Jain and Kaur - Role of Socio-Demographics in Segmenting and Profiling - JICM - 18 - 3

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

This article was downloaded by: [INFLIBNET India Order]On: 15 July 2009Access details: Access Details: [subscription number 909277329]Publisher RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House,37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Journal of International Consumer MarketingPublication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information:http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t792306871

Role of Socio-Demographics in Segmenting and Profiling Green ConsumersSanjay K. Jain a; Gurmeet Kaur a

a Department of Commerce, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, Delhi, India

Online Publication Date: 13 June 2006

To cite this Article Jain, Sanjay K. and Kaur, Gurmeet(2006)'Role of Socio-Demographics in Segmenting and Profiling GreenConsumers',Journal of International Consumer Marketing,18:3,107 — 146

To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1300/J046v18n03_06

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1300/J046v18n03_06

Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf

This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial orsystematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling, loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply ordistribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden.

The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contentswill be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug dosesshould be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss,actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directlyor indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t792306871

http://dx.doi.org/10.1300/J046v18n03_06

http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf

Role of Socio-Demographicsin Segmenting and Profiling

Green Consumers:An Exploratory Studyof Consumers in India

Sanjay K. JainGurmeet Kaur

ABSTRACT. Though green consumerism is on the rise, not all the con-sumers are equally green. To be able to more effectively market greenproducts and ideas, marketers need to segment their market and use differ-entiated marketing approach for each target segment. Socio-demographiccharacteristics have been widely used in the past researches as a basis ofmarket segmentation and profiling of green consumers. The present studyexplores the usefulness of select socio-demographic characteristics incapturing variations present in the environmental consciousness of theconsumers in India. Both the univariate and multivariate analyses point tothe presence of statistically significant linkages between the socio-demo-graphic characteristics and different environmental consciousness con-structs, thus implying potential usefulness of these characteristics in

Sanjay K. Jain is Professor of Marketing and International Business, Department ofCommerce, Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi, Delhi-110 007, India(E-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]). Gurmeet Kaur is Lecturer inCommerce, Sri Guru Teg Bahadur Khalsa College, University of Delhi, Delhi-110007, India.

The authors are thankful to the anonymous reviewers for their constructive com-ments and suggestions that proved helpful in substantially revising the original draft ofthe paper.

Journal of International Consumer Marketing, Vol. 18(3) 2006Available online at http://www.haworthpress.com/web/JICM

2006 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.doi:10.1300/J046v18n03_06 107

Downloaded By: [INFLIBNET India Order] At: 12:51 15 July 2009

profiling different segments of green consumers and evolving accordinglythe green marketing strategies and environmental campaigns as capable ofmore effectively reaching and influencing the chosen green consumersegments. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Deliv-ery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: <[email protected]> Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.com> © 2006 by The Haworth Press,Inc. All rights reserved.]

KEYWORDS. Green marketing, environmental consciousness, seg-menting and profiling green consumers, socio-demographic characteris-tics of green consumers

Consumers have emerged as a force to reckon with for attaining thecoveted objectives of environmental protection and sustainable devel-opment. In fact, the green consumerism in recent years has provided animpetus to the upsurge of corporate environmentalism. With a rise inecological consciousness among the consumers and rising demand forgreen products, business firms have started turning green and have be-gun offering green products and services (Chan, K., 1999; Ottman,1992; Peattie and Ratnayaka, 1992; Salzman, 1991; Vandermerwe andOliff, 1990). Recognising the role that consumers can play in protectingthe environment and making the earth a place worth living for the pres-ent and future generations (Grunert, 1993; McGougall, 1993; Wasik,1992), the governmental as well as non-governmental organizations theworld over have started focussing on consumers in their environmentalcampaigns.

Though the environmental consciousness among the consumers is onthe rise, not all the consumers are equally green and demand green prod-ucts (e.g., Chan, K., 1999; Diamantopoulos et al., 2003; Ottman, 1992;Peattie, 1992; Roper, 1990, 1992). That being the case, target marketingrather than mass marketing appears as a better strategy. Having identifiedand selected the segments of green customers, marketers can evolve posi-tioning and marketing-mix strategies keeping in view the profile of cus-tomers in the chosen segments (Bohlen et al., 1993; Chan, T. S., 1996;Chan, K., 1999; Meffert and Kirchgeorg, 1994). Not only the businessfirms, but also the environmental organisations and governmental agen-cies can benefit from the adoption of such an approach.

Segmentation and profiling of green consumers are the research ar-eas, which have received considerable attention in the past (for a review

108 JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL CONSUMER MARKETING


of such studies, see Chan, K., 1999; Diamantopoulos et al., 2003;Cornwell and Schwepker, 1995, Roberts, 1996). A wide variety of geo-graphic, socio-demographic and personality characteristics have beenemployed in the past studies for segmenting and profiling green con-sumers, with the socio-demographic characteristics having been used asthe key profiling variables in view of their ease of measurement and ap-plication (Diamantopoulos et al., 2003).

Until the 1980s, most studies examining the role of socio-demo-graphics were US based. Since the 1990s, however, the number of stud-ies undertaken in the context of consumers in Europe, and those in thenewly emerging industrialised countries in Asia, has considerably goneup. Diamantopoulos et al. (2003) provide an excellent review of thestudies undertaken in North America and Europe. A reference to theAsian studies can be had from K. Chan (1999) and Tang et al. (2004).Notwithstanding somewhat inconsistent findings, the past studies dopoint to the usefulness of socio-demographic characteristics in identify-ing and profiling different green market segments, and evolving accord-ingly the targeting, positioning and marketing mix-strategies. T. S. Chan,(1996), for instance, found that the young and well-educated consumerswere having stronger green concerns in Hong Kong; and, therefore,suggested that these consumers be focused in future investigations toproperly understand the promotion of environmentally friendly pur-chase behaviours. In a similar vein, K. Chan (1999), on finding that theheavy green consumers in Hong Kong were having higher householdincome, recommended that the marketers of environmentally friendlyproducts should aim at the affluent and elite classes as the prime targetmarket.

Of late, the green movement has spread its wings to other countriesincluding India. India stands next only to China in terms of population,accounting for about 16 per cent of the world population. Even if a frac-tion of the Indian consumers goes green, they can contribute signifi-cantly to the cause of environmental protection. Indian marketers andpolicy makers too can benefit by employing segmentation-based greenmarketing strategies (Jain and Kaur, 2003). But no significant study ex-ists in the country to guide the decision makers in this respect. Findingsof the past studies conducted in other countries (including those inAsian countries) are per se not generalisable to the consumers in India.Socio-cultural differences present among the consumers across coun-tries make consumers think and behave differently, thus precluding anydirect transfer of marketing strategies and plans from one country toanother (Tai and Tam, 1996). And this holds true to some extent even in

Sanjay K. Jain and Gurmeet Kaur 109


respect of the consumers’ environmental attitudes and behaviours.Macnaghten and Urry (1998:2) rightly observe in this context that “peo-ple respond to or interact with nature based on specific social practices,especially of people’s dwellings, which produce, reproduce and trans-form different natures and different values. It is through such practicesthat people respond, cognitively, aesthetically and hermeneutically, towhat have been constructed as the signs and characteristics of nature.”

A few past studies do point to the ecological differences presentamong the consumers across countries (e.g., Chan, T. S., 1996; Chanand Lau, 2000; Gallup, 1992; Johnson et al., 2004; Johri and Sahasak-montri, 1998; Tai and Tam, 1996; Tang et al., 2004:90). What to speakof differences across countries, even within a country consumers be-longing to different ethnic groups have been found differing in theirenvironmental beliefs and activism because of the carry over effects oftheir past cultures even after having settled in a new country (Johnsonet al., 2004). Green consumers, moreover, have been found differing intheir profiles across countries (Chan, K., 1999; Diamantopoulos et al.,2003:477). These and other culture-specific differences hamper adop-tion of a standardised green marketing strategy throughout the world(Simon, 1992; Tai and Tam, 1996), and as such call for taking up coun-try-specific investigations.

It is against this backdrop that the present paper attempts to exploreas to how the Indian consumers belonging to different socio-demo-graphic groups differ in their environmental consciousness. The paperis organised into five sections. The first section provides a review of theresearches undertaken in other countries and puts forward hypothesestaken up for empirical testing in the present study. The next two sectionsdescribe the methodology used in the study and discuss study findings.Conclusions and policy implications of the study, along with directionsfor future research, are provided in the last two sections.

LITERATURE REVIEW AND HYPOTHESES FORMULATION

Consumers differ in their environmental knowledge, attitude and be-haviour (Ottman, 1992; Peattie, 1992). A poll in 1993, for instance,found “better educated older females with high income and a liberalorientation” as being green consumers (EPA, 1994). In contrast, “youn-ger, apolitical, less well educated males” tended to be less green or non-green consumers (Shrum et al., 1995). The Roper Organisation too in its



opinion poll found “white-collar workers, women and educated” con-sumers as being more green-minded consumers (Shrum et al., 1995).That being the case, it does not seem appropriate approaching all theconsumers with a single standardised green marketing program. A pref-erable alternative is to cluster the consumers into different segments andapproach each of the selected segments with a different green marketingstrategy.

An extensive body of literature has emerged during the last twenty-five years, with socio-demographic characteristics having been morefrequently used as the bases for segmenting and profiling green con-sumers. Roberts (1996), K. Chan (1999), and more recently Diamant-opoulos et al. (2003) provide a comprehensive review of the studiesinvestigating impact of the socio-demographic characteristics on con-sumers’ green consciousness. Gender, age, income, level of education,occupation, number of children, social class and place of residence areamongst the key socio-demographic variables that have been used in thepast studies. Following paragraphs discuss the theoretical and empiricaljustifications underlying the use of these variables for explaining varia-tions present in the consumers’ environmental consciousness and putforth various hypotheses for empirical testing in the present study.

Gender: Impact of the gender on ecology and green marketing hasbeen explored in a number of past studies, but with somewhat diverseresults. While some studies have found no significant relationship be-tween gender and environmental knowledge (e.g., Arbuthnot, 1977;Diamantopoulos et al., 2003; Samdahl and Robertson, 1989; Tognacciet al., 1972); others report males as being environmentally more knowl-edgeable than females (Chandler, 1972; Grunert and Kristensen, 1994;Lyons and Breakwell, 1994; Meffert and Bruhn, 1996) probably due tothe fact that males are generally more outgoing and, hence, more ex-posed to the environmental information than females. Since the logicseems applicable to Indian males too, it can be hypothesised that:

H1.1: Males are environmentally more aware and knowledgeablethan females.

In regard to the environmental attitudes and behaviour, however,most studies report that females are environmentally more concerned(e.g., Davidson and Freudenburg, 1996; Diamantopoulos et al., 2003;Lowe et al., 1980; Shrum et al., 1995; Stern et al., 1993; Straughan andRoberts, 1999; Tognacci et al., 1972; Van Liere and Dunlap, 1981;



Yam-Tang and Chan, 1998), and engage more intensively in the envi-ronmentally friendly behaviour than males (Prothero, 1990; Roberts,1996; Roper, 1992; Yam-Tang and Chan, 1998). Theoretical justifica-tion underlying this phenomenon is that women because of their socialdevelopment and unique sex roles, skills and attitudes consider morecarefully the impact of their actions on others (Straughan and Roberts,1999). Since green consumerism in India is a relatively recent phenom-enon, we do not have evidence available to us from the past studies tooutrightly subscribe to this reasoning. One can rather argue that themales in India might be having greater concern for the environment andengaging in the environmentally friendly behaviour to a greater extentdue to their greater exposure to the media and/or interface with the envi-ronmental problems owing to their greater outgoing behaviour. In viewof the lack of any empirical or theoretical support, we propose the fol-lowing exploratory (two-tail rather than one-tail) hypotheses with re-spect to the environmental attitudes and behaviours:

H1.2: Males and females differ in their concern for environment.

H1.3: Males and females differ in their pursuit of environmental activ-ities.

Age: Age is another demographic variable that has been extensivelyresearched in the past studies. A majority of the studies point to a signifi-cant and negative relationship between the age and environmental knowl-edge (e.g., Anderson et al., 1974; Arcury et al., 1987; Diamantopoulos etal., 2003; Grunert and Kristensen, 1994). Even with regard to environ-mental attitudes, a significant and negative relationship with age has beenreported by several researchers (e.g., Diamantopoulos et al., 2003;Grunert and Kristensen, 1994; Scott and Willits, 1994; Tognacci et al.,1972; Van Liere and Dunlap, 1981; Zeidner and Shechter, 1988). Envi-ronmental behaviour too has been found to be significantly and nega-tively related with the age (Arcury et al., 1987; Arbuthnot, 1977;Diamantopoulos et al., 2003; Grunert and Kristensen, 1994; Jolibertand Baumgartner, 1981; Meffert and Bruhn, 1996; Mohai, 1985;Neuman, 1986; Roper, 1992; Samdahl and Robertson, 1989; Tognacciet al., 1972; Van Liere and Dunlap, 1981; Zeidner and Shechter, 1988;Zimmer et al., 1994).

There are only a few studies that report a non-significant relationship(e.g., Chan, K., 1999; Kinnear et al., 1974; Meffert and Bruhn, 1996;Ostman and Parker, 1987; Roper, 1990; 1992; Shrum et al., 1995; Web-



ster, 1975) or significantly positive relationship (e.g., Roberts, 1996;Samdahl and Robertson, 1989) between age and environmental con-sciousness. Influence of age on the environmental behaviour, moreover,has been found to be country specific. In a two-country study, for in-stance, T. S. Chan (1996) found the respondents’ age having a signifi-cant influence on the environmentally friendly purchases in Canada(i.e., younger Canadian respondents reporting a higher incidence ofpurchasing recyclable products). But the same has not been found truein respect of the respondents from Hong Kong.

Baring these few exceptions, past studies in general indicate an in-verse relationship between the age and environmental knowledge, atti-tudes and behaviours. The probable reason for a greater sensitivityamong the younger persons towards the environmental issues might bethat these persons have grown up at a time when the environmental con-cerns have already become a prominent issue (Straughan and Roberts,1999). Since the above reasoning seems equally applicable to the Indianconsumers, it can be hypothesised that:

H2.1: Environmental awareness and knowledge are negatively relatedwith age.

H2.2: Environmental attitudes are negatively related with age.

H2.3: Environmental behaviours are negatively related with age.

Education Level: Level of education has been linked to the environ-mental consciousness in a number of studies that report relatively moreconsistent results. A vast majority of the studies reveal a positive rela-tionship between education and environmental knowledge (e.g., Arbuthnotand Lingg, 1975; Arcury et al., 1987; Chandler, 1972; Diamantopouloset al., 2003; Grunert, 1991; Maloney and Ward, 1973; Maloney et al.,1975; Moore, 1981; Ostman and Parker, 1987).

Education level, moreover, has been found to be positively relatedwith the environmental attitudes (Aaker and Bagozzi, 1982; Grunert,1991; Leonard-Barton, 1981; Murphy et al., 1978; Roberts, 1996;Roper, 1990, 1992; Tognacci et al., 1972; Van Liere and Dunlap, 1981;Zimmer et al., 1994). Even with respect to the environmental behaviour,a positive relationship has been reported (Arbuthnot, 1977; Chan, T. S.,1996; Devall, 1970; Harry et al., 1969; Jolibert and Baumgartner, 1981;Maloney and Ward, 1973; Ostman and Parker, 1987; Scott and Willits,1994; Webster, 1975; Widegren, 1998). The possible reason underlying



such a relationship between the education level and environmental con-sciousness might be that it is rather the better-educated people who canunderstand the intricate relationship between the environment and hu-man beings.

A few exceptions to the above findings, however, do exist. Samdahland Robertson (1989), for instance, found education being negativelyrelated with the environmental attitudes and behaviour. Arbuthnot andLingg (1975) too found a negative relationship between education andenvironmental behaviour. Meffert and Bruhn (1996), on the other hand,reported no significant relationship between the education and environ-mental knowledge. In a similar vein, researchers like Baldassare andKatz (1992), Diamantopoulos et al. (2003), Honnold (1981), Lowe et al.(1980), Meffert and Bruhn (1996), Ray (1975) and Shrum et al. (1995)found education having no significant relationship with environmentalattitudes. Even with respect to the environmental behaviour, no signifi-cant relationship has been found in some past studies (Arbuthnot andLingg, 1975; Arcury et al., 1987; Meffert and Bruhn, 1996; Neuman,1986; Pickett et al., 1993; Schahn and Holzer, 1990).

Nonetheless, in view of a positive relationship found between educa-tion and eco-consciousness in majority of the studies and the theoreticalreasoning underlying the relationship to be intuitively holding true forthe Indian consumers too, it can be hypothesised that:

H3.1: Environmental awareness and knowledge are positively relatedwith the education level.

H3.2: Environmental attitudes are positively related with the educa-tion level.

H3.3: Environmental behaviours are positively related with the edu-cation level.

Type of School Attended: Though not investigated in the past re-searches, “type of school attended” seems to be a potent socio-demo-graphic variable affecting consumer environmental consciousness. Thegovernment and private schools differ considerably in terms of studentintake and type of persons they churn out after their schooling. In India,for instance, most private schools charge exorbitantly high fees andlevy other dues, which make these schools inaccessible to the childrenfrom the weaker and lower social strata of the society. The two types ofschools, moreover, differ in terms of infrastructure and education orien-



tation. In general, private schools possess better infrastructure and laymore emphasis on extracurricular activities and personality develop-ment than is the case with the government schools. Students coming outof the two types of school, therefore, differ in their personality traits.Personality traits and social orientation have been found to significantlyaffect environmental consciousness in the past studies (Kinnear et al.,1974; Schwepker and Cornwell, 1991). Academically too, studentsfrom the two types of school have been found to differ in their perfor-mances, with such differences being present even among the students inthe United States (The Public Purpose, 1998). Since these differencescan possibly influence the consumers’ environmental awareness, atti-tudes and behaviours, we propose the following three exploratoryhypotheses:

H4.1: People with different school backgrounds differ in their envi-ronmental awareness and knowledge.

H4.2: People with different school backgrounds differ in their envi-ronmental attitudes.

H4.3: People with different school backgrounds differ in pursuing en-vironmental activities.

Income: A general belief about income is that it is positively relatedto the environmental consciousness for the simple reason that it is thehigher income people who can bear additional costs associated withsupporting the green causes and favouring green products (Straughanand Roberts, 1999). While several empirical studies report income be-ing positively related with the environmental attitudes (Kinnear et al.,1974; McEvoy, 1972; Mitchell, 1983; Reizenstein et al., 1974; Webster,1975; Roper, 1990, 1992; Simon, 1992; Tai and Tam, 1996; Tuckeret al., 1981; Zimmer et al., 1994) and behaviours (Arbuthnot, 1977;Chan, K., 1999; Roper, 1990, 1992; Zimmer et al., 1994); only a fewstudies point to a non-significant effect of income on environmentalknowledge (e.g., Buttell and Flinn, 1978), attitudes (e.g., Kassarjian,1971; Van Liere and Dunlap, 1981) and behaviours (Anderson et al.,1974; Antil, 1984; Pickett et al., 1993). Studies by Roberts (1996) andSamdahl and Robertson (1989) report even a negative relationship be-tween the income and environmental behaviours.

Keeping in view the findings of majority studies and also the com-monly held belief that income is positively related to environmental



consciousness which seems logical for the Indian consumers too, it isproposed that:

H5.1: Environmental awareness and knowledge are positively relatedwith level of income.

H5.2: Environmental attitudes are positively related with level of in-come.

H5.3: Environmental behaviours are positively related with level ofincome.

Occupation: Occupation has been used as an antecedent of environ-mental consciousness in the past studies, including the ones conductedin the Asian context (e.g., Chan, K., 1999; Yam-Tang and Chan, 1998).Though the past studies do not provide any explicit rationale for the in-clusion of this variable, the plausible explanation can be found in theclose parallel that it has with the variable “social class.” Like socialclass, occupation is a sort of composite variable that manifests differ-ences present among the persons in terms of their income, educationallevel and social sophistication. Similar to the reasoning that people be-longing to higher social classes are more likely to be concerned with theenvironmental degradation because of their greater outdoor recreationalactivities (Diamantopoulos et al., 2003), people belonging to differentoccupational groups too can be expected to differ in their sensitivity tothe environmental issues because of the inherent occupational charac-teristics and needs, incidence of outdoor activities, and the types of so-cial groups with whom people with different occupations interact andsocialise. Though occupation by no means can serve as a substitute forthe variable social class which is a more embracing concept, it neverthe-less is being used as a proxy for the latter especially in the case of a de-veloping country like India where data on social classes are not readilyavailable.

Impact of occupation on environmental consciousness has been ex-amined in several past studies, but the results are too diverse to permitany conclusive inference. Buttell and Flinn (1978), for instance, foundno significant relationship between occupation and environmentalknowledge. With respect to environmental attitudes, while Andersonand Cunningham (1972), Balderjahn (1988), Mitchell (1983) andReizenstein et al. (1974) report a significant relationship; no such rela-tionship has been observed by researchers like Kassarjian (1971),



Kinnear et al. (1974), Samdahl and Robertson (1989), Van Liere andDunlap (1981), and Webster (1975). Even concerning the environmen-tal behaviour, past studies report somewhat inconsistent results. WhileAnderson et al. (1974) and Roper (1990, 1992) found occupation beingan important determinant of environmental behaviour, others havefound no such statistically significant relationship (e.g., Antil, 1984;Roberts, 1996; Samdahl and Robertson, 1989; Straughan and Roberts,1999; Vining and Ebreo, 1990).

In view of the diverse findings of past studies undertaken in othercountries and also absence of any such previous study in the Indian con-text, the present study takes up the following exploratory hypotheses forempirical testing:

H6.1: People with different occupations differ in environmentalawareness and knowledge.

H6.2: People with different occupations differ in environmental atti-tudes.

H6.3: People with different occupations differ in pursuing environ-mental activities.

THE STUDY

The data for analysis in the present study came from a survey of con-sumers located in Delhi. A “structured non-disguised” questionnairewas employed to elicit the necessary attitudinal and behavioural infor-mation from the respondents. Using quota sampling method, 250 con-sumers were personally approached during September-December 2001and were asked to fill in a self-administered questionnaire. Due precau-tion was taken to ensure that the respondents belonged to varioussocio-economic categories. Since no up-to-date and reliable samplinglist of the households was available, a two-phase sampling method wasused to have adequate representation of the people from differentsocio-economic groups under study. In the first phase, lecturers and stu-dents engaged with both graduate and post-graduate studies in variouscolleges and departments of the University of Delhi were approachedon a convenience basis. After collecting the filled in questionnaires,they were requested to get a few more questionnaires filled in from theirparents, spouses and friends engaged in different occupations so as to



have much broader representation of the respondents. The two-phasesampling method used in the study is akin to the snowball samplingmethod employed in some past studies. In view of the non-availabilityof sampling list, it was decided to lay emphasis on an adequate ratherthan a proportionate number of respondents from various socio-demo-graphic groups of people living in Delhi. After repeated call backs, 209questionnaires were received. Of these, however, only 206 were foundusable for analysis in the present study. Operationalisation of varioussocio-demographic and environmental consciousness variables used inthe study is as follows:

Socio-Demographic Variables

A total of six independent variables were used in the study and thesewere initially categorised as: gender (male, female), age (below 18years, 18-24 years, 24-35 years, 35-50 years and 50 years and above),income (monthly family income below Rs. 5,000, Rs. 5,000-10,000, Rs.10,000-20,000, Rs. 20,000-35,000, Rs. 35,000-50,000 and above Rs.50,000), education (matric, secondary school, graduate, post-graduateand others), type of school attended (government, private) and occupa-tion (housewife, student, employed/service, business/self-employedand professional). At the analysis stage, however, four of these groups(viz., “below 18 years,” “50 years and above,” “below Rs. 5,000” and“above Rs. 50,000”) had to be dropped as only a single respondent wasfound belonging to each of these groups. Furthermore, as none of the re-spondents belonged to the category “matric education” (largely due tothe use of a questionnaire prepared in English language); this categorytoo was dropped from further analysis.

A profile of 206 respondents belonging to various socio-demographicsub-groups finally used in the study is provided in Table 1. While thesample is almost evenly comprising of the respondents from two differ-ent gender groups and three income groups, it is somewhat skewed inrespect of other variables. Respondents belonging to the age group24-35, graduates and post-graduates, private school background per-sons and employed/service class people constitute relatively a greaterportion of the sample.

Environmental Consciousness Construct

A wide gamut of terms and operationalisations of the construct “en-vironmental consciousness” have been used in the past studies and these



range from “environmental awareness”(Buttell and Flinn, 1978) to “en-vironmental knowledge” (Balderjahn, 1988), “environmental concern”(Kinnear et al., 1974; Tognacci et al., 1972; Zimmer et al., 1994), “per-ceived environmental effectiveness” (Ellen et al., 1991) and environ-mental behaviour as expressed in terms of “recycling behaviour”(Anderson et al., 1974; Vining and Ebreo, 1990), “conservation behav-iour” (Geller, 1981; Leonard-Barton, 1981), “pollution abatement be-haviour” (Reizenstein et al., 1974), “environmentally friendly purchasebehaviour” (Davis, 1993; Ottman, 1992; Schwepker and Cornwell,


TABLE 1. Respondents’ Socio-Demographic Characteristics

Characteristics Frequency (N = 206) Percent of respondents

Gender

Male 85 41.39

Female 121 58.70

Age (in years)

18-24 53 25.70

24-35 95 46.10

35-50 58 28.20

Education

Secondary school 28 13.60

Graduate 96 46.60

Post-graduate 82 39.80

School Last Attended

Government 82 39.80

Private (Public/convent) 124 60.20

Monthly Family Income (Rs.)

Below 10,000 47 22.80

10,000-20,000 62 30.10

20,000-35,000 52 25.20

35,000-50,000 45 21.80

Occupation

Housewife 22 10.70

Student 46 22.30

Professional 34 16.50

Business/self-employed 26 12.60

Employed/service1 78 37.90

Note: 1. There were a total of 78 persons who belonged to this category. A break-up of these persons according to the natureof the job is: lecturers (28.21%), managers (28.21%), software engineers (17.95%), doctors (7.69%), bankers/computeroperators (7.69%), clerks (5.13%), lawyers (2.56%) and gazetted officers (2.56%).


1991) and “ecologically conscious consumer behaviour” (Roberts,1996). However, a major problem with the past researches is that onlyone or select aspects of the environmental consciousness construct havebeen investigated (Diamantopoulos et al., 2003; Schlegelmilch et al.,1996). Since the aspects investigated have differed from study to study,little wonder that the past researches report diverse findings.

To rectify the above problem, it was decided in the present study tomake use of a multi-dimensional “environmental consciousness” con-struct like the one recommended and used by Diamantopoulos et al.(2003). Since the details regarding the scales used by Diamantopouloset al. (2003) and Schlegelmilch et al. (1996) were not available to theauthors at the time of conducting this study in 2001, the relevantitems/scales were sourced from several previous studies and used in thepresent work after reliability testing and necessary purification. Thefollowing paragraphs provide a brief discussion of the various environ-mental consciousness scales employed in the study.

Environmental Awareness and Knowledge: Environmental aware-ness has been conceptualised in the study as the “consumers’ percep-tions of their familiarity with the environmental issues/problems ingeneral.” A two-item scale was developed to measure the consumers’environmental awareness. The two items included in the scale were“awareness about the environmental issues/problems” and “awarenessabout the Indian environmental regulations.” The statement about theenvironmental regulations was added because such legislations havebeen greatly relied upon (Jain and Kaur, 2004) and also advocated(Chan and Yam, 1995:282) as a potential means of bringing about envi-ronmentally responsible behaviour among the consumers in the devel-oping countries. Moreover, much of the environmental activism such asfiling complaints with the regulatory authorities can occur only whenthe consumers are aware of the environmental laws in vogue in thecountry. Consumers’ responses to these two-scale items were obtainedon a five-point Likert scale (1 = “Strongly agree,” 5 = “Strongly dis-agree”). Since the scale performed poorly in terms of its reliability(Cronbach alpha being just 0.4888), it was split into two single-itemscales, viz., “awareness about the environmental issues/problems” (AEIP)and “awareness about the Indian environmental regulations” (AER).

Unlike previous researches, the present study maintains a distinctionbetween “awareness” and “knowledge.” While awareness has beenposited as the respondents’ overall familiarity with the environmentalissues, knowledge has been conceptualised as signifying the respon-dents’ perception of being sufficiently knowledgeable and confident of



discussing specific environmental issues/problems with others. An “en-vironmental knowledge” (EK) scale was developed using thirty-fourenvironmental issues/developments. These issues/developments as rel-evant to consumers in India were culled out from Zimmer et al.’s (1994)“environmental concern” scale. Employing a dichotomous responseformat (i.e., Yes/No), respondents were asked to report whether theywere sufficiently knowledgeable and confident of discussing each ofthe listed environmental issues/developments. For each respondent, allthe “yes” answers were summed up and divided by 34 to arrive at acomposite score ranging from 0 to 1. The approach used by us for com-puting the composite knowledge score is similar to the one used byK. Chan (1999).

Environmental Attitude: A seven-item scale was employed for as-sessing the respondents’ attitudes towards environmental issues andtheir concern for environment. Items for these scales came mostly fromthe “Perceived Consumer Effectiveness” (PCE) scale (Roberts, 1996)and “Environmental Concern” (EC) scale (Straughan and Roberts,1999). Consumers’ responses were obtained on a five-point Likert scale(1 = “Strongly agree,” 5 = “Strongly disagree”). In view of the poorscale reliability, only three items could be retained. Since the scale con-tinued to suffer from poor reliability, a factor analysis was performedwhich suggested the presence of two dimensions, viz., “willingness tobuy green products” (WBG) and “perceived effectiveness of the envi-ronmental action” (PEEA). The first scale was comprised of two items–“willingness to pay more for the environmentally certified products”and “willingness to seek environmentally certified products.” However,in view of its poor reliability (Cronbach alpha being 0.5291), the scalewas split into two separate single-item scales, viz., “willingness to paymore for the environmentally certified products” (WPM) and “willing-ness to seek environmentally certified products” (WSE).

Environmental Behaviour: As a departure from the erstwhile investi-gations, the present study operationalises consumers’ pro-environmentalbehaviour in terms of both the “incidence” and “frequency” of engagingin the environmentally friendly behaviour. Items used for constructingthe behavioural scales were largely culled out from the two empiricallytested and used scales employed in the past studies, viz., a 30-item “En-vironmentally Conscious Consumer Behaviour” (ECCB) scale devel-oped by Roberts (1996), and a 45-item “Total Environmentally FriendlyBehaviour” scale developed by Allen and Ferrand (1999). Only thoseitems that appeared relevant in the Indian context were retained.



Incidence of the pro-environmental behaviour (i.e., whether or notconsumers engage in the pro-environmental behaviour) has been as-sessed through the use of four sub-scales: “incidence of informationseeking behaviour” (IISB)–a two item-scale; “incidence of the conser-vation behaviour” (ICB)–a two-item scale; “incidence of choosing theleast polluting products” (ICLPP)–a single-item scale; and “incidenceof influencing others” (IIO)–a four-item scale. Consumers’ responsesto items constituting these four scales were obtained on a five-pointLikert scale anchored on 1 = “Strongly agree” to 5 = “Strongly dis-agree.” Initially, the ICLPP scale comprised two items, but in view of itspoor reliability, one of the two items was dropped, thereby reducing it toa single-item scale.

Three frequency related environmental behaviour scales were used:“frequency of conservation behaviour” (FCB)–an eight-item scale,“frequency of environmentally friendly purchase behaviour” (FEFPB)–a seven-item scale and “frequency of environmental activism” (FEA)–afive-item scale. A six-point Likert scale ranging from “1 = Never” to “5 =Usually” was used to elicit responses from the surveyed persons.

A summary of the scales employed in the present study along withtheir reliability coefficients is provided in Table 2. Barring the case ofICB, all other multi-item scales tapping the incidence as well as the fre-quency of pro-environmental behaviour are reliable enough for use inthe exploratory researches (Nunnally, 1967). In the case of the multi-item scales, each respondent’s scores for various items constituting thegiven scale were summed up and averaged to arrive at an overall meanscore for that scale.

STUDY FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

The relationship of socio-demographic variables with the environ-mental consciousness has been assessed using various statistical tech-niques. For the two categorical (dichotomous) variables “gender” and“type of school attended,” significance of differences between groupmean scores has been ascertained through use of t-test. Since the infor-mation relating to the variables “age,” “education” and “income” hasbeen collected in the metric form (i.e., close to interval scaled data),linkages of these variables with the various environmental conscious-ness dimensions have been analysed through Karl Pearson’s coeffi-cients of correlation. One-way ANOVA and post hoc Duncan MultipleRange (DMR) test were used to assess the significance of differences in



the mean environmental consciousness scores across various occupa-tional groups. Finally, multiple regression analysis has been performedusing all the six demographic variables together to examine their jointeffects on environmental consciousness. Major findings of the study arediscussed in the following sections.


TABLE 2. Reliability of Environmental Consciousness Measures

Environmental Consciousness MeasuresNumber of

ItemsCronbacha value

Environmental Awareness and Knowledge

Awareness of environmental issues/problems (AEIP) 1 -

Awareness of environmental regulations (AER) 1 -

Environmental knowledge (EK) Compositescore

-

Environmental Attitude

Willingness to pay more for environmentally certified products (WPM) 1 -

Willingness to seek environmentally certified products (WSE) 1

Perceived effectiveness of environmental action (PEEA) 1 -

Pro-environmental Behaviour

Incidence of engaging in eco-friendly behaviour

Incidence of information seeking behaviour (IISB)1 2 0.767

Incidence of conservation behaviour (ICB)2 2 0.593

Incidence of choosing least polluting products (ICLPP) 1 -

Incidence of influencing others (IIO)3 4 0.633

Frequency of engaging in environmentally friendly behaviour

Frequency of conservation behaviour (FCB)4 8 0.685

Frequency of environmentally friendly purchase behaviour (FEFPB)5 7 0.765

Frequency of environmental activism (FEA)6 5 0.648

Notes:1. Items included were: reading publications on environmental issues and taking steps to remain informed about envi-ronmental issues.

2. Specific items included in the scale were: shopping once/twice for week’s requirement to save fuel and plastic bags,and choosing reusable rather than disposable plates or utensils to reduce waste.

3. Specific items included in the scale were: influencing others to behave in environmentally friendly manner, convinc-ing family and friends not to buy environmentally harmful products, actively participating in environmental cam-paign, and convincing friends to reduce car driving by car-pooling.

4. Specific items included in the scale were: switching off lights/fans when leaving office/classroom/public buildings;having installed expensive light bulbs/tubes in house/office to save energy; having replaced light bulbs to smallerwattage to conserve electricity; using a low-phosphate detergent (or soap) for washing clothes; driving personalcar/scooter as little as possible; using coolers, air conditioners, fans, lights, etc., as little as possible; using bothsides of paper and waste envelopes for rough work; and using plastic bags given by shopkeepers than carrying ownbags (reverse coded).

5. Specific items included in the scale were: minimising purchase of products using scarce/short supply resources,having purchased products that cause less pollution, not buying products of ecologically irresponsible company,looking for environmental information when buying everyday items, buying energy efficient household appliances,buying toilet paper/napkins made from recycled paper, and having switched brand due to ecological reasons.

6. Specific items included in the scale were: participating in environmental activities, joining in community cleanupefforts, having picked up some other person’s litter, having donated money or paid membership to conservationorganisation, and having attended meeting of environmental organisations in last six months.


Gender: Males were hypothesised to be environmentally more awareand knowledgeable than females (H1.1). But the results do not lend cre-dence to this proposition (see Table 3). Both the males and femalesshare almost similar and lower levels of environmental awareness andknowledge. The results are somewhat similar to those of Arbuthnot(1977), Diamantopoulos et al. (2003), Samdahl and Robertson (1989),and Tognacci et al. (1972) who did not find significant differences be-


TABLE 3. Environmental Consciousness–Mean Scores and Significance ofDifferences Across Gender and Type of School Attended Groups

Dimension Agg

rega

teS

core

(N=

206)

Gender

Sig

nific

ance

Type of SchoolAttended

Sig

nific

ance

(Tw

o-T

aile

dT

est)

Mal

e

Fem

ale

Gov

ernm

ent

Priv

ate


Awareness about environmental issues/problems(AEIP)

3.26 3.19 3.31 0.24a 3.51 3.09 0.01

Awareness about environmental regulations (AER) 2.75 2.72 2.78 0.36a 2.84 2.69 0.37

Environmental knowledge of specific issues (EK) 0.52 0.52 0.52 0.38a 0.52 0.52 0.89


Willingness to pay more for environmentally friendlyproducts (WPM)

3.85 3.77 3.90 0.38b 3.96 3.77 0.20

Willingness to seek environmentally friendlyproducts (WSE)

3.92 3.64 4.12 0.00b 4.06 3.82 0.05

Perceived effectiveness of environmental action(PEEA)

3.08 2.93 3.19 0.09b 3.00 3.14 0.37

Environmental Behaviour


Incidence of information seeking behaviour (IISB) 3.43 3.35 3.49 0.20b 3.60 3.32 0.02

Incidence of conservation behaviour (ICB) 3.62 3.41 3.77 0.00b 3.86 3.46 0.00

Incidence of choosing least polluting products(ICLPP)

4.16 4.13 4.18 0.63b 4.34 4.04 0.00

Incidence of influencing others (IIO) 3.36 3.31 3.40 0.34b 3.39 3.34 0.64

Frequency of engaging in eco-friendly behaviour

Frequency of conservation behaviour (FCB) 4.29 4.06 4.44 0.00b 4.27 4.22 0.85

Frequency of environmentally friendly purchasebehaviour (FEFPB)

3.91 3.63 4.11 0.00b 3.93 3.90 0.85

Frequency of environmental activism (FEA) 2.49 2.24 2.67 0.00b 2.33 2.60 0.01

Note: aOne-tailed test, bTwo-tailed test.


tween males and females in regard to their environmental awarenessand knowledge.

Concerning the environmental attitudes (H1.2), however, the resultsare somewhat on the expected lines. Barring the case of willingness topay more for green products (WPM) where no significant differenceexists, the results in regard to other attitudinal scales show significantdifferences prevalent between the males and females, with the latter re-porting a greater willingness to seek eco-friendly products (WSE) andhaving a greater faith in the effectiveness of environmental actions(PEEA). The results are quite in conformity with those of Davidson andFreudenburg (1996), Diamantopoulos et al. (2003), Lowe et al. (1980),Shrum et al. (1995), Stern et al. (1993), Straughan and Roberts (1999),Tognacci et al. (1972) and Van Liere and Dunlap (1981) who too foundfemales to be holding stronger environment attitudes.

H1.3 postulated males and females to be differing in their pursuit of en-vironmentally friendly activities. Our results only partly conform to thisproposition. While no significant differences are observable with respectto information seeking behaviour (IISB), incidence of choosing the leastpolluting products (ICLPP) and incidence of influencing others (IIO); theresults with respect to rest of the four behavioural constructs point to thepresence of differences between males and females in their incidence aswell as the frequency of engaging in ecologically friendly behaviours,with females having an edge over the males. Concerning the environmen-tal behaviour, therefore, the study findings are to some extent consistentwith those of Grunert and Kristensen (1994), Roberts (1996), Roper(1992), Van Liere and Dunlap (1981) and Webster (1975). A recent studyby Diamantopoulos et al. (2003) too reported evidence in support, albeitpartly, of this hypothesis. The results are, however, at variance with thoseof Chan, K. (1999) who did not find the light, medium and heavy greenconsumers to be differing in terms of their gender.

Age: The variable “age” does not show significant relationship withthe environmental awareness and knowledge constructs (see Table 4),thus leading to the rejection of hypothesis H2.1. The results-though con-trary to those of Arcury et al. (1987), Diamantopoulos et al. (2003) andGrunert and Kristensen (1994) should not be construed as altogethersurprising as some previous studies too have found a non-significant re-lationship existing between the age and environmental knowledge (e.g.,Kinnear et al., 1974; Roper, 1990, 1992).

Even in respect of the environmental attitude, age does not emerge as asignificant variable. The only exception is the WSE scale where presenceof a negative and significant correlation signifies a greater willingness



among the relatively younger persons (viz., those belonging to agegroups 18-24 years and 24-35 years) to seek green products, thus pro-viding only limited support in favour of the proposition H2.2.

Relationship of age with the environmental behaviour is in the hy-pothesised direction (H2.3) only with respect to the scales “incidence ofinformation seeking behaviour” (IISB) and “incidence of influencingothers” (IIO). A significant but positive relationship of age with ICLPP,on the other hand, implies a lower tendency among the relatively youn-ger persons (i.e., respondents belonging to the age groups 18-24 yearsand 24-35 years) to choose the least polluting products. This might bedue to the fact that the relatively younger persons (especially those be-longing to the age group 18-24 years) being mostly the students and/orwithout jobs have a lower purchasing power to be able to afford the lesspolluting but costlier alternatives.


TABLE 4. Age, Education Level and Income as Covariates of EnvironmentalConsciousness–Correlation Coefficients

Environmental Consciousness Age EducationLevel

Income


Awareness about environmental issues/problems (AEIP) 0.00 0.01 0.02

Awareness about environmental regulations (AER) –0.07 0.10 0.15*

Environmental knowledge of specific issues (EK) 0.05 0.25** –0.06


Willingness to pay more for environmentally friendly products(WPM)

–0.00 –0.03 0.22**

Willingness to seek environmentally friendly products (WSE) –0.24** –0.30** 0.10

Perceived effectiveness of environmental action (PEEA) –0.03 0.08 –0.07



Incidence of information seeking behaviour (IISB) –0.14* 0.14* 0.27**

Incidence of conservation behaviour (ICB) –0.02 0.04 0.01

Incidence of choosing least polluting products (ICLPP) 0.21** –0.10 0.16*

Incidence of influencing others (IIO) –0.22** 0.03 –0.17**

Frequency of engaging in eco-friendly behaviour

Frequency of conservation behaviour (FCB) 0.02 0.12* –0.16**

Frequency of environmentally friendly purchase behaviour(FEFPB)

–0.06 0.10 –0.08

Frequency of environmental activism (FEA) –0.08 0.54** 0.05

Notes: **Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (1-tailed).*Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (1-tailed).


Education Level: Education level was hypothesised to be positivelyrelated to the environmental awareness and knowledge as well as to theenvironmental attitudes and behaviours (H3.1 to H3.3). But the results re-veal a significant positive relationship to be present only with respect toone scale, viz., “environmental knowledge of specific issues” (EK). Theresults thus provide only limited support to the hypothesis H3.1. With re-spect to environmental attitudes too, the proposed relationship (H3.2) isnot supported. Though the scale “willingness to seek environmentallyfriendly products” (WSE) is having a significant relationship with theeducation level, the relationship is in the reverse direction. Even in re-gard to the environmental behaviour, significantly positive relationshipexist only with respect to three scales, viz., “incidence of informationseeking behaviour” (IISB), “frequency of conservation behaviour”(FCB) and “frequency of environmental activism” (FEA), thus provid-ing only a partial support to the hypothesis H3.3.

Type of School Attended: Regarding the variable “type of school at-tended,” results indicate people with different school backgrounds to bediffering in their environmental consciousness with respect to six out of atotal of thirteen scales under examination in the present study. The specificenvironmental consciousness constructs for which the significant differ-ences exist include awareness about environmental issues/problems(AEIP), willingness to seek environmentally friendly products (WSE), in-cidence of information seeking behaviour (IISB), incidence of conserva-tion behaviour (ICB), incidence of choosing the least polluting products(ICLPP) and frequency of environmental activism (FEA). Overall, the re-sults provide only a partial support to the hypotheses H4.1 to H4.3.

It is, however, interesting to note that except for the scale “frequencyof environmental activism” (FEA) where private school backgroundpersons report a marginally but significantly a higher frequency of en-gaging in the environmental behaviour, it is otherwise the respondentswith the government school background who hold sway over theircounterpart. Be it the awareness about environmental issues/problems(AEIP), willingness to seek environmentally friendly products (WSE),incidence of information seeking behaviour (IISB), “incidence of con-servation behaviour”(ICB) or incidence of choosing least pollutingproducts (ICLPP), the government school background persons outper-form the respondents with private school background (see Table 3).

Income: With respect to income, though a significant relationship isobservable in respect to six environmental consciousness scales, it is inthe hypothesised direction (i.e., positive) only for a total of four scales.Among the awareness and knowledge scales, AER is the only scale



where relationship is positive and in the hypothesised direction (H5.1),implying higher income persons to be having greater knowledge aboutthe environmental regulations. Overall, the results are somewhat in tunewith those of Buttell and Flinn (1978) who found education having anon-significant relationship with the environmental knowledge.

With respect to environmental attitudes too, income turns out to be apoor predictor. The only exception is the willingness to pay more for theenvironmentally friendly products (WPM) construct where a positiveand significant correlation coefficient implies higher income persons tobe having greater willingness to pay more for the environmentallyfriendly products (H5.2). An overall non-significant correlation betweenthe environmental attitudes and income confirms the findings ofKassarjian (1971) and Van Liere and Dunlap (1981) who too did notfind the environmental attitudes to be related to income.

Even in regard to the environmental behaviour, results are only partlysupportive of the hypothesised relationship (H5.3). Only two (viz., IISBand ICLLP) of the seven environmental behaviour scales show a signif-icant and positive relationship with income. Though the constructs IIOand FCB are also significantly related to income, the relationship is inreverse direction implying persons with relatively higher income to behaving lower incidence of influencing others and engaging less fre-quently in the conservation behaviour. The study finding with respect tothe latter two constructs appear to be somewhat similar to that of Rob-erts (1996) who also observed a negative relationship between the in-come and environmental behaviour.

Occupation: Hypotheses (H6.1 to H6.3) posited that the people belong-ing to different occupation groups would differ in their environmentalconsciousness. One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) reveals signi-ficant differences existing for as many as eight environmental scales rep-resenting almost equally the“awareness and knowledge,” “attitude” and“behaviour” dimensions (see Table 5). But in terms of the post hocDuncan multiple range (DMR) test which tries to ascertain as to which ofthe several groups differ significantly from one another, results are notable to present any clear cut picture about the linkage of occupationalgroups with different environmental constructs.

The Duncan test reveals clearly distinct sets of groups to be present onlywith respect to four constructs, viz., AEIP, AER, WSE and FCB. For thetwo environmental awareness and knowledge constructs (i.e., AEIP,AER), the Duncan test suggests two distinct sets of respondent groups: oneconsisting of students, employed in service and business/self-employedpersons, and the other one including professionals and housewives; with



TA

BLE

5.E

nviro

nmen

talC

onsc

ious

ness

–Mea

nS

core

san

dS

igni

fican

ceof

Diff

eren

ces

Acr

oss

Occ

upat

ion

Gro

ups

Dim

ensi

on

Occ

upat

ion

Dun

can

Mul

tiple

Ran

ges

Tes

t1

Gro

upC

lust

ers2

Gro

ups

Fou

nd/A

ppea

rto

Be

Diff

eren

t

(1)

(2)

(3)

(4)

(5)

En

viro

nm

enta

lAw

aren

ess

and

Kn

ow

led

ge

Aw

aren

ess

abou

tenv

ironm

enta

liss

ues/

prob

lem

s(A

EIP

)3.

263.

962.

983.

743.

153.

050.

000

2,5,

4;3,

12,

5,4

<3,

1

Aw

aren

ess

abou

tenv

ironm

enta

lreg

ulat

ions

(AE

R)

2.75

3.36

2.30

3.44

2.81

2.53

0.00

02,

5,4;

1,3

2,5,

4<

1,3

Env

ironm

enta

lkno

wle

dge

ofsp

ecifi

cis

sues

(EK

)0.

520.

510.

490.

520.

530.

540.

459

--

En

viro

nm

enta

lAtt

itu

de

Will

ingn

ess

topa

ym

ore

for

envi

ronm

enta

llyfr

iend

lypr

oduc

ts(W

PM

)3.

854.

273.

673.

473.

784.

010.

023

3,2,

4,5;

4,5,

13,

2<

1

Will

ingn

ess

tose

eken

viro

nmen

tally

frie

ndly

prod

ucts

(WS

E)

3.92

4.18

4.04

3.88

3.42

3.95

0.01

34;

3,5,

2,1

4<

3,5,

2,1

Per

ceiv

edef

fect

iven

ess

ofen

viro

nmen

tala

ctio

n(P

EE

A)

3.08

3.18

3.22

2.88

3.08

3.06

0.71

6-

-

En

viro

nm

enta

lBeh

avio

ur

Inci

den

ceo

fen

gag

ing

inec

o-f

rien

dly

beh

avio

ur

Inci

denc

eof

info

rmat

ion

seek

ing

beha

viou

r(I

ISB

)3.

433.

733.

253.

323.

653.

430.

113

2,3,

5,4;

3,5,

4,1

2<

1

Inci

denc

eof

cons

erva

tion

beha

viou

r(I

CB

)3.

623.

833.

364.

103.

523.

550.

000

2,4,

5;4,

5,1;

1,3

2<

1,3;

4,5

<3

Inci

denc

eof

choo

sing

leas

tpol

lutin

gpr

oduc

ts(I

CLP

P)

4.16

4.33

3.91

4.09

4.00

4.35

0.01

32,

4,3;

4,3,

1,5

2<

1,5

Inci

denc

eof

influ

enci

ngot

hers

(IIO

)3.

363.

183.

383.

393.

213.

440.

338

--

Fre

qu

ency

of

per

son

ally

eng

agin

gin

eco

-fri

end

lyb

ehav

iou

r

Fre

quen

cyof

cons

erva

tion

beha

viou

r(F

CB

)4.

293.

764.

234.

414.

164.

460.

001

1;4,

2,3,

51

<4,

2,3,

5

Fre

quen

cyof

envi

ronm

enta

llyfr

iend

lypu

rcha

sebe

havi

our

(FE

FP

B)

3.91

3.50

3.86

4.17

3.95

3.93

0.10

81,

2,5,

4;2,

5,4,

31

<3

Fre

quen

cyof

envi

ronm

enta

lact

ivis

m(F

EA

)2.

492.

772.

152.

602.

512.

570.

011

2,4;

5,3,

12

<5,

3,1

Not

es:1

.Sig

nific

ance

leve

l=0.

05.

2.G

roup

clus

ters

are

liste

din

the

asce

ndin

gor

der

ofth

eir

mea

nsc

ores

.

129

Significance

Employed/Service

Business/Self-Employed

Professional

Student

Housewife

AggregateScore(N=206)


the former set having significantly lower mean scores than the latter. Inregard to WSE, the first set comprised of only the business/self-employedpersons which is having lower willingness to seek the environmentallyfriendly products than the second set which comprised the profession-als, service class persons, students and housewives. With respect to thevariable FCB, housewives constitute the first set and engage less fre-quently in the conservation behaviour than the other set of respondentscomprising of persons engaged in business/self-employed, students,professionals and service class people.

No clearly distinct sets of occupational groups are evident for the con-structs WPM, IISB, ICB, ICLPP, FEFPB and FEA (see Table 5). None-theless, certain inferences about the group differences can be made byidentifying groups which do not simultaneously belong to more than oneset (for a similar interpretation, see Freund and Wilson, 1997). For the con-struct WPM, for instance, it can be inferred that the professionals and stu-dents have lower willingness to pay more for the environmentally friendlyproducts than the housewives do. Similarly, in the case of IISB, studentsappear to have lower incidence of information seeking behaviour thanhousewives have. In regard to the ICB, students depict a lower incidence ofengaging in conservation behaviour than is the case with the housewives.In a similar vein, the two groups–business/self-employed and service classpersons–depict less willingness to engage in such a behaviour than the pro-fessionals do. So far as the incidence of choosing the least polluting prod-ucts (ICLPP) is concerned, students show lower incidence of making sucha choice than groups comprising of housewives and service class persons.But with respect to FEFPB, housewives report a lower frequency of pursu-ing the environmentally purchase behaviour than is the case with the pro-fessionals. Finally, in regard to FEA, students report less activism than thegroups service class persons, professionals and housewives do.

Construct-to-construct differences notwithstanding, it can be observedthat in general housewives and/or professionals and service class personsconstitute the occupational groups who possess higher environmental con-sciousness. To some extent, the results are similar to those arrived at byK. Chan (1999) who also found managerial and professional workers asbeing heavy green consumers.

Environmental Consciousness and Various Socio-DemographicVariables Considered Together:Multiple Regression Analysis Results

With a view to assess the joint impact of socio-demographic vari-ables, various environmental consciousness constructs were separately



regressed on the six socio-demographic variables. For each of the inde-pendent variables, dummy variables were created (one less than thenumber of categories). The standardised regression residual plots wereexamined and these by and large indicated a conformance to the nor-mality assumption. Furthermore, values pertaining to the two colli-nearity statistics, viz., TOI and VIF, were greater than 0.10 and less than10 respectively, thus implying absence of multicollinearity among theindependent variables (Hair at al., 1995).

The regression results are reported in the Appendix, and are summa-rised in Table 6. Each of the socio-demographic variables can be seen tobe significantly, though differently, affecting some or the other environ-mental consciousness constructs. When examined in terms of the signsof regression coefficients, the results point to almost similar conclu-sions as arrived at earlier in connection with the univariate analysis at-tempted in the preceding sections. Significant and positive regressioncoefficients for the independent variable “gender” with respect to theenvironmental constructs WSE, PEEA, ICB, FCB and FEFPB, for in-stance, signify that females in comparison with males are more willingto seek the environmentally friendly products, perceive greater effec-tiveness of environmental actions, depict greater incidence as well asfrequency of conservation behaviour and engage more frequently in theenvironmentally friendly purchase behaviours. These inferences are thesame as reported earlier with respect to the influence of gender on envi-ronmental consciousness. Standardised regression coefficients providedin Table 6 point to the relative impact of different socio-demographicvariables on the respondents’ environmental consciousness.

High and significant values of adjusted R2 (ranging from 0.20 to0.46) for the six environmental constructs (viz., WSE, IISB, ICB,ICLPP, FCB and FEA) suggest that the socio-demographic variablesare able to explain 20 to 46 per cent of the variations present in the re-spondents’ environmental consciousness.

The multivariate results of the present study are at variance withthose of Diamantopoulos et al. (2003) who did not find various socio-demographic variables to be significantly related to the environmentalconsciousness constructs. The results thus suggest that the influence ofsocio-demographic variables is culture and context specific. While inthe developed countries where environmentalism came into existencemuch earlier, almost all the persons irrespective of their socio-demo-graphic backgrounds have almost equally embraced the concept of en-vironmentalism; and, hence, the socio-demographic characteristics donot appear to be the significant determinants of consumer environmen-




TABLE 6. Multiple Regression Analysis–Summary Resultsa

Dependent Variable Independent Variables Found Significantb Adjusted R2

(SignificanceLevel)

Environmental Awareness andKnowledge

Awareness about environmentalissues/problems (AEIP)

School attended: private school (–ve); Income: Rs. 20,000-35,000 (+ve); Occupation: students (–ve) and service/employed persons (–ve)

0.10 (0.001)

Awareness about environmentalregulations (AER)

Occupation: students (–ve) and service/employed per-sons (–ve)

0.16 (0.000)

Environmental knowledge ofspecific issues (EK)

Age: 24-35 years (+ve) 0.06 (0.022)


Willingness to pay more forenvironmentally friendly products(WPM)

School attended: private school (–ve); Income: all codeddummy groups (+ve); Occupation: professionals (–ve)

0.09 (0.003)

Willingness to seekenvironmentally friendly products(WSE)

Gender: females (+ve); Age: 24-35 years (+ve) and 35-50years (–ve); Education level: all coded dummy groups(–ve); School attended: private school (–ve); Occupation:students (–ve) and business/self-employed persons (–ve)

0.46 (0.000)

Perceived effectiveness ofenvironmental action (PEEA)

Gender: females (+ve) 0.01 (0.263)


Incidence of engaging ineco-friendly behaviour

Incidence of information seek-ing behaviour (IISB)

Age: 35-50 years (–ve); School attended: private school(–ve); Income groups: Rs. 20,000-35,000 (+ve) and Rs.35,000-50,000 (+ve)

0.27 (0.000)

Incidence of conservationbehaviour (ICB)

Gender: females (+ve); Education level: post-graduates(–ve); School attended: private school (–ve); Income: Rs.10,000-20,000 (+ve) and Rs. 20,000-35,000 (+ve);Occupation: professionals (+ve)

0.25 (0.000)

Incidence of choosing leastpolluting products (ICLPP)

Age: all coded dummy groups (+ve); Education level: allcoded dummy groups (–ve); School attended: privateschool (-ve); Income: Rs. 20,000-35,000 (–ve);Occupation: students (–ve)

0.21 (0.000)

Incidence of influencingothers (IIO)

Age: all coded dummy groups (-ve); Income: Rs. 20,000-35,000 (-ve); Occupation: service/employed persons(+ve)

0.09 (0.004)

Frequency of personally engag-ing in eco-friendly behaviour

Frequency of conservationbehaviour (FCB)

Gender: females (+ve); Education level: all coded dummygroups (–ve); Income: all coded dummy groups (–ve);Occupation: all coded dummy groups (+ve)

0.27 (0.000)

Frequency of environmentallyfriendly purchase behaviour(FEFPB)

Gender: females (+ve); Age: 24-35 years (–ve); Schoolattended: private school (–ve); Occupation: all codeddummy groups (+ve)

0.16 (0.000)

Frequency of environmental ac-tivism (FEA)

Age: 24-35 years (+ve); Education level: post-graduates(+ve); School attended: private school (+ve); Income: Rs.20,000-35,000 (+ve); Occupation: students (–ve)

0.45 (0.000)

Notes: a. Based on results given in Appendix.b. Plus or minus signs indicate whether the impact of the given variable is positive or negative with reference to the

base variable. At the time of creating dummy variables, the base variables used were: Gender: male; Age group:18-24 years; Education level: secondary school; School attended: private school; Income group: less than Rs.10,000; Occupation: housewives. For details, see Appendix.


tal consciousness. But the same is not true for the respondents in the de-veloping countries like India where environmentalism is a late starterand is slowly catching up. Little wonder that only the persons belongingto select socio-demographic groups have so far been able to gather envi-ronmental awareness and knowledge, possess positive attitudes towardsthe environmentally friendly behaviour and also engage in such behav-iours.

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

Exploration of socio-demographics as a correlate of consumer envi-ronmental consciousness has been quite a popular research theme in thegreen marketing literature. In view of the diverse and often conflictingfindings of past studies, it is not an easy task to draw any direct andstraightforward inference about the association of socio-demographiccharacteristics with the environmental consciousness. Use of a wide va-riety of conceptualisations and operationalisations of the environmentalconsciousness construct and the country/culture specific influences ofsocio-demographic variables on the environmental consciousness seemto be the two major contributory factors responsible for the diverse find-ings reported in the past.

Unlike the majority of the past researches, the present study has em-ployed a more elaborate conceptualisation of the environmental con-sciousness construct. Application of the multidimensional frameworkas suggested by Diamantopoulos et al. (2003) seems more than justifiedbecause each of the socio-demographic variables examined in the studyis found differently related with different environmental consciousnessdimensions and sub-dimensions. Use of a narrowly conceptualised andoperationalised construct of the environmental consciousness constructwould not have been able to capture the richness of its relationship withsocio-demographic variables. In all probability, use of a narrower con-ceptualisation would have led to an erroneous conclusion that thesocio-demographic variables do not have much of a role to play in seg-menting and profiling green consumers. Use of the variable “type ofschool attended” constitutes another noteworthy feature of the presentstudy as the impact of this socio-demographic variable has not been ex-amined in the past researches.

Though the number of sub-dimensions employed in the present studyis much larger than that used in the studies by Diamantopoulos et al.



(2003) and Schlegelmilch et al. (1996), it per se should not be construedas a limiting factor. Since none of the socio-demographic variables inthe study is found uniformly correlating with all the sub-dimensions ofthe environmental consciousness construct, any drastic and forced re-duction in the number of sub-dimensions and computation of an overallmeasure of the relationship might not be able to tap the richness of rela-tionship that otherwise exists between the socio-demographic charac-teristics and individually distinct sub-dimensions of the environmentalconsciousness.

In general, findings of the present study are quite encouraging andpoint to the usefulness of socio-demographic variables in segmentingand profiling the green consumers. Various hypotheses tested in thestudy and the results are summarised in Table 7. Genderwise, the studyreveals differences existing between males and females in respect oftheir environmental attitudes and behaviours. In general, females arefound to be outperforming the males with respect to willingness to seekenvironmentally friendly products (WSE), perceived effectiveness ofthe environmental actions (PEEA), conservation behaviour (ICB andFCB), frequency of buying environmentally friendly products (FEFPB),and involvement with environmental activism (FEA).

Regarding age, once again a similar conclusion emerges. A negativerelationship of age with WSE, IISB and IIO signifies a greater tendencyamong the relatively younger persons (viz., those belonging to the agegroups 18-24 years and 24-35 years) to actively search for the environ-mentally friendly products, gather environment-related information andinfluence others to behave in an environmentally responsible manner.These persons, however, appear less enthusiastic about choosing theleast polluting products (ICLPP). This might be due to their lower pur-chasing power for being mainly either students or unemployed at thisstage in their family life cycle.

Education level is found to be significantly related with the environ-mental consciousness in respect to five environmental consciousness mea-sures. A significantly positive relationship of the education level withenvironmental knowledge (EK), incidence and frequency of conserva-tion behaviour (ICB and FCB) and frequency of environmental activ-ism implies greater environmental consciousness among the relativelymore educated persons. Because of their higher intellectual orientation,these persons are able to better understand and appreciate green ideasand green claims made by the green marketers. Education level is, how-ever, found to be significantly but negatively related with the respon-dents’ willingness to seek environmentally friendly products (WSE).



The variable “type of school attended” emerges as a significant corre-late of the environmental consciousness for as many as six constructs.Notwithstanding being less articulate and extrovert, persons with thegovernment school background exhibit a higher level of environmentalconsciousness in terms of environmental awareness (AEIP) as well aswillingness to seek environmentally friendly products (WSE), inci-dence of seeking information (IISB), conserving resources (ICB) and


TABLE 7. Influence of Socio-Demographic Factors on Environmental Con-sciousness: Hypotheses Tested and Summary Results

Variable Result

Gender

H1.1: Males are environmentally more aware and knowledgeable than females. Not supported

H1.2: Males and females differ in their concern for environment. Largely supported

H1.3: Males and females differ in their pursuit of environmental activities. Partly supported

Age

H2.1: Environmental awareness and knowledge is negatively related with age. Not supported

H2.2: Environmental attitudes are negatively related with age. Partly supported

H2.3: Environmental behaviours are negatively related with age. Partly supported

Education

H3.1: Environmental awareness and knowledge are positively related with theeducation level.

Partly supported

H3.2: Environmental attitudes are positively related with the education level. Not supported

H3.3: Environmental behaviours are positively related with the education level. Partly supported

Type of School

H4.1: People with different school backgrounds differ in their environmentalawareness and knowledge.

Partly supported

H4.2: People with different school backgrounds differ in their environmentalattitudes.

Partly supported

H4.3: People with different school backgrounds differ in pursuing environmentalactivities.

Partly supported

Income

H5.1: Environmental awareness and knowledge are positively related with levelof income.

Partly supported

H5.2: Environmental attitudes are positively related with level of income. Partly supported

H5.3: Environmental behaviours are positively related with level of income. Partly supported

Occupation

H6.1: People with different occupations differ in environmental awareness andknowledge.

Largely supported

H6.2: People with different occupations differ in environmental attitudes. Largely supported

H6.3: People with different occupations differ in pursuing environmental activities. Largely supported


choosing the least polluting products (ICLPP). The only aspect wherethey lag behind persons with the private school background is fre-quency of environmental activism (FEA), probably due to being lessextrovert and gregarious than their counterpart.

Income also emerges as an important correlate of environmental con-sciousness. Persons with higher income are also high in their awarenessof the environmental regulations (AER), willingness to pay for the envi-ronmentally friendly products (WPM), incidence of information seek-ing behaviour (IISB) and choosing the least polluting products (ICLPP).But in terms of their involvement with the activities relating to influenc-ing others (IIO) and conserving the environment (FCB), they turn out tobe poor performers.

The study finds significant differences among the persons belongingto different occupational groups with respect to several environmentalconsciousness components. Though the linkage of the occupation withenvironmental consciousness differs from construct to construct, the re-sults in general show that it is the housewives and/or professionals andservice class persons who have greater environmental consciousnesswith respect to most of the environmental constructs.

Multivariate analysis undertaken in the study to examine the joint ef-fects of the socio-demographic variables reveal almost similar results.All the variables are found relevant, though differently with differentenvironmental constructs. For a majority of the environmental con-structs examined in the study, these variables when taken together areable to explain about 20 per cent-46 per cent of the variations present inthe consumers’ environmental consciousness.

Overall, the results thus point to the usefulness of socio-demographicvariables in predicting consumers’ environmental consciousness. Sig-nificant differences present in the environmental consciousness amongthe consumers belonging to different socio-demographic groups implythat the policy makers and marketers be sensitive to these differencesand make use of such knowledge for evolving positioning and market-ing-mix strategies as suitable to different green segments.

STUDY LIMITATIONS AND DIRECTIONSFOR FUTURE RESEARCH

It would not be out of place to mention here a few limitations of thestudy. First, use of a small sample that consists of respondents located ina metropolitan city precludes any generalisation of the study findings to



the country’s population as a whole. So far as marketing of the greenconsumer products is concerned, this might not come up as a seriousthreat because it is the urban consumers who constitute a major marketfor such products. But an outright exclusion of the rural people from thestudy severely restricts the external validity of the study findings for be-ing utilised for developing strategies for promoting green ideas and run-ning environmental education campaigns by the governmental agenciesand non-profit environmental organisations among the masses in thecountry. This is so because the rural people who constitute about 72.5per cent of the country’s population (Census of India, 2001) are vastlydifferent from their urban counterparts with respect to their literacy lev-els as well as media habits, occupations, values and life styles. For in-stance, people living in rural areas are considerably less literate (49.44per cent) as compared with the urban people (70.09 per cent). What ismore disturbing is the fact that while only 38.94 per cent of the ruralwomen are literate, the literacy rate among the urban females is muchhigher, that is 63.89 per cent (Census of India, 2001). Occupationwisetoo, while rural people are predominantly employed in agricultural andallied activities, a majority of the urban populace is engaged in the ser-vice or manufacturing industries (Ministry of Agriculture, 2002). Thetwo groups of people, moreover, differ in their media habits and expo-sure levels (IRS, 2001); and being more tradition bound, the rural peo-ple employ purchase criteria different from those used by the people inurban areas (Parthasarathy, 2002).

In view of these and other differences, the two types of people are un-likely to be similar in their environmental consciousness across differ-ent socio-demographic groups. For instance, no statistically significantdifference has been found in the present study between the males and fe-males living in Delhi with respect to their environmental awareness andknowledge. But such is unlikely to be the case with rural areas wherewomen in contrast to their male counterparts are considerably muchmore illiterate; and, hence, are unlikely to be equally aware of the envi-ronmental issues and developments. Such differences in the environ-mental consciousness existing among people living in different parts ofa country have been observed even in some past studies undertaken inother countries (e.g., Prothero, 1990; Schwepker and Cornwell, 1991).It is, therefore, suggested that the studies employing larger samples andcovering rural areas be undertaken in the future so as to arrive at morevalid and reliable inferences. Any such coverage of rural people in thefuture studies, however, would require translation of the questionnaireinto languages spoken in the rural areas. Since English is not the lan-



guage of the rural people, a questionnaire prepared in English languagewould serve no purpose.

Another limitation of the study is that it has examined the influence ofonly select socio-demographic variables on the environmental conscious-ness. It would be a worthwhile endeavour in future studies to explore theimpact of other socio-demographic characteristics such as marital status,number of children, place of residence and social class which have been in-vestigated in the past studies (e.g., Diamantopoulos et al., 2003; Roberts,1996). On a comparative basis, studies can also investigate the relative roleof psychographic variables such as conservatism and dogmatism, politicalorientation, altruism, egoism, self-esteem, individualism and collectiv-ism that have been found to be significantly correlating with eco-con-sciousness in the previous researches undertaken in other countries(e.g., Anderson and Cunnigham, 1972; Allen and Ferrand, 1999;Balderjahn, 1988; Geller, 1995; Henion and Wilson, 1976; Hine andGifford, 1991; Kinnear and Taylor, 1973; Cornwell and Schwepker,1995; Kinnear et al., 1974; McCarty and Shrum, 1994; Pettus and Giles,1987; Roberts, 1996; Schwartz, 1994; Stern et al., 1993; Triandis,1993). Moreover, the present study has attempted to explore only link-ages between the consumers’ socio-demographic characteristics andenvironmental consciousness. It would be insightful to examine in thefuture the influence of cultural values on the environmental conscious-ness as has been done in the past select studies relating to other coun-tries (e.g., Chau and Lau, 2000).

The present study has made use of both the “incidence” and “fre-quency” of consumers’ involvement with environmentally friendly be-haviour. In the future, it needs to be resolved as to which of these twomeasures constitute a better operationalisation of the pro-environmentalbehaviour construct.

At the initial stages in the study, various multi-item scales were em-ployed to tap the different dimensions of environmental consciousnessconstruct. However, some of these scales (especially those pertaining tothe “environmental awareness and knowledge” and “environmental at-titude” components) had to be split into sub-scales in view of their poorfactor loadings and reliability coefficients. In the process, many of thescales got reduced to just single-item scales. Efforts, therefore, need tobe made in the future to develop multi-item scales that are psycho-metrically sound in measuring various dimensions and sub-dimensionsof the environmental consciousness construct. It is only after the devel-opment and deployment of such valid and reliable multi-item scales that



we would be in a position to draw definitive inferences about the role ofsocio-demographics in profiling green consumers.

Also, no attempt has been made in the present study to identify differ-ent clusters of green consumers and profile them on the basis ofsocio-demographic characteristics. More elaborate studies using clus-tering technique can be taken up in future to segment the consumers intodifferent groups and profile them in terms of socio-demographic char-acteristics. This can enable the marketers to draw implications for de-veloping positioning and marketing mix strategies as appropriate foreach of the identified green segments.

REFERENCES

Aaker, D.A. and Bagozzi, R.P. (1982). Attitudes toward public policy alternatives toreduce air pollution. Journal of Marketing, 42(1), 85-94.

Allen, J.B. and Ferrand, J.L. (1999). Environmental locus of control, sympathy, andproenvironmental behaviour: A test of Geller’s actively caring hypothesis. Envi-ronment and Behavior, 31(3) May, 338-353.

Anderson, W.T., Jr. and Cunningham, W.H.C. (1972). The socially conscious con-sumer. Journal of Marketing, 36(3), 23-31.

Anderson, W.T., Jr., Henion, K.E. and Cox III, E.P. (1974). Socially vs. ecologicallyconscious consumers, American Marketing Association Combined ConferenceProceedings, 36 (Spring and Fall), 304-11.

Antil, J.H. (1984). Socially responsible consumers: Profile and implications for publicpolicy. Journal of Macromarketing, 4(2), 18-39.

Arbuthnot, J. (1977). The roles of attitudinal and personality variables in the predictionof environmental behaviour and knowledge. Environment and Behavior, 9(2),217-32.

Arbuthnot, J. and Lingg, S. (1975). A comparison of French and American environ-mental behaviours, knowledge and attitudes. International Journal of Psychology,10(4), 275-81.

Arcury, T.A., Scollay, S.J. and Johnson, T.P. (1987). Sex differences in environmentalconcern and knowledge: The case of acid rain. Sex Roles, 16(9/10), 463-72.

Baldassare M. and Katz, C. (1992). The personal threat of environmental problems aspredictor of environmental practices. Environment and Behavior, 24(5), 602-16.

Balderjahn, I. (1988). Personality variables and environmental attitudes as predictorsof ecologically responsible consumption patterns. Journal of Business Research,17(1), 51-56.

Bohlen, G., Schlegelmilch, B.B. and Diamantopoulos, A. (1993). Measuring ecologi-cal concern: A multi-construct perspective. Journal of Marketing Management,9(4), 415-430.

Buttell, F.H. and Flinn, W.L. (1978). The politics of environmental concern: Impactsof party identification and political ideology on environmental attitudes. Environ-ment and Behavior, 10(1), 17-37.



Census of India (2001). www.censusindia.net.Chan, K. (1999). Market segmentation of green consumers in Hong Kong. Journal of

International Consumer Marketing, 12(2), 7-24.Chan, R.Y.K. and Lau, L.B.Y. (2000). Antecedents of green purchases: A survey in

China. Journal of Consumer Marketing, 17(4), 338-357.Chan, R.Y.K. and Yam, E. (1995). Green movement in a newly industrializing area: A

survey on the attitudes and behavior of the Hong Kong citizens. Journal of Commu-nity & Applied Social Psychology, 5, 273-284.

Chan, T.S. (1996). Concerns for environmental issues and consumer purchase prefer-ences: A two-country study. Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 9(1),43-55.

Chandler, R. (1972). Public opinion: Changing attitudes on contemporary politicaland social issues. New York: R.R. Bowker.

Cornwell, T.B. and Schwepker, C.H., Jr. (1995). Ecologically concerned consumersand their product purchases. In M.J. Polonsky and A.T. Mintu-Wimsat (Eds.), Envi-ronmental marketing: Strategies, Practice, Theory, and Research, New York: TheHaworth Press, Inc.

Davidson, D.J. and Freudenburg, W.R. (1996). Gender and environmental risk con-cerns: A review and analysis of available research. Environment and Behavior,28(3), 302-39.

Davis, J.J. (1993). Strategies for environmental advertising. Journal of ConsumerMarketing, 10(2), 19-36.

Devall, W.B. (1970). Conservation: An upper-middle class social movement, a repli-cation. Journal of Leisure Research, 3, 123-6.

Diamantopoulos, A., Schlegelmilch, B.B., Sinkovics, R.R. and Bohlen, G.M. (2003).Can socio-demographics still play a role in profiling green consumers? A review ofthe evidence and an empirical investigation. Journal of Business Research, 56(2),465-80.

Ellen, P.S., Wiener, J.L. and Cobb-Walgren, C. (1991). The role of perceived con-sumer effectiveness in motivating environmentally conscious behaviours. Journalof Public Policy and Marketing, 10(2), Fall, 102-17.

EPA (1994). Determinants of effectiveness for environmental certification and label-ling programs, US Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Pollution Preven-tion and Toxics, EPA-742-R-98-009; Washington. http://www.epa.gov/oppt/epp/pubs/privsect.pdf

Freund, R.J. and Wilson, W.J. (1997). Statistical Method, San Diego: Academic Press.Gallup (1992). Health of the Planet Survey 1992. Cited in Meffert, Heribert and Kirch-

georg, Manfred (1994), Green marketing. Companion Encyclopedia of Marketing,London: Routledge, pp. 979-1002.

Geller, E.S. (1981). Evaluating energy conservation programs: Is verbal reportenough? Journal of Consumer Research, 8(4), December, 331-5.

Geller, E.S. (1995). Integrating behaviorism and humanism for environmental protec-tion. Journal of Social Issues, 51(4), 179-195.

Grunert, S.C. (1991). Everybody seems concerned about the environment: But is thisconcern reflected in (Danish) consumers’ food choice? Aarhus School of BusinessWorking Paper Series, Aarhus.



Grunert, S.C. (1993). Everybody seems concerned about the environment but is thisconcern reflected in (Danish) consumers’ food choice? European Advances in Con-sumer Research, 1, 428-433.

Grunert, S.C. and Kristensen, K. (1994). The green consumer: Some Danish evidence.Marketing Review, 19(2), 138-45.

Hair, J.F. Jr., Anderson, R.E., Tatham, R.L. and Black, W.C. (1995). Multivariate DataAnalysis with Readings (4th edn.), Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall.

Harry, J., Gale, R. and Hendee, J. (1969). Conservation: An upper-middle class socialmovement. Journal of Leisure Research, 2, 246-54.

Henion, K.E. II and Wilson, W.H. (1976). The ecologically concerned consumer andlocus of control. In Henion, K.E. II and Kinnear, T.C. (Ed.), Ecological Marketing.American Marketing Association, Chicago, IL.

Hine, D.W. and Gifford, R. (1991). Fear appeals, individual differences, and environ-mental concern. The Journal of Environmental Education, 23(1), 36-41.

Honnold, J.A. (1981). Predictors of public environmental concern in the 1970s. In D.E.Mann (Ed.), Environmental Policy Formation–The Impacts of Values, Ideologyand Standards (pp. 68-75). Lexington: Lexington Books.

IRS (2001). Indian readership survey–Round 2.Jain, S.K. and Kaur, G. (2003). Strategic green marketing: How should business firms go

about adopting it? The Indian Journal of Commerce, 55(4), October-December, 1-16.Jain, S.K. and Kaur, G. (2004). Green marketing: An Indian perspective. Decision,

31(2), July-December, 18-31.Johri, L.M. and Kanokthip, S. (1998). Green marketing of cosmetics and toiletries in

Thailand. Journal of Consumer Marketing, 15(3), 265-281.Johnson, C.Y., Bowker, J.M. and Cordell, H.K. (2004). Ethnic variation in environ-

mental belief and behavior: An examination of the new ecological paradigm in a so-cial psychological context. Environment and Behavior, 36(2), March, 157-186.

Jolibert, A. and Baumgartner, G. (1981). Toward a definition of the consumerist seg-ment in France. Journal of Consumer Research, 8(June), 114-117.

Kassarjian, H.H. (1971). Incorporating ecology into marketing strategy: The case of airpollution. Journal of Marketing, 35(3) July, 61-5.

Kinnear, T.C. and Taylor, J.R. (1973). The effects of ecological concern on brand per-ceptions. Journal of Marketing Research, 10, 191-197.

Kinnear, T.C., Taylor, J.R. and Ahmed, S.A. (1974). Ecologically concerned consum-ers: Who are they? Journal of Marketing, 38(2) April, 20-24.

Leonard-Barton, D. (1981). Voluntary simplicity lifestyles and energy conservation.Journal of Consumer Research, 8(3), 243-252.

Lowe, G.D., Pinhey, T.K. and Grimes, M.D. (1980). Public support for environmentalprotection: New evidence from national surveys. Pacific Sociological Review, 23(4)October, 423-45.

Lyons, E. and Breakwell, G.M. (1994). Factors predicting environmental concern andindifference in 13-to 16-year-olds. Environment and Behavior, 26(2), 223-38.

Macnaghten, P. and Urry, J. (1998). Contested Natures. London: Sage.Maloney, M.P. and Ward, M.P. (1973). Ecology: Let’s hear from the people: An objec-

tive scale for the measurement of ecological attitudes and knowledge. AmericanPsychologist, 28(7) July, 583-6.



Maloney, M.P., Ward, M.P. and Brauchi, G.N. (1975). A revised scale for the measure-ment of ecological attitudes and knowledge. American Psychologist, 30(7), July,787-90.

McCarty J.A. and Shrum, L. (1994). The recycling of solid wastes: Personal values,value orientations and attitudes about recycling as antecedents of recycling behav-iour. Journal of Business Research, 30(2), 53-62.

McEvoy, III, J. (1972). The American concern with the environment. In Social Behav-iour, Natural Resources, and the Environment. New York: Harper and Row.

Mc Dougall, G.H.G. (1993). The green movement in Canada: Implications for market-ing strategy. Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 5(3), 69-87.

Meffert, H. and Bruhn, M. (1996). Das Umweltbewußtsein von Konsunenten, DieBetriebswirtsch, 56(5), 621-58.

Meffert, H. and Kirchgeorg, M. (1994). Green marketing. Companion Encyclopedia ofMarketing, London: Routledge, 979-1002.

Ministry of Agriculture (2002). Agricultural statistics at a glance: 2002. New Delhi:Government of India.

Mitchell, A. (1983). The nine American lifestyles. New York: Macmillan PublishingCo. Inc.

Mohai, P. (1985). Public concern and elite involvement in environmental conservationissues. Social Science Quarterly, 66(3), December, 820-38.

Moore, H.K. (1981). Energy related information–Attitude measures of college-age stu-dents, Journal of Environmental Education, 12(1), 30-3.

Murphy, P.E., Kangun, N. and Locander, W.B. (1978). Environmentally concernedconsumers–Racial variations. Journal of Marketing, 42(4), 61-66.

Neuman, K. (1986). Personal values and commitment to energy conservation. Envi-ronment and Behavior, 18(1), 53-74.

Nunnally, J. (1967). Psychometric Theory. New York: McGraw Hill.Ostman, R.E. and Parker, J.I. (1987). Impact of education, age, newspapers, and televi-

sion on environmental knowledge, concerns, and behaviours. Journal of Environ-mental Education, 19(1), 3-9.

Ottman, J. (1992). Sometimes consumers will pay more to go green. Marketing News,July 6, 16.

Parthasarathy, V. (2002). Does the rural market like it hot or cold? The Hindu, http://www.hinduonnet.com/ct/2002/04/25/stories/2002042500130200.htm, April 25.

Peattie, K. (1992). Green Marketing. London: Longman Group Ltd.Peattie, K. and Ratnayaka, M. (1992). Responding to the green movement, Journal of

Industrial Management, 21(2): 103-110.Pettus, A.M. and Giles, M.B. (1987). Personality characteristics and environmental at-

titudes. Population and Environment, 9(3), 127-137.Pickett, G.M., Kangun, N. and Grove, S.J. (1993). Is there a general conserving con-

sumer? A public policy concern. Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, 12(2),234-43.

Prothero, A. (1990), Green consumerism and the societal marketing concept–Market-ing strategies for the 1990s, Journal of Marketing Management, 6(2), 87-103.

Ray, J.J. (1975). Measuring environmentalist attitudes. The Australian and New Zea-land Journal of Sociology, 11(2), June, 70-71.



Reizenstein, R.C., Hills, G.E. and Philpot, J.W. (1974). Willingness to pay for controlof air pollution: A demographic analysis. Combined Proceedings, American Mar-keting Association, Chicago, IL, 323-8.

Roberts, J.A. (1996). Green consumers in 1990s: Profile and implications for advertis-ing. Journal of Business Research, 36(3), 217-231.

Roper Organization (1990). The Environment: Public Attitudes and Individual Behav-ior. Racine, WI: S. C. Johnson & Son.

Roper Organization (1992). Environmental Behaviour, North America: Canada, Mex-ico, United States. New York: SC Johnson and Son.

Salzman, J. (1991). Green labels for consumers, OECD Observer, 169, 28-30.Samdahl, M.D. and Robertson, R. (1989). Social determinants of environmental con-

cern: Specification and test of the model. Environment and Behavior, 21(1), Janu-ary, 57-81.

Schahn, J. and Holzer, E. (1990). Studies of individual environmental concern: Therole of knowledge, gender and background variables. Environment and Behavior,22(6), 767-86.

Schlegelmilch, B.B., Bohlen, G.M. and Diamantopoulos, A. (1996). The link betweengreen purchasing decisions and measures of environmental consciousness. Euro-pean Journal of Marketing, 30(5), 35-55.

Schwartz, S.H. (1994). Are there universal aspects in the structure and contents of hu-man values? Journal of Social Issues, 50(4), 19-45.

Schwepker, C.H. and Cornwell, T.B. (1991). An examination of ecologically con-cerned consumers and their intention to purchase ecologically packaged products.Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, 10(2), Fall, 77-101.

Scott, D. and Willits, F.K. (1994). Environmental attitudes and behaviour: A Pennsyl-vania survey. Environment and Behavior, 26(2), March, 239-60.

Shrum, L.J., McCarty, J.A. and Lowrey, T.M. (1995). Buyer characteristics of thegreen consumer and their implications for advertising strategy. Journal of Advertis-ing, 24(2), 71-82.

Simon, F. (1992). Marketing green products in the Triad. Columbia Journal of WorldBusiness, 27(Fall and Winter), 268-285.

Sriram, V. and Forman, A.M. (1993), The relative importance of products’ environ-mental attributes. International Marketing Review, 10(3), 51-70.

Stern, P.C., Dietz, T. and Kalof, L. (1993). Value orientations, gender, and environ-mental concern. Environment and Behavior, 25(3), 322-48.

Straughan, R.D. and Roberts, J.A. (1999). Environmental segmentation alternatives: Alook at green consumer behaviour in the new millennium. Journal of ConsumerMarketing, 16(6), 558-575.

Tai, S.H.C. and Tam, J.L.M. (1996). A comparative study of Chinese consumers inAsian markets–A lifestyle analysis. Journal of International Consumer Marketing.9(1), 25-42.

Tang, E., Fryxell, G.E. and Chow, C.S.F. (2004). Visual and verbal communication inthe design of eco-label for green consumer products. Journal of International Con-sumer Marketing, 16(4), 85-105.

The Public Purpose (1998). U.S. public schools and private schools: Performance andspending compared. 18 (January), http://www.publicpurpose.com/pp-edpp.htm(accessed on November 10, 2004).



Tognacci, L.N., Weigel, R.H., Wideen, M.F. and Vernon, D.T.A. (1972). Environmentalquality: How universal is public concern? Environment and Behavior, 4(1), 73-86.

Triandis, H.C. (1993). Collectivism and individualism as cultural syndromes.Cross-cultural Research, 27(3), 155-80.

Tucker, L.R. Jr., Dolich, I. and Wilson, D. (1981). Profiling environmentally responsi-ble consumer citizens. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Fall, 454-478.

Van Liere, K.D. and Dunlap, R.E. (1981). Environmental concern: Does it make a dif-ference how it’s measured? Environment and Behavior, 13(6), 651-76.

Vandermerwe, S. and Oliff, M.D. (1990). Customers drive corporations green. LongRange Planning, 23, No. 6 (November-December): 10-16.

Vining, J. and Ebreo, A. (1990). What makes a recycler? A comparison of recyclersand non-recyclers. Environment and Behavior, 22(1), 55-73.

Wasik, J. (1992). Green marketing: Marketing is confusing, but patience will pay off.Marketing News, 26(21), 16-17.

Webster, F.E. Jr. (1975). Determining the characteristics of the socially conscious con-sumer. Journal of Consumer Research, 2(3), 188-96.

Widegren, O. (1998). The new environmental paradigm and personal norms. Environ-ment and Behavior, 30(1), 75-100.

Yam-Tang, E.P.Y. and Chan, R.Y.K. (1998). Purchasing behaviors and perceptions ofenvironmental harmful products. Marketing Intelligence & Planning, 16(6),356-362.

Zeidner, M. and Shechter, M. (1988). Psychological responses to air pollution. Somepersonality and demographic correlates. Journal of Environmental Psychology,8(2), 191-208.

Zimmer, M.R., Stafford, Thomas F. and Stafford, M.R. (1994). Green issues dimen-sions of environmental concern. Journal of Business Research, 30(1), 63-74.

SUBMITTED: July 2003FIRST REVISION: October 2004

SECOND REVISION: January 2005ACCEPTED: May 2005



AP

PE

ND

IX

Env

ironm

enta

lCon

scio

usne

ssan

dS

ocio

-Dem

ogra

phic

s:R

egre

ssio

nR

esul

ts

Dep

en-

dent

Var

i-ab

le5

Inde

pend

entV

aria

bles

:Reg

ress

ion

Coe

ffici

ents

1,2,

3,4

Adj

.R

2F

-va

lue

Sig

.(p

)C

onst

ant

GE

N2

AG

D2

AG

D3

ED

D2

ED

D3

SC

HD

2ID

2ID

3ID

4O

CC

D2

OC

CD

3O

CC

D4

OC

CD

5

AE

IPb

3.66

0.26

�0.

340.

05�

0.03

0.01

�0.

38**

0.20

0.58

**0.

11�

0.75

**0.

17�

0.36

�0.

59*

0.10

2.78

0.00

1

B (sta

nd.)

0.11

�0.

150.

02�

0.01

0.01

�0.

17**

0.08

0.22

**0.

04�

0.28

**0.

05�

0.11

�0.

26*

AE

Rb

3.64

�0.

06�

0.07

�0.

3�

0.34

0.07

�0.

08�

0.29

0.31

0.32

�1.

20**

*0.

17�

0.55

�0.

80**

*0.

163.

970.

000

B (sta

nd.)

�0.

03�

0.03

�0.

12�

0.15

0.03

�0.

03�

0.11

0.12

0.11

�0.

43**

*0.

06�

0.16

�0.

34**

*

EK

b0.

56�

0.03

0.07

***

0.02

�0.

050.

020.

00�

0.05

�0.

03�

0.04

�0.

04�

0.02

�0.

010.

000.

062.

010.

022

B (sta

nd.)

�0.

110.

25**

*0.

06�

0.17

0.09

0.02

�0.

18�

0.10

�0.

12�

0.12

�0.

05�

0.02

0.00

WP

Mb

3.82

0.16

0.09

�0.

09�

0.10

�0.

15�

0.44

***

0.59

**0.

66**

*0.

84**

*�

0.37

�0.

64**

�0.

27�

0.06

0.09

2.55

0.00

3

B (sta

nd.)

0.07

0.04

�0.

04�

0.05

�0.

07�

0.21

***

0.26

**0.

27**

*0.

32**

*�

0.15

�0.

23**

�0.

08�

0.03

WS

Eb

5.33

0.34

***

0.32

***

�0.

25*

�1.

57**

*�

1.57

***

�0.

42**

*�

0.23

0.11

0.14

�0.

36*

0.03

�0.

51**

0.17

0.46

14.6

50.

000

B (sta

nd.)

0.20

***

0.19

***

�0.

13*

�0.

94**

*�

0.92

***

�0.

25**

*�

0.13

0.06

0.07

�0.

18*

0.01

�0.

20**

0.10

PE

EA

b2.

30.

47**

�0.

190.

310.

230.

310.

23�

0.12

0.36

�0.

250.

340.

030.

160.

090.

011.

230.

263

B (sta

nd.)

0.22

**�

0.09

0.13

0.11

0.14

0.10

�0.

050.

15�

0.10

0.13

0.01

0.05

0.04

IISB

b3.

310.

130.

18�

0.54

***

0.13

0.24

�0.

53**

*0.

120.

35**

0.79

***

�0.

22�

0.19

0.31

0.06

0.27

6.71

0.00

0

B (sta

nd.)

0.08

0.11

–0.2

9***

0.08

0.14

–0.3

1***

0.06

0.18

**0.

39**

*–0

.11

–0.0

90.

120.

03

145


AP

PE

ND

IX(c

ontin

ued)

Dep

en-

dent

Var

i-ab

le5

Inde

pend

entV

aria

bles

:Reg

ress

ion

Coe

ffici

ents

1,2,

3,4

Adj

.R

2F

-va

lue

Sig

.(p

)C

onst

ant

GE

N2

AG

D2

AG

D3

ED

D2

ED

D3

SC

HD

2ID

2ID

3ID

4O

CC

D2

OC

CD

3O

CC

D4

OC

CD

5

ICB

b3.

670.

36**

*0.

09�

0.15

�0.

30�

0.31

*�

0.64

***

0.34

**0.

30**

0.26

�0.

200.

64**

*0.

200.

160.

256.

230.

000

B (sta

nd.)

0.23

***

0.06

�0.

09�

0.19

�0.

19*

�0.

40**

*0.

20**

0.17

**0.

14�

0.11

0.30

***

0.09

0.10

ICLP

Pb

4.70

0.20

0.37

***

0.46

***

�0.

84**

*�

0.73

***

�0.

36**

*�

0.27

*0.

130.

24�

0.40

*�

0.09

�0.

200.

180.

215.

110.

000

B (sta

nd.)

0.13

0.25

***

0.28

***

�0.

56**

*�

0.48

***

�0.

24**

*�

0.17

*0.

080.

13�

0.22

*�

0.04

–0.0

90.

12

IIOb

3.58

�0.

04�

0.21

*�

0.59

***

0.03

�0.

04�

0.15

0.08

�0.

25*

�0.

230.

120.

270.

190.

40**

0.09

2.46

0.00

4

B (sta

nd.)

�0.

03�

0.16

*�

0.42

***

0.02

�0.

03�

0.12

0.06

�0.

17*

�0.

150.

080.

160.

100.

31**

FC

Bb

3.84

0.61

***

0.07

0.12

�0.

50**

*�

0.28

*�

0.06

�0.

71**

*�

0.32

**�

0.38

***

0.55

***

0.99

***

0.72

***

1.06

***

0.27

6.81

0.00

0

B (sta

nd.)

0.41

***

0.05

0.08

�0.

34**

*�

0.19

*�

0.04

�0.

45**

*�

0.19

**�

0.22

***

0.32

***

0.51

***

0.33

***

0.71

***

FE

FP

Bb

3.1

0.80

***

�0.

46**

*�

0.06

�0.

200.

07�

0.25

*�

0.14

0.19

0.01

0.57

**1.

17**

*0.

94**

*0.

88**

*0.

163.

990.

000

B (sta

nd.)

0.44

***

�0.

25**

*�

0.03

�0.

110.

04�

0.13

*�

0.07

0.09

0.00

0.26

**0.

48**

*0.

35**

*0.

47**

*

FE

Ab

1.75

0.11

0.26

**�

0.09

0.25

0.91

***

0.24

***

0.19

0.45

***

0.20

�0.

40**

�0.

13�

0.33

�0.

270.

4513

.73

0.00

0

B (sta

nd.)

0.07

0.17

**�

0.05

0.16

0.58

***

0.15

***

0.11

0.25

***

0.11

�0.

21**

�0.

06�

0.14

�0.

17

Not

es:

1.S

igni

fican

cele

vels

are:

***p

£0.

01;*

*p£

0.05

and

*p£

0.10

.2.

Firs

trow

corr

espo

ndin

gto

each

depe

nden

tvar

iabl

ere

fers

toun

stan

dard

ised

beta

coef

ficie

nts.

3.S

econ

dro

wco

rres

pond

ing

toea

chde

pend

entv

aria

ble

refe

rsto

stan

dard

ised

beta

coef

ficie

nts.

4.T

hele

gend

fort

hein

depe

nden

tvar

iabl

esis

:GE

ND

2st

ands

forg

ende

rgro

up‘fe

mal

es’w

ithba

seva

riabl

ebe

ing

mal

e;A

GD

2an

dA

GD

3st

andi

ngfo

rage

grou

ps24

-35

year

san

d35

-50

year

sre

spec

-tiv

ely,

with

base

age

grou

pbe

ing

18-2

4ye

ars;

ED

D2

and

ED

D3

stan

ding

for‘

grad

uate

s’an

d‘p

ost-

grad

uate

s,’w

ith‘s

econ

dary

scho

ol’a

sth

eba

se;S

CH

D2

stan

ding

forp

rivat

esc

hool

atte

nded

,with

‘gov

ernm

ent

scho

olat

tend

ed’a

sth

eba

se;

ID2,

ID3

and

ID4

stan

ding

for

inco

me

grou

psR

s.10

,000

-20,

000,

Rs.

20,0

00-3

5,00

0an

dR

s.35

,000

-50,

000

resp

ectiv

ely

with

inco

me

‘less

than

Rs.

10,0

00’a

sth

eba

se;

and

OC

CD

2,O

CC

D3,

OC

CD

4an

dO

CC

D5

stan

ding

for

occu

patio

ngr

oups

stud

ents

,pr

ofes

sion

als,

busi

ness

/sel

fem

ploy

edpe

rson

san

dse

rvic

e/em

ploy

edpe

rson

s,w

ithho

usew

ives

asba

se.

5.T

hele

gend

fort

hede

pend

entv

aria

ble

is:

AE

IP=

Aw

aren

ess

abou

tenv

ironm

enta

liss

ues/

prob

lem

s;A

ER

=A

war

enes

sab

oute

nviro

nmen

talr

egul

atio

ns;E

K=

Env

ironm

enta

lkno

wle

dge

ofsp

ecifi

cis

sues

;WP

M=

Will

ingn

ess

topa

ym

ore

for

envi

ronm

enta

llyfr

iend

lypr

oduc

ts;

WS

E=

Will

ingn

ess

tose

eken

viro

nmen

tally

frie

ndly

prod

ucts

;PE

EA

=P

erce

ived

effe

ctiv

enes

sof

envi

ronm

enta

lac-

tion;

IISB

=In

cide

nce

ofin

form

atio

nse

ekin

gbe

havi

our;

ICB

=In

cide

nce

ofco

nser

vatio

nbe

havi

our;

ICLP

P=

Inci

denc

eof

choo

sing

leas

tpol

lutin

gpr

oduc

ts;I

IO=

Inci

denc

eof

influ

enci

ngot

hers

;F

CB

=F

requ

ency

ofco

nser

vatio

nbe

havi

our;

FE

FP

B=

Fre

quen

cyof

envi

ronm

enta

llyfr

iend

lypu

rcha

sebe

havi

our;

and

FE

A=

Fre

quen

cyof

envi

ronm

enta

lact

ivis

m.

146


Jain and Kaur - Role of Socio-Demographics in Segmenting and Profiling - JICM - 18 - 3

Documents

Transcript of Jain and Kaur - Role of Socio-Demographics in Segmenting and Profiling - JICM - 18 - 3