e.g. Mannetti et al., 2004; Bamberg, 2003).The results of the TPB in the pro-environmental behaviour context provide strongempirical support for this model.

MethodologySampling procedureData for this study are obtained through a face-to-face survey of subscribers toTurk Telecom, Antalya. The present authors selected the “e-invoice campaign” of TurkTelecom as the most environmentally sensitive corporate initiative suitable for thecontext of this study. The campaign aims to encourage Turk Telecom subscribers toreceive their telephone and internet invoices by internet (to their e-mail addresses)rather than by post so that the savings made could be used for the afforestation effortsof Turk Telecom.

A systematic sampling method was preferred for achieving the purposes of thestudy. In order to ensure that both e-invoice subscribers and non-subscribers could bewell represented, a complete customer list which consists of both groups has beenobtained with the permission of the company. From the full customer list of Turk

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Telecom 300 e-invoice subscribers and 1,100 non-subscribers had been selectedseparately. Their names with address details were given to the survey makers. Totally14 survey makers, who had been trained in the research procedures beforehand,explained the aim of the study and during their visits asked customers for theirparticipation in the study.

Customer volunteers participated in the study and completed the questionnaires.To encourage participation, various promotional materials donated by the publicrelations department of Turk Telecom were given to participating customers. Afterthe uncompleted questionnaires were eliminated, out of the 1,400, 1,309 questionnaireforms contained usable data. Data from 285 forms were gathered from the e-invoicesubscribers and data from 1,024 forms from non-subscribers.

MeasurementsThe survey used in the study consists of four sections: first, the demographics of thecustomer, second, their environmental concern which was measured by the 13 itemsfrom Stern and Dietz (1994), third, their levels of scepticism towards the environmentalclaims of the companies which were measured by 13 items from Mohr et al. (1998), andfinally, the TPB. Items of environmental concern and scepticism were measured by afive-point Likert-type scale (1¼ totally disagree with, 5¼ totally agree with). Itemsmeasuring the TPB constructs of attitudes, subjective norms, PBC, and intention weredeveloped according to published guidelines (Ajzen, 2003). Hereupon, a seven-pointLikert-type scale (1¼ totally disagree with; 7¼ totally agree with) measured the levelof respondent agreement to two questions which were asked to understand theirbehavioural intentions regarding being e-invoice subscribers and two questions toidentify their subjective norms (see Table II).

Ajzen and Fishbein (1980) suggest the use of a semantic differential scale to measureattitude, and PBC in order to situate respondents on a bipolar evaluative dimension.Therefore, the attitudes of the respondents towards being e-invoice subscribers wereassessed with four seven-point semantic differential scales: useful/useless, right/wrong,good/bad, and pleasant/unpleasant. Three statements were used to measure the PBC byasking respondents to judge the degree to which they felt in control of participating in ane-invoice campaign. Prior to survey administration, a pilot test was conducted among121 graduate students in order to pre-test the content and readability.

ResultsThe majority of the respondents (almost 54 per cent of the e-invoice subscribers andapproximately 51 per cent of the non-subscribers) were male. In both groups, 37 per centof the respondents were between 30 and 40 years of age (Table I). Among e-invoicesubscriber respondents, 51.7 per cent (146) were at a university or above level ofeducation, while in non-subscribers the corresponding datum was 32.3 per cent (324).While 35.4 per cent of the e-invoice subscribers had 2,000 Turkish lira (TL) and abovemonthly income, this ratio was just 23.2 per cent for the non-subscribers.

Dimensions of the TPBFactor analysis was conducted to verify the construct validity and Cronbach’s a valuefor each dimension was computed to verify the reliability. The factor analysis wasbased on the principal component analysis with varimax rotation. All items indicatedfactor loadings 40.5 and factors had eigenvalues 41 (except subjective norm withan eigenvalue of 0.814), accounting for 67.12 per cent of the total variance. Generally,

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items loaded strongly on their intended factors, with cross-loadings were almostnon-existent.

The reliability coefficient of the entire scale was 0.802 (see Table II). Factors’reliability coefficients ranged between 0.613 and 0.829, showing a reasonable level of

e-Invoice subscribers Non-subscribersVariable Research sample n % n %

Gender Male 153 54.3 524 51.4Female 129 45.7 497 48.6

Age o30 106 37.6 354 34.830-40 105 37.3 378 37.141-50 52 18.4 180 17.7450 19 6.7 106 10.4

Education Primary school 16 5.7 117 11.6Secondary school 33 11.7 160 15.9College 87 30.9 404 40.2University 118 41.8 283 28.2MBA 28 9.9 41 4.1

Income o1,000 Turkish lira (TL) 56 20.4 252 24.71,001-1,500 50 18.3 264 26.01,501-2,000 71 25.9 265 26.12,001-2,500 56 20.4 179 17.642,500 41 15.0 57 5.6

Table I.Socio-demographic

characteristics ofe-invoice subscribersand non-subscribers

Construct/indicatorFactorloading

Constructreliability

Varianceexplained

Mean(SD)

Behavioural intention 0.829 13.06 4.44 (1.70)I intend to engage to be e-invoice subscriber over thenext month 0.892I plan to be an e-invoice subscriber over the next month 0.879Attitude 0.775 34.48 5.63 (1.14)For me, being a e-invoice subscriber for protectingenvironment would be – good/bad 0.781Right/wrong 0.754Useful/useless 0.734Pleasant/unpleasant 0.695Subjective norm 0.633 7.40 5.14 (1.31)People who are important to me would approve of mebeing an e-invoice subscriber for protecting environment 0.852People whose opinions are important to me thinkI should be an e-invoice subscriber 0.723Perceived behavioural control 0.613 12.17 5.61 (1.18)If I have more information about this issue, I can easilybecome an e-invoice subscriber whenever I want to 0.579I have control over my decision whether or not Ibecome an e-invoice subscriber over the next month 0.784It is up to me whether or not I become an e-invoicesubscriber over the next month 0.816

Notes: Bartlett’s test of sphericity: 3,177 ( p: 0.000); KMO: 0.800

Table II.Factor analysis results

of the theory ofplanned behaviour

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internal consistency among items (De Vellis, 1991). Mean attitudes towards e-invoicesubscription were 5.63, while mean behavioural intentions were 4.44 (see Table IIfor mean values). A mean attitude score of 5.63 indicated that the stated attitudestowards e-invoice subscription were generally very positive. The mean value ofPBC (5.61) reflects the positive PBC of the respondents with respect to e-invoicesubscription. The mean value for social norms was 5.14, which suggests that mostrespondents did not really experience high social norms in relation to being e-invoicesubscribers.

Dimensions of scepticism and environmental concernBefore the comparison of environmental concern and scepticism of the e-invoicesubscribers and non-subscribers, exploratory factor analysis with the use ofprincipal components analysis and varimax rotation was conducted for eachconstruct separately to verify the construct validity and to determine the structureof items. In both analyses, items which have communalities o0.5 and areclustered in more than one factor were deleted and the analysis was replicated.As a result, items that measure the scepticism of the participants about theenvironmental claims were loaded in two factors. These dimensions explain67.93 per cent of the total variance (Table III). The first factor is called “disbelief”which classified the items that refer to the different aspects of trust. Thesecond factor is “speciousness”; which is correlated with the speciousness ofthe environmental claims. The reliability of the two constructs was controlledby calculating Cronbach’s a. Cronbach’s a for “disbelief” was 0.881 and for“speciousness” was 0.761.

The results of the factor analysis procedure revealed three factors with eigenvaluesof one or higher that explained 69.78 per cent of the cumulative variation inenvironmental concern. The scales had Cronbach’s a coefficients ranging from 0.590 to

Construct/indicatorFactorloading

Constructreliability

Varianceexplained

Disbelief 0.881 34.59Most environmental claims made on package labels or inadvertising are true (R) 0.873I do not believe most environmental claims made on packagelabels or in advertising 0.874Environmental claims made on package labels or inadvertisements are generally truthful (R) 0.846Speciousness 0.761 33.34Most environmental claims on package labels or in advertisingare intended to mislead rather than to inform consumers 0.701Environmental claims on package labels or in advertising leadpeople to believe things that are not true 0.768Because environmental claims are exaggerated, consumerswould be better off if such claims on package labels or inadvertising were eliminated 0.789I am sceptical about the accuracy of environmental claimsmade on package labels or in advertising 0.676

Notes: R, reverse-coded items. Bartlett’s test of sphericity: 2,830 ( p: 0.000); KMO: 0.841

Table III.Factor analysis resultsfor scepticism

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0.776. In Table IV, the factor loadings of the environmental concern scale, reliabilitycoefficiencies, and ratio of the explained variance are shown. The results offer evidencefor the distinction between egoistic, biospheric, and altruistic concerns and providesupport for the three-factor structure of environmental attitudes in line with severalother recent studies (Schultz, 2000).

Comparison of the e-invoice subscribers and non-subscribers by environmental concernand scepticismThe literature strongly suggests that concern for the environment manifests itself inconsumer purchasing behaviours. Therefore, the current research anticipated that theenvironmental concern level of the customers who are e-invoice subscribers would behigher than that for non-subscribers. To ascertain whether the level of environmentalconcern and scepticism varied significantly according to subscription status, the meanscores of environmental concern and scepticism for both groups were calculated andcompared. Then the differences were tested by using independent t-tests. Significantdifferences between e-invoice subscribers and non-subscribers were found in twodimensions: first, altruistic concern ( p¼ 0.001) and second, biospheric concern( p¼ 0.022). In both dimensions, as previously expected, e-invoice subscriber concernswere higher than those of non-subscribers (see Table V). These results lend further

Construct/indicatorFactorloading

Constructreliability

Varianceexplained

Egoistic concern 0.776 23.32Protecting the environment will threaten the jobs of peoplelike me (R) 0.849Laws to protect the environment limit my choices andpersonal freedom (R) 0.910Altruistic concern 0.667 24.92The effects of pollution on public health are worse than we realize 0.574Environmental protection will help people have a betterquality of life 0.774Environmental protection benefits everyone 0.805Biospheric concern 0.590 21.54Modern development threatens wildlife 0.812Over the next several decades, thousands of species of plants andanimals will become extinct 0.781

Notes: R, reverse-coded item. Bartlett’s test of sphericity: 1,697 ( p: 0.000); KMO: 0.773

Table IV.Factor analysis results

for environmentalconcern

e-Invoice subscribers Non-subscribersDimension Mean SD Mean SD p

Environmental concern Egoistic concern 3.398 1.322 3.518 1.180 0.142Altruistic concern 4.412 0.672 4.256 0.726 0.001**Biospheric concern 4.249 0.791 4.123 0.874 0.022*

Scepticism Disbelief 2.292 0.958 2.685 1.160 0.000**Speciousness 3.369 0.839 3.349 0.912 0.729

Notes: *,**Significant in 0.05 and 0.01 levels, respectively

Table V.Comparison of the

e-invoice subscribersand non-subscribers

by scepticism andenvironmental concern

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support to the findings of other researchers (Bamberg, 2003), which have suggestedthat environmental concern influences green purchase behaviour. In the egoisticconcern dimension, no statistically significant difference could be found betweenthe two groups. When compared to other dimensions of environmental concern, theegoistic concern of the both groups was lower than their altruistic and biosphericconcerns.

When the scepticism level of the e-invoice subscribers and non-subscribers wasexamined, significant differences were found in the disbelief dimension, but nosignificant difference could be found in speciousness. The disbelief level of thee-invoice subscribers was also lower than that of non-subscribers.

The effects of environmental concern and scepticism on green purchase behaviourThe following experiment was designed to assess how high and low levels ofenvironmental concern; high and low scepticism levels affect intentions over becominge-invoice subscribers. Non-subscriber participants were subdivided into four groupsaccording to both their environmental concern and scepticism levels (high and lowlevels) by using their median scores. These groups were named according to theirenvironmental concern and scepticism levels (Table VI).

Factor analysis results suggest that the scales used in this study adequatelyrepresent the intended underlying constructs, so the authors proceeded to conduct aseries of multiple regression analyses to assess the moderating effect of environmentalconcern and scepticism on the intention towards e-invoice subscription. The factorscores of attitude, subjective norms, and PBC were used as the independentvariables to explain statistically the dependent variable of the behavioural intention.Standardized regression coefficients were used to assess the relative impact of theattitude, subjective norm, and PBC on behavioural intention amongst four groups.Also the comparison of the ratio of total variance explained by four regression models(from each model) gives an insight into the ability to predict behavioural intentions.The results of the regression analyses are reported in Table VII.

Environmental concern levelLow concern (1) High concern (2)

Scepticism level High scepticism (2) Sceptics (n¼ 214) Sceptical environmentalists (n¼ 193)Low scepticism (1) Uncurious (n¼ 184) Environmentalists (n¼ 236)

Table VI.Customer groups byenvironmental concernand scepticism level

Overall(n¼ 827)

Uncurious(n¼ 184)

Sceptics(n¼ 214)

Sceptical environmentalists(n¼ 193)

Environmentalists(n¼ 236)

Attitude 0.200 0.346 0.189 0.002a 0.418Norm 0.360 0.212 0.389 0.458 0.446PBC 0.179 0.174 0.172 0.331 0.168R2 0.201 0.175 0.232 0.292 0.366F 86.05 12.76 21.15 25.99 44.67

Notes: aNot significant, all other standardized b coefficiencies are significant in 0.01 level

Table VII.Regression model forthe customer groups(dependent variable:behavioural intention)

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Inspection of Table VII suggests a number of interesting findings. First, the TPB modelexplained the 20.1 per cent of the total variance of the intention towards being ane-invoice subscriber in a general way. The amount of variance explained varies greatlyacross four groups. While the greatest amount of variance is explained in the case ofthe environmentalists (high concern/low scepticism), in the low scepticism/low concerngroup (uncurious) the ratio of explained variance is rather low. The two groups withhigh environmental concerns (sceptical environmentalists and environmentalists) havea higher variance explanation ratio when they are compared to low concern groups(the uncurious and the sceptics). In the group with high levels of environmentalconcern, the participants were grouped once again according to their scepticismlevels, and the ratio of variance explanation was found to be higher for customerswith low scepticism levels (environmentalists) than customers with high scepticismlevels (sceptical environmentalists). The results show that environmental concernis a determinant variable of behavioural intention; however, scepticism lowers thispositive effect.

Second, as can be seen in Table VII, for the four groups all regression coefficientsfor the behavioural intention are significant. Only in the sceptical environmentalistgroup, a non-significant interaction effect was found for intention. This providessupport to the internal validity of the TPB. In the uncurious group, whereboth the environmental concern and the scepticism levels of the customers were low,attitude had the most pervasive effect on intention (b: 0.346) while norm (b: 0.212) andPBC (b: 0.179) had a significant but lower effect in the formation of behaviouralintention.

In the environmentalist group where the environmental concern of the customerswas high and their scepticism was low, attitudes (b: 0.418) and norm (b: 0.446)contributed significantly to the prediction of intention, but there was little evidencefor the influence of perceived behavioural control. When it was compared withthe environmentalist group, for the sceptical environmentalist group, where both theenvironmental concern and scepticism levels of the customers were high, the influenceof the attitude on behavioural intention was statistically insignificant. However, in bothgroups, the norm was the most important determinant of the behavioural intention.The effect of PBC on behavioural intention was higher for the scepticalenvironmentalist group than it was on the environmentalist group.

Discussion and conclusionThe overall purpose of the study was to test the effect of environmental concernand scepticism levels on green purchase behaviour. More specifically, the firstobjective was to compare the environmental concern and scepticism levels of thecustomers whether or not they display green purchasing behaviour. The secondobjective was to investigate to the influences of environmental concern and scepticismon green purchase behaviour by utilizing the TPB. The study employs a large andrepresentative sample of customer of Antalya, Turkey in order to achieve theseobjectives.

To achieve the first objective of the study, e-invoice subscribers and non-subscriberswere compared through three dimensions of value orientations, that is, in the egoistic,altruistic, and biospheric concerns which determine customer environmental concern(Stern and Dietz, 1994; Schultz, 2000). Results show that people who show greenpurchase behaviour have higher levels of altruistic and biospheric environmentalconcerns.

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People with high levels of altruistic and biospheric concern were more likelyto engage in green purchase behaviour than people with low altruistic and biosphericconcerns. This result is consistent with previous studies which relatepro-environmental intention and behaviour positively to altruistic or biosphericconcern (e.g. Schultz et al., 2005). However, in contrast to some studies which indicatethat pro-environmental behaviour is negatively related to egoistic concern (Stern andDietz, 1994), in the present study, no statistically significant difference could be foundbetween the egoistic concern of the e-invoice subscribers and non-subscribers. Whenthe scepticism of the two groups was compared, a significant difference was found inthe disbelief dimension. The disbelief level of the e-invoice subscribers was lower thanthat of non-subscribers.

To achieve the second objective of the study, first, the participants were groupedinto four subgroups according to their environmental concern and scepticism levels.Based on the TPB, multiple regression showed that 36.6 per cent of the variance thatmeasures the intention to protect the environment by being an e-invoice subscriber wasexplained by the combination of attitudes, perceived behavioural control, and thesubjective norm of the participants who have high environmental concern and lowscepticism levels (environmentalist group). This finding is consistent with Armitageand Conner’s (2001) meta analysis results from 154 studies, which showed thatattitude, subjective norm and PBC account for 39 per cent of the variance in intention.Therefore, the explanatory model was acceptable. The ratio of the explainedvariance decreased 29.2 per cent among the sceptical environmentalists, where theparticipants with high environmental concern and high scepticism levels wereclustered. This means the high level of scepticism causes a 7.4 per cent decrease to theratio of variance explanation of the behavioural intention. To conclude, the TPBrepresented a reliable predictive model of intent to become an e-invoice subscriber asexpressed in this study.

The models which were generated for the two groups (the low and the highlysceptical) that have low environmental concern levels had lower ratio of varianceexplanation for behavioural intention than did the groups that have high levels ofenvironmental concern (see Table VII). Bamberg (2003) had grouped the participantsinto two groups by their low or high environmental concern levels too, in a study forwhich he employed the TPB in order to understand green electricity product purchasebehaviour. The comparison of these two groups showed that participants with highenvironmental concern levels had more positive intentions and behaviours. Thus, theresults of this study support those of Bamberg’s (2003) research in this respect.

In the environmentalist group, where the participants who have high environmentalconcern and low scepticism levels were clustered, the influence of the attitude andsubjective norm on behavioural intention was found to be higher. These results revealthat for the participants who have a high level of environmental concern but a low levelof scepticism; a positive attitude, a positive subjective norm can reason to a strongerintention to become an e-invoice subscriber.

In general, this study shows that environmental concern is a determinant ofenvironmentally sensitive consumer behaviour, and positively affects to consumerbehaviour. However, that influence is considerably decreased by mediator variable ofscepticism. Therefore, companies are advised to present some evidences to consumersabout their environmental claims for decreasing or eliminating that kind of negativeinfluences. The results of the study also show that green consumer behaviour isaccurately to be estimated for market segments (such as for consumers who have high

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environmental concern and low scepticism, like in this study) rather than markets’general.

A sizeable number of studies have utilized the TPB to explain environmentalbehaviour (e.g. Davies et al., 2002; Bamberg, 2003). However, the bulk of the dataapplying the TPB to environmental behaviour have been collected in westerncountries. Thus, the results found in the present paper provide clear evidencesupporting the TPB in Turkey. Moreover, while most previous studies have employedundergraduate samples (Langdridge et al., 2007) which are not representative ofcommon customers (Schultz et al., 2005), the present study employed a large and realcustomer sample which strongly represents customers in general.

Understanding green consumer behaviour is an increasingly important researchtopic, especially for the developing countries like Turkey, where the environmentallysensitive market segment has recently emerged and is growing rapidly. For identifyingthe determinant variables and understanding customer behaviour in this segment ofthe market, further studies should be conducted in such countries. In the present study,green purchase behaviour was examined in the context of the e-invoice subscriptionfor Turk Telecom services. Therefore, the results of this study need to be supportedby similar studies in other research areas. In particular, the variables which maynegatively influence green purchasing behaviour should be investigated in many suchstudies.

References

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Cheah, I. and Phau, I. (2011), “Attitudes towards environmentally friendly products: the influenceof ecoliteracy, interpersonal influence and value orientation”, Marketing Intelligence &Planning, Vol. 29 No. 5, pp. 452-72.

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Further reading

Aksoy, S. and Albayrak, T. (2009), “Cevre duyarlılıgı”, Business Akdeniz, Vol. 1 No. 4, pp. 20-1.

Brechin, S.R. and Kempton, W. (1994), “Global environmentalism: a challenge to thepost-materialism thesis?”, Social Science Quarterly, Vol. 75 No. 2, pp. 245-69.

Chen, Y.S., Lai, S.B. and Wen, C.T. (2006), “The influence of green innovation performance oncorporate advantage in Taiwan”, Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 67 No. 4, pp. 331-9.

Dunlap, R.E. and Mertig, A.A. (1997), “Global environmental concern: an anomaly for post-materialism”, Social Science Quarterly, Vol. 78 No. 1, pp. 24-9.

Webb, D.J., Mohr, L.A. and Harris, K.E. (2008), “A re-examination of socially responsibleconsumption and its measurement”, Journal of Business Research, Vol. 61 No. 2,pp. 91-8.

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About the authors

Tahir Albayrak completed his PhD at Akdeniz University, Business Management Programme in2008. His dissertation subject was about the influence of the corporations’ environmental claimsto consumer attitude and behaviour. He has several published international conference papersand refereed articles about niche marketing, consumer behaviour and service quality at themarketing and tourism journals. He works as Assistant Professor and Vice Director at AkdenizUniversity, Faculty of Tourism. Tahir Albayrak is the corresponding author and can becontacted at: tahiralbayrak@akdeniz.edu.tr

Safak Aksoy is Professor of Marketing at the Department of Business Administration, atAkdeniz University Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. His research interestsare consumer behaviour, brand equity, service quality and international marketing of the freshfruit and vegetables. He has several articles published at the refereed international marketingjournals, conference presentations and research projects.

Meltem Caber works as Assistant Professor at Akdeniz University, Faculty of Tourism. Someof her research interests are e-CRM, foreign direct investments in tourism and destinationmanagement. She has several published international conference papers and refereed articlesabout tourism management.

To purchase reprints of this article please e-mail: reprints@emeraldinsight.comOr visit our web site for further details: www.emeraldinsight.com/reprints

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