LITERATURE REVIEW
The study of ethical consumer behaviour can be categorised into two groups: ‘ethical consumerism’ and ‘consumer ethics’. According to Harper and Makatouni (2002, p. 289), being an ethical consumer means ‘buying products which are not harmful to the environment and society’. Shaw and Clarke (1998, p. 163) refer to ethical consumption as ‘the degree to which consumers prioritize their own ethical concerns when making product choices’. In the nutshell, ethical consumerism therefore relates to environmental and social concern in consumption-related activities (e.g. recycling, buying fairly traded products, charitable giving and market place activism such as boycotting).
Muncy and Vitell (1992) define consumer ethics as ‘the moral principles and standards that guide behavior of individuals or groups as they obtain, use and dispose of goods and services.’ Consumer ethics have also been described as the ‘rightness as opposed to the wrongness of certain actions on the part of the buyer or potential buyer in consumer situations’ (Dodge, Edwards & Fullerton 1996). Therefore in this instance, consumer ethics refers to the role of ethics in decision-making, including misconduct in the marketplace (e.g. shop lifting, failing to declare undercharging, buying counterfeit goods and downloading pirated digital products). The focus point for this research would be ‘consumer ethics’ rather than ‘ethical consumerism’.
Fundamentally the study of business and consumer ethics lies in the definition of ethics itself. According to Valasquez (2006) ethics is a discipline that examines one’s moral standards or the moral standards of a society. The question that would normally be asked would be how these moral standards apply to our lives and whether these standards are reasonable or unreasonable. Another definition of ethics by Desjardins (2009) is concern about how we should act, what we should do and what kind of person we should be, i.e. how we should live our lives. There are several theoretical models that emerged for explaining ethical behavior. The following theory of utilitarian, deontology, virtue ethics and religious ethics will be discussed in brief.
The fundamental insight of utilitarian thinking is rooted in the idea of “maximizing the overall good” or producing “the greatest good for the greatest number” (Desjardins 2009). Therefore in utilitarian concept we should consider all the consequences of our actions before deciding what to do. The principle underlying this is that we should consider not only the consequences that our acts might have for ourselves, but also the consequences of our acts for all parties affected by them. Most economic decisions are implicitly justified on utilitarian grounds. From the original rationale for market-based economies found in Adam Smith, to much public policy and law governing finance, employment, consumerism and world trade, utilitarian considerations have played a prominent role.
Likewise, deontological approaches to ethics capture another insight that is recognized in such common observations, as “the end does not justify the means”. Deontological approaches demand that something should, or should not be done regardless of the consequences (Valasquez 2006). Some acts are right or wrong, as a matter of principle and therefore the duty is to act accordingly even if beneficial consequences would suggest otherwise. Respecting individual rights and fulfilling the ethical obligations can set limits on decisions aimed at producing good consequences.
Virtue ethics encourages us to step back from specific decisions and actions to ask the very profound and personal questions: Who am I? What type of person am I to be? Throughout the course of our lives, each one of us develops a personal character that is reflected in what we believe, what we value, what we desire, and how we act. This character is manifested in our habits, dispositions and personality. Virtue ethics seeks to articulate which of those habits and character traits are likely to be part of a meaningful and happy human life. Whether reflected in the ordinary language of such virtues as honesty, integrity, modesty and trustworthiness, or such vices as greed, materialism, belligerence and rudeness, virtue ethics plays an important role in ordinary business life.
The religious ethics is one that relies on the guidance of a supreme being, who sets standards of right and wrong. Thus, the source of the ethic is identified as God. God provides ethical direction via written commandments or through prayer. Major world religions include Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Western civilization has been most affected by the Judeo-Christian moral perspective. Religion is a meaningful ethical foundation because the religious person can point to God as the source of the ethical standard. The Judeo-Christian religious ethic offers moral imperatives such as: be honest, respect other people’s lives, respect other people’s property, be kind to others, and so forth.
The basic approaches to ethics outlined above will provide essential tools for understanding business and consumer ethics in this study. The ethical perspective from virtue and religious ethics will be further explored. Based on past studies, religious ethics has been found to be a significant contributor towards consumer ethical beliefs (Vitell & Paolillo 2003; Vitell, Paolillo & Singh 2005). Past research have also identified ethical values such as the love of money (Tang 2002) and attitude towards business (Vitell, Singh & Paolillo 2006) to have direct influence on consumer ethical beliefs. Furthermore, the current study will also explore the demographic determinant of gender on consumer ethical belief.
The basis and foundation of this study originated from the general marketing ethics model developed by Hunt and Vitell (1986). The theory draws on both deontological and teleological aspects of moral philosophy. Deontologist believe that certain features of the act itself other than value it brings into existence make an action or rule right while teleologists believe that there is one and only one basic or ultimate right-making characteristic.
The Hunt and Vitell (1986) theory also posits that an individual’s ethical judgments (e.g., the belief that a particular alternative is the most ethical alternative) are a function of the individual’s deontological evaluation and the individual’s teleological evaluation. Furthermore, ethical judgments affect behaviour through the intervening variable of intentions. The model proposes that ethical judgments will sometimes differ from intentions because teleological evaluation also independently affects intentions. That is, although an individual may perceive a particular alternative as the most ethical, the person may intend to choose another alternative because of certain preferred consequences.
Research Gaps
From the readings of past literatures, three research gaps have been identified.
For the first research gap it was discovered that there were many studies conducted to investigate whether there were differences in gender to ethical beliefs but these results were not conclusive. Vitell (2003) called for further investigation on demographic factors especially gender in future research, as past studies on gender differences were not conclusive.
Review of past literatures revealed that there was a lack of published research specifically attempting to directly link religiosity with consumer ethical beliefs. Attitude toward business and money ethics were also not included in many of the past research on consumer ethics. Therefore this is the second research gap identified. The only recent study linking all the three psychographics factors of religiosity, attitude towards business and money ethics was the Vitell, Singh and Paolillo (2006) research. Furthermore, none of these past research link these psychographics factors in the Malaysian setting.
Finally, there were also no past studies that empirically test the relationship between all the five dimensions of consumer ethics and ethical intention. In his article on suggestions for future research, Vitell (2003) proposed that future researchers should consider linking consumer ethics (all the five dimensions) to consumer ethical intention. Review of past literatures found that no empirical research have been conducted on this.
Research Questions
Based on the three research gaps identified through the readings of past literatures, three research questions are formulated:
Q1: Is there significant difference between genders with all the five dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs?
Q2: What are the relationships between religiosity (intrinsic and extrinsic), attitude toward business and money ethics with all the five dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs?
Q3: What are the relationships between all the five dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs with ethical intention?
CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
Vitell, Singh and Paolillo’s (2006) model of consumer ethics will be adopted and extended as shown in Figure 1. A key difference between the proposed conceptual framework and that of Vitell, Singh and Paolillo’s (2006) model is that there is an extension to further investigates the relationship between ethical beliefs and ethical intention of young consumers in this study. This has not been explored before but was called upon by Vitell (2003) in his suggestions for further research in consumer ethics.
Figure 1: Schematic diagram – conceptual framework
The adaptation of the model will be used via a positivist methodology, namely the development of hypotheses to address the research questions, use of objective measures to obtain quantitative data from a large sample, and statistical analysis to test the hypotheses (Cavana, Delahaye & Sekaran 2001; Tashakkori & Teddlie 1998). This will be consistent with the positivist approach used by Vitell, Singh and Paolillo (2006) in the testing of their model.
HYPOTHESES DEVELOPMENT
Consumer Ethics
Vitell and Muncy (2005) consumer ethics scale has been identified as one of the dependent variable in this research. The original consumer ethics scale by Muncy and Vitell (1992) consists of four distinct dimensions: (1) actively benefiting from illegal activities, (2) passively benefiting, (3) actively benefiting from deceptive but legal practices and (4) no harm activities. The first dimension signifies the behaviour in which the consumers actively taking advantage of a situation at the expense of the seller. For example, a customer gives misleading price information to the cashier when the price tag has been peeled off. The second dimension consists of a situation where consumers passively benefiting themselves due to the seller’s mistake. An example of this situation is when a customer gets too much change and does not inform the cashier. The third dimension represents actions in which consumers actively involved in unethical but not necessarily illegal practices. For example, a customer keeps quiet when a waitress at the fast food restaurant serves him first instead of the other customer lining up in front of him. The final dimension refers to the behaviour that is not seen as harmful to others. An example of this situation is the act of spending an hour trying on different shoes and not purchasing any. In 2005, the consumer ethics scale was modified and a new dimension that represents consumers’ desire to recycle products and ‘do the right thing’ was added (Vitell & Muncy 2005). An example of this situation is not purchasing products from companies that consumers believe are not treating their employees fairly. The current study will include all these five dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs.
Gender
Gender has been found to be a significant predictor of ethical attitudes and perceptions and for that reasons it is to be considered as one of the independent variable in this study. Ford and Richardson (1994) conducted a review of fourteen past literatures and reported that seven studies found that women tend to behave more ethically than men. In addition, prior studies reported a significant gender effect in the relationship between ethical attitudes of students and gender (Albaum & Peterson 2006). Specifically, most studies discovered that female students are more ethical than male students. Borkowski and Ugras (1998) reported that female students displayed stronger ethical attitudes than did the males. In the context of consumer ethics, Rawwas (1996) reported that female consumers tended to view unquestionable consumer practices more negatively than did the males. In line with the above discussion, the following hypothesis is formulated:
H1: There is a significant difference between gender and all dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs.
Religiosity
Religiosity has been identified as one of the independent variable in this research. Some prior studies in religiosity and consumer ethics classified religiosity into two categories: (1) extrinsic and (2) intrinsic. The ‘extrinsically motivated person uses his religion whereas the intrinsically motivated lives his religion’ (Allport & Ross, 1967, p. 434). Donahue (1985) argued that intrinsic religiosity correlated more highly than extrinsic religiosity with religious commitment. Hence, intrinsic religiosity tends to have positive relationship with ethical beliefs. Nevertheless, researchers have employed both types of religiosity in prior studies. Vitell and Paolillo (2003) investigated the role of religiosity in determining consumer beliefs regarding various questionable consumer practices. They found that religiosity was an indirect determinant of consumer ethical beliefs. Vitell, Paolillo, and Singh (2005) discovered that an intrinsic religiousness was the only significant determinant of consumer ethical beliefs. This is consistent with the findings of Vitell and Paolillo (2003). Vitell, Paolillo, and Singh (2006) examined the intrinsic religiosity only. Consistent with the finding of the previous research, they found that intrinsic religiosity was a significant determinant of consumer ethical beliefs. In a related study, Vitell, Singh and Paolillo (2006) used a non-student population to investigate the role of religiosity, money ethic and attitude toward business in determining consumer ethical beliefs. They utilised Muncy-Vitell consumer ethics scale and discovered that intrinsic religiosity was a significant predictors for three dimensions of the consumer ethical beliefs. Meanwhile, extrinsic religiosity significantly explained only one consumer ethics dimension. In line with the above discussion, the following hypotheses are formulated:
H2: Intrinsic religiosity is a positive determinant of all dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs. That is, those with higher intrinsic religiosity will be more likely to believe that consumer activities from the consumer ethics survey are wrong.
H3: Extrinsic religiosity is a positive determinant of all dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs. That is, those with higher extrinsic religiosity will be more likely to believe that consumer activities from the consumer ethics survey are wrong.
Attitude Towards Business
Another independent variable identified is attitude towards business. There has only been sporadic investigation linking consumer ethics and attitude towards business. Attitude toward business was included as a scale in the original Muncy and Vitell (1992) research. In their study, those consumers that were more negative toward business were less likely to consider questionable consumer practices as unethical. Another study by Vitell and Muncy (2005) discovered that attitude toward business was not a significant predictor of differences in consumer ethics between students and non-students. A recent study by Vitell, Singh and Paolillo (2006) also investigated the relationship between attitude towards business and the five dimensions of consumer ethics. In line with the discussion, the following hypothesis is elicited:
H4: Attitude toward business is a positive determinant of all dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs. That is, those with a more favorable attitude toward business will be more likely to believe that consumer activities from the consumer ethics survey are wrong.
Money Ethics
Krueger (1986) states that money at the individual level is the most meaningful object in modern – contemporary life and only food and sex are close competitors for conjuring strong, diverse and significant feelings. Tang (1992, 1993, 1995) developed a scale to measure the ethical meanings that people ascribe to money and has called it the money ethics scale (MES). Tang (2002) further reports that one’s money ethic has a significant and direct impact on unethical behavior. Furthermore, he labeled the money ethic as the ‘love of money’ and unethical behavior as ‘evil’ stating that ‘the love of money is the root of all evil.’ Therefore, money ethics will be considered as one of the antecedent of consumer ethics in this study. Mitchell and Mickel (1999) reported that money appears to be related to important individual personality and attitudinal variables. More importantly, Tang (2002) reported that one’s money ethic has a significant and direct impact on unethical behavior. Hence, it is reasonable to assume that people with a high money ethic (love of money) who place a high degree of importance on money would be less ethically sensitive than individuals with a low money ethic. In line with the discussion, the following hypothesis is formulated:
H5: Money ethic (love of money) is a positive determinant of all dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs. That is, those with a higher money ethic will be less likely to believe that consumer activities from the consumer ethics survey are wrong.
Consumer Ethical Intention
Another dependent variable identified in the research is consumer ethical intention. Scenarios or vignettes will be used in this research as they are commonly used in studies of individual ethical decision-making. Furthermore Morris and McDonald (1995, p. 719) supported this stance that ‘the use of multiple scenarios is preferable in ethics research’. In this research, four consumer ethics scenarios developed by Vitell, Singhapakdi and Thomas (2001) will be adopted: scenario 1: consumer using expired coupons, scenario 2: switching price tags, scenario 3: cashier mistake and scenario 4: copying software. Ethical intentions will be measured by asking each respondent if he or she would act in the same manner as the consumer depicted in each of the scenarios. In line with discussion, the following hypothesis is elicited:
H6: There is a significant relationship between all the dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs and the ethical intention.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
A positivist methodology, namely the development of hypotheses to address the research questions, use of objective measures to obtain quantitative data from a large sample, and statistical analysis to test the hypotheses will be adopted. This method is also consistent with the positivist approach used by Vitell, Singh and Paolillo (2006) in their study.
Questionnaire in the form of scaled-response will be adopted as it permits measurement of the intensity of the respondents’ answers. The items of the questionnaire will be adopted from different sources in the literatures and will apply Likert scale format, as it is suitable for self-administered survey method.
The target sample in this research will be the undergraduate students from two major universities in Malaysia – a private and a public university. Undergraduate students are chosen as respondents due to their ready accessibility and their demographic that fit into the profile of young consumers. As for sampling method, a non-probability method especially judgment sampling will be adopted in this research.
DATA ANALYSIS STRATEGY
At the initial stage, reliability test and multicollinearity analysis will be conducted. Subsequently factor analysis will be performed to identify factors that statistically explain the variation and co-variation among measures. To test the proposed hypotheses, several statistical analyses will be carried out as shown in Table 1 below.
Table 1: Mapping of analysis tools and hypotheses
CONCLUSION
Consumers face many ethical and moral challenges of living in a contemporary consumption environment. This is significant especially in a fast changing consumer landscape in Asia. Before the world financial crisis, most countries in Asia experienced tremendous economic boom and have seen a change towards higher consumer spending and consumptions. However with the advent of world recession coupled with rising unemployment and cost of living, there would be challenges of adhering to the ethical values in consumer related activities. The main objective of this research therefore is to examine the antecedents that influence consumer ethical beliefs and intention in the Malaysian context. Young consumers will be the focal point of the study as this group is growing rapidly and has been the target of many marketing and promotional efforts. Findings from this research can contribute further to the development of consumer ethics theories, an area where research is currently lagging behind practice.
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