Factors Affecting Customer Purchase Intention Of Cloth Bags For Shopping.pdf

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

TRINH NGOC HONG ANH

FACTORS AFFECTING CUSTOMER
PURCHASE INTENTION OF CLOTH
BAGS FOR SHOPPING

MASTER’S THESIS
MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Hanoi, 2019

H

i


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

TRINH NGOC HONG ANH

FACTORS AFFECTING CUSTOMER
PURCHASE INTENTION OF CLOTH
BAGS FOR SHOPPING
MAJOR: BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
CODE: 60340102

RESEARCH SUPERVISORS:

ASSOC.PROF.DR. VU ANH DUNG
PROF.DR. TOHRU INOUE

Hanoi, 2019


ACKNOWLEDGMENT
I would like to express my gratitude to all those who gave me the possibility to
complete this thesis. I have received extensive help, suggestions and
encouragements at each step along the way, and I am very grateful to my
beloved and dedicated professors, family and friends for their time and support.

First and foremost, I would like to thank my two supervisors, who are not only
my guide throughout the completion of this thesis but also my lecturers,
Associate Professor. Vu Anh Dung and Professor. Tohru Inoue, for their wholehearted guidance and help as well as invaluable feedbacks, which enable me to
complete this paper.

Furthermore, during this work I have received remarkable help and
encouragement from my beloved professor in Business Administration
Department – Professor Tran Thi Bich Hanh for her thoughtful support and
advice during my time of generating ideas and finalizing the topic.
Besides, I would like to say thank-you to all of the participants who helped me
answer my questionnaire when I did the survey, without you there will not be
the results for this research.

Last but not least, I am greatly indebted to Vietnam Japan University and
Yokohama National University for creating a wonderful study environment for
me to develop myself and study which encourage me to finish my thesis.

Student,

Trinh Ngoc Hong Anh

i


ABSTRACT
Plastic shopping bags are a daily use product of everyone, which is not only harmful
to environment but also to people’s health. Environmental terms such as global
warming, green house effects are becoming more and more popular in the media
channel. People seem to be more aware of the negative effects of using plastic
shopping bags, which leads to a need for an alternative. Cloth bags are a typical
option for changing in everyday life of customers, which is recyclable and is made
with more eco-friendly materials compared to plastic bags. This study explores the
factors affecting consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping by using
theory of planned behavior. The constructs of theory of planned behavior: attitude,
subjective norms, perceived availability and perceived consumer effectiveness are
tested to check if they have a positive significant relationship with consumer
purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping or not. Moreover, since media
exposure seems to make a certain influence on the relationships between constructs
of theory of planned behavior and purchase intention, it is used as a proposed
moderator. The study uses convenient sampling and distributes questionnaire
adopted from previous researches to 120 respondents both offline and online. 113
results sent back to analyzed by SPSS 20. The results found that attitude and
subjective norm have a significant positive impact on purchase intention while
perceived availability and perceived consumer effectiveness do not. Media exposure
to environmental message also does not show a moderating effect to the relations.

ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGMENT ............................................................................................. i
ABSTRACT ............................................................................................................... ii
LIST OF TABLES .................................................................................................... vi
LIST OF FIGURES................................................................................................. viii
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ...............................................................................1
1.1.

Background and necessity of the research ........................................................1

1.1.1.

Why is environment degrading gradually? ................................................1

1.1.2.

Plastic bags versus cloth bags. ...................................................................3

1.1.3.

Green marketing and customer purchase intention ....................................5

1.2.

Statement of the problems ................................................................................8

1.3.

Research objectives ...........................................................................................9

1.4.

Research questions ..........................................................................................10

1.5. Research scope ...................................................................................................10
1.6.

Structure of the research .................................................................................10

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ..................................................................12
2.1. Green consumptions and related definitions ......................................................12
2.1.1. Sustainable consumption .............................................................................12
2.1.2. Green consumption ......................................................................................13
2.1.3. Green products and related researches ........................................................16

iii


2.1.4. Eco-friendly shopping bags and cloth bags .................................................17
2.2. Consumer behavior and purchase intention .......................................................22
2.3. Theory of Planned behavior ...............................................................................25
2.3.1. Attitudes towards behavior ..........................................................................26
2.3.2. Perceived behavioral control .......................................................................27
2.3.3. Subjective norms .........................................................................................28
2.4. Media exposure to environmental messages:.....................................................28
2.5. Final proposed research model...........................................................................30
CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY ......................................................31
3.1. Research process ................................................................................................31
3.2. Sampling and data collection .............................................................................32
3.3. Designing questionnaire .....................................................................................33

3.4. Analyzing data plan............................................................................................38
CHAPTER 4. DATA PRESENTATIONS AND FINDINGS ..................................47
4.1.

Data description ..............................................................................................47

4.2. Reliability analysis .............................................................................................51
4.2.1. Reliability of ATTITUDE-ATT scale .........................................................51
4.2.2. Reliability of SUBJECTIVE NORM – SN scale ........................................52
4.2.3. Reliability of PERCEIVED AVAILABILITY - PA scale ..........................53
4.2.4. Reliability of PERCEIVED CUSTOMER EFFECTIVENESS scale .........54
4.2.5. Reliability of PURCHASE INTENTION scale ...........................................57
iv


4.2.6. Reliability of MEDIA EXPOSURE TO ENVIORNMENTAL MESSAGE
scale .......................................................................................................................58
4.3. Exploratory factor analysis ................................................................................59
4.3.1. Exploratory factor analysis of TPB scale ....................................................59
4.3.2. Exploratory factor analysis of PURCHASE INTENTION SCALE ...........62
4.3.3.

Exploratory factor analysis of MEDIA EXPOSURE TO

ENVIORNMENTAL MESSAGE Scale ...............................................................64
4.4. Regression analysis ............................................................................................66
4.5. Moderation analysis via PROCESS model 1 SPSS ...........................................72
4.5.1. Moderation analysis between MEDIA EXPOSURE to the relationship of
ATTITUDE and PURCHASE INTENTION ........................................................73
4.5.2. Moderation analysis between MEDIA EXPOSURE to the relationship of

SUBJECTIVE NORM and PURCHASE INTENTION .......................................75
4.6. Hypothesis tested results. ...................................................................................78
CHAPTER 5: RESULT DISCUSSION ....................................................................80
5.1. Result discussion and implications ....................................................................80
5.2. Contributions of the research .............................................................................85
5.3. Limitations and future research direction ..........................................................86
REFERENCES ..........................................................................................................88
APPENDIX 1. QUESTIONNAIRE ..........................................................................94

v


LIST OF TABLES
Table 3.1. Measuring items for survey .....................................................................35
Table 3.2. Likert scale of Agreement extent .............................................................37
Table 3.3. Likert scale of Frequency extent ..............................................................38
Table 3.4. Encoded terms for data testing .................................................................38
Table 4.1. Descriptive Statistics of 113 participant ..................................................47
Table 4.2. Gender distributions among 113 participants ..........................................48
Table 4.3. Income distributions among 113 participants ..........................................50
Table 4.4. Reliability statistics of ATT scale ............................................................51
Table 4.5. Reliability statistics of SN scale ..............................................................52
Table 4.6. Reliability statistics of PA scale ..............................................................53
Table 4.7 Reliability statistics of PCE scale – 1st test ...............................................54
Table 4.8. Reliability statistics of PCE scale – 2nd test .............................................55
Table 4.9. Reliability statistics of PCE scale – final test ..........................................56
Table 4.10. Reliability statistics of PI scale ..............................................................57
Table 4.11. Reliability statistics of ME scale............................................................58
Table 4.12. Exploratory factor analysis for TPB scale .............................................59
Table 4.13. Exploratory factor analysis for PI scale .................................................62

Table 4.14. Exploratory factor analysis for ME scale...............................................64
Table 4.15. Pearson correlation statistic ...................................................................66
Table 4.16: Collinearity Statistics .............................................................................68
vi


Table 4.17: Regression analysis summary ................................................................69
Table 4.18. Regression analysis summary ................................................................71
Table 4.19. Hypotheses tested results .......................................................................78

vii


LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 2.1. Five stages of consumer buying process ................................................23
Figure 2.2. Conceptual framework............................................................................25
Figure 2.3. Theory of reasoned action and theory of planned behavior ...................26
Figure 2.4. Proposed theoretical model ....................................................................30
Figure 3.1. Research process proposed by the author ...............................................31
Figure 3.2. Conceptual Model of simple moderatio .................................................44
Figure 3.3. Statistical Model of simple moderation ..................................................45
Figure 4.1. Age distribution among 113 participants................................................49
Figure 4.2. Education level distribution among 113 participants .............................50
Figure 4.3. Regression Standardized Residual..........................................................68
Figure 4.4. Proposed conceptual moderating effect of ME ......................................73
Figure 4.5. Statistical diagram with ME moderates the relation ...............................74
Figure 4.6. Moderation analysis statistic for ATT*ME ............................................75
Figure 4.7. Proposed conceptual moderating effect of ME ......................................76
Figure 4.8. Statistical diagram with ME moderates the relation ...............................76
Figure 4.9. Moderation analysis statistic for SN*ME ...............................................77

viii


CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1.

Background and necessity of the research

1.1.1. Why is environment degrading gradually?
It is undeniable to say that the 21st century has been marked as the period of
economic, technological, and scientific achievements. Under the impact of major
developments, the world economy as a whole and especially Vietnamese economy,
have maintained an exceptional growth with remarkable achievements. According
to world economic forum, Vietnam is “one of the stars of the emerging markets
universe” with its economic growth 6-7% rivals China (Vanham, 2018). In fact, in
2017, the economy of Vietnam grew by an impressive 6.81% laying an important
foundation for its plan towards the future. This ASEAN nation, recently, seems to
become an attractive environment for giant brands’ manufacturing and foreign
investment due to their infrastructure, human resources and market-friendly policies
from the government.
However, along with the good sides of economic growth, nations will usually face
some challenges in regard to stimulate a sustainable development, which in terms of
developing countries, involves environmental problems and protection. In a
common sense, in order to create such noticeable performances, a certain amount of
resources must be exploited and there will be consequences and impacts on nature.
These are inevitable results of a quick development process and minor attention to
the nature while not covering every aspect of development in one country. Talking
about Vietnam, one typical example is that economic growth means more foreign
investment which results in building many more factories and plants in the country.

According to a study conducted by researchers at Harvard University and the
University of Colorado Boulder, by 2030 when comparing ten countries in ASEAN
region, Vietnam will be the most affected by coal pollution with a rate of premature
mortality due to coal-fired plant emissions (Koplitz et al, 2017). This means that the
1


environment is being heavily damaged and affecting the condition of people’s lives
as a whole and especially their health. Vietnam is finding itself in a crossroads in
terms of its future economic development model. The most important thing is the
need for a way of balancing the conflicts between environmental issues and
sustainable development, climate change vulnerability, natural disasters, pollution,
ecosystems and biodiversity. (Achim Steiner, 2018)
In recent years, Vietnamese government are taking steps by steps towards a
sustainable future. Vietnam’s Comprehensive Poverty Reduction and Growth
Strategy mentioned creating an environment for sustainable development is one of
the major development goals, which integrate with different types of government’s
strategies to face the challenges of environmental problems. In addition, frequent
efforts have been made and put into policies and programs trying to transform the
industrial structure and made the production process cleaner, more efficient and
effective. However, the concerns for environmental issues and their catastrophic
impacts are not only recognized by the government but also by the mass media,
environmentalists, non-profit organizations, by many business and customers – the
people. Many businesses can reduce the impacts on environment caused by
production activities but it is not enough; the damage to environments caused by the
customers with their selection, usage and disposal of products also is also a major
behavior that need changing. With the environmental problems that are visible day
by day, customers are more and more concerned about the immediate and gradual
consequences of those problems while receiving alarming news from the public,
environmental activists and environment protection organizations. (Agyeman, 2014)

Why customers perform a central part in the environmental protection process?
According to Gardner and Stern (2002), environmental problems for example global
warming or climate change, basically, relate to human behaviors. When there is an
increasing demand of greener products among customers, suppliers will respond to
that and offer them to them. However, in order to do that, businesses need to have
an in-depth look into the customers’ behaviors, understand what drives them to have
2


that type of needs or what influences them to shift their behavior from traditional to
green consumption. In the end, for a business to fulfil their social responsibility and
achieve a competitive advantage over competitors, there is a need to review the
circumstances and consumers purchase behaviors for green products.
In fact, in the world, green consumption is formed as a new trend in the field of
customer behavior although it seems that the action is done better in developed
countries than developing ones (Vietnam for example). In the context of Vietnam,
polluted environment, contaminated food and water and such environmental issues
are becoming more and more noticeable, many businesses decided to join in the
trend to produce and sell more green products aiming at helping the environments
steps and steps. However, towards consumers, in order for them to change from
cognitive thoughts and sole awareness to actions depend on various factors
subjectively and objectively. In reality, Vietnamese consumers are aware of what
should be done to help the environment but they still hesitate to act and follow the
trends completely. This also claims for business to look into Vietnamese consumers
behaviors.
1.1.2. Plastic bags versus cloth bags.
Using plastic bags in Vietnam is very popular among individuals, households and
community. This behavior is a habit of Vietnamese people all ages. Nylon
bags/plastic bags are used every day from local markets, stores to supermarkets or
shopping malls because of their convenience and cheap cost. According to I. S. Zen

et al (2013), customers perceive receiving and using plastic bags for free is an
appropriate right and an important factor to help their shopping become easier.
Without reliable public information to the people, plastic bags are believed to be a
traditional kind of consumption product which are safe to the environment and
human’s health. Because plastic bags are a daily and common product that used so
frequently and thoughtlessly everywhere, their damage to environment are
sometimes overlooked (Akulian et al. 2007). However, the damage caused by their
usage is becoming noticeable. The existence of plastic bags being thrown into the
3


nature will cause severe damage to the soil and water. Surprisingly, the soil and
water environment contaminated by plastic bags will both directly and indirectly
affect human health. There are no official statistics on the number of plastic bags
used in Vietnam yet but there are some surveys and estimates of these numbers.
Although there are differences in numbers, the overall impression of the figures is
very large, this claims for a change in consumption behavior.
One of the ways to reduce the damage coming from plastic bags dumping into
environment is by reducing the number of trash and garbage relating to plastic bags.
So, one of reasonable solution to decrease the number of plastic garbage is using
eco-friendly bags in daily activities instead of plastic ones. The current trend of
customers preferred eco-friendly shopping bags can be divided into the following
categories: plastic, paper and fabric/cloth bags. In searching for an alternative of
plastic bags in this context, fabric or cloth bags is used (generally called cloth bags).
This is because paper bags are also considered eco-friendly bags but their life span
is not long and not as reusable and recyclable as cloth bags. In terms of availability,
cloth bags are also seen to be sold more frequently compared to paper bags because
of its convenience and mainly Vietnamese customers use motorbikes to travel so
using cloth bags will be more suitable for them.
Companies offer green products like cloth bags which is not only friendly and less

harmful for the environment but also good for their brand image and reputation,
show their social responsibility. Cloth bags in particular, and eco-friendly bags in
general are normally treated as a means of storage for goods and products when
consumers when shopping rather than just a plain consumption product. This relates
to the idea of plastic bags as a means of storage, usually given as a free
complementary with the any goods bought in stores. However, cloth bags in these
days can be seen displayed at stores like normal products and in supermarkets, cloth
bags nowadays can be offered for customers to purchase at the end of checkout
counters as a complementary good and to raise environmental protection awareness.
Hence, in this research, cloth bags are be considered as a type of green product for
4


customers to buy at any store, supermarkets or shopping malls, and as an alternative
to plastic shopping bags.
1.1.3. Green marketing and customer purchase intention
In the world, there are many researches looking into the concept of green
consumption in general and consumer purchase intention in particular using
different variety of theories. However, the main subjects for these types of
researches normally involve recycling, green energy and other common types of
green products. Moreover, many authors doing research in this field have chosen
theory of planned behavior to explore this psychological aspect of customers –
behavioral intention with some new type of green products or services such as green
hotel in researches by Heesup Han et al. or eco-friendly restaurants by Yong Joong
Kim et al. Others tend to focus on conducting researches relating to products in a
broader term like “green product consumption”.
Few researches involving the concept of eco-friendly shopping bags or choosing it
as the unit of analysis, especially cloth bags so it claims for more studies exploring
about this type of products since it is normally ignored comparing to other types of
alternatives for plastic bags, both in the world and in Vietnam. Some example of a

typical research about shopping bags is: “Applying Ethical Concepts to the Study
of “Green” Consumer Behavior: An Analysis of Chinese Consumers’ Intentions
to Bring their Own Shopping Bags” (Chan, R. Y., 2007). In this research Chan and
associates focuses mostly on general ethics and social psychology to present a
model to decide the main factors affecting consumer’s intention to bring their own
shopping bags when visiting a supermarket. Another research also investigated the
ethical behaviors of customer as “bring your own shopping bags” named “BYOB:
How Bringing Your Own Shopping Bags Leads to Treating Yourself and the
Environment” by Uma R. Karmarkar et al. Both studies concerned about the factors
that can affect customers to change to green behaviors in order to minimize the
negative impacts of pollution and climate change, however, the aspects of providers
for these reusable shopping bags have not been concentrated much. This means that
5


when considering reusable shopping bags for customers to bring from their homes,
their materials, original sources or seller have not been mentioned. In the context of
recent years, since providing green products seem to be a promising business and
more and more startups or businessmen want to get access to this niche, the need for
doing more researches about a new type of green products for companies is high.
Some other researches such as: “Consumer identity and moral obligations in
non‐plastic bag consumption: a dialectical perspective” (Hélène Cherrier, 2006)
studies about green consumption behavior with their use of non-plastic bags, but the
author looks into the problem with a different perspective, philosophical view.
Hence, there are not a large number of studies explore this particular green
consumption product. With the aim at predicting purchase intention of customers
psychologically to help business develop in a sustainable way with the offering of a
green product, especially in Vietnam’s context and in order to fill in this gap of
research and contribute an appropriate approach for further studies as well as
consider the current situation of damages caused by plastic bag user, it is necessary

to study about an alternative of plastic bags, in this case cloth bags for shopping is
chosen.
According to Vicki Morwitz (2012), purchase intention are normally considered one
of the primary inputs for marketing managers to measure consumer demand,
forecast future sales, assess and decide which actions to takes to favorably impact
the consumer purchase intentions. Hence, it is reasonable to consider cloth bags as a
type of green product and look into their consumer purchase intentions in the favor
of both businesses and government in general and especially for consumer
themselves. As mentioned above, theory of planned behavior is normally used to
predict behavioral intentions of customers, consider the widespread popularity of
this theory and the amount of previous studies have used it for researching the same
green marketing and green consumption, this research also adopts this theory for
looking into the factors affecting customer purchase intention of cloth bags for
shopping.
6


1.1.4. Media exposure to environmental messages as additional variables
Theory of planned behavior is normally used with three constructs named: Attitudes,
Subjective norms and Perceived Behavioral control to determine customers’
intentions. However, previous studies suggest that not only these three factors can
have influence on intentions of customers and there should be some other specific
factors that can be included in this model. (Armitage, 2001) Especially in recent
years, the amount of evidences in previous studies also build up when researchers
continue adding additional constructs to strengthen the predictive power of theory
of planned behavior (for example adding self-identity; habit or past behaviors etc.).
Ajzen also recommended that besides adding direct constructs to three original ones
of the theory, changing the path of variables by adding moderators is one of the
good way to create depth for the model. Baron and Kenny (1986) described that a
moderator variable can be a quantitative or qualitative depending on the nature of

the researches, in which the moderator can change the direction or strengthen the
relationship between dependent and independent variables.
This study uses media exposure to environmental messages as a moderator to theory
of planned behavior, for the following reasons:
 The fact that recently in all types of official media such as social media,
television, newspapers etc. the negative impacts of pollution and environmental
problems are spreading more and more. Governments and non-governmental
organizations are trying to raise awareness of people about protect natural
resources and environments. Thus, Vietnam’s economy is developing rapidly
(described by GDP increased by 7.08% in 2018 - the highest figure since 2008;
the economic structure of Vietnam continues to shift positively according to the
trend of reducing the proportion of agriculture, forestry and fisheries; increase
the share of industry, construction and service industry) is a rationale behind the
high consumption level of Vietnamese. However, media also points out that
behind the successful economy and consumption growth, the environment is
being damaged, especially by the amount of plastic garbage from daily uses.
7


This also bring the green products producers a chance to help change the
behavior of customers from using plastics to alternatives. One of them is cloth
bags for shopping instead of traditional low-cost free plastic bags.
 In academic aspects, media exposure is used in some previous researches such
as “The moderating effect of media exposure on the purchase intention of
generic drugs: an application of the theory of planned behavior” by Reynaldo A.
Baustista, Jr. There are some other moderators considered when researchers
extended theory of planned behavior in green marketing filed, for example: in a
study named “Exploring purchase intention of green skincare products using
theory of planned behavior: testing the moderating effects of country of origin
and price sensitivity” by Chia Lin Hsu et al. Others study in the same field did

not explore moderating effects much so there is a lack of research expanding the
theory using this approach. For this specific case, cloth bag for shopping is a
common consumption products when offered to customers to raise their
environmental protection awareness, its price can be higher than plastic bags but
due to its reusability; and the fact that consumers normally do not care for the
country of origin (because cloth bags is used for more environmental protection
rather than fashionable and expensive high-end products as long as their
materials is good), price sensitivity and country of origin is not very suitable to
add to this study. Meanwhile, media exposure is usually a good means of
communication to encourage people to develop green behaviors, it is more
advisable to use Media exposure to environmental messages as an additional
variable of this model.
1.2.

Statement of the problems

The problems of plastic bags dumping to environment from daily use is a threat to
people’s lives. In the world, government and different companies and organizations
coming with various solutions to help deal with this such as: banning plastic bags’
uses or put a restriction to different entities, switching plastic bags used in business
to alternatives. In Vietnam, the Government is taking some first step to prevent the
8


negative effects of using plastic bags. The project to enhance the environmental
pollution control due to people using difficult-to-decompose plastic bags states that
those types of plastic bags are banned from manufacturing and used. Similarly,
many companies and organizations also undertake campaigns to help educate
people about the impact of using plastic bags and partly help shift the consumer’s
preferences to use alternatives of plastic bags. With great efforts, Vietnamese

people seem aware of those consequences of their usage of plastic bags. However,
they are somehow unconcerned and due to the convenience of plastic bags, still
reach to use them. In the case of more and more eco-friendly bags are produced and
promoted for daily uses, in particular cloth bags, it is necessary to investigate what
can influence the intention to purchase cloth bags in order to control this
phenomenon and also help the business investigate what actions to take to shift the
consumer’s preferences to green consumption. Moreover, the lack of researches in
this subject, especially in Vietnam also a more recent and newer look into this field
of study.
1.3.

Research objectives

First, based on the literature on theory of planned behavior and customer purchase
intention, identifying and investigating if the components of theory of planned
behavior can be considered as factors affecting customer purchase intention for one
of green products known as cloth bags for shopping, which means these constructs
are seen as units of analysis. Second, this research aims at finding a moderator that
can make an influence on the relationship between the constructs of theory of
planned behavior and customer purchase intention. In addition, these relationships
are be explored to find out how they are affected and from that, this thesis gives
several solutions to help improve the situation dedicated to the context of Vietnam.

9


1.4.

Research questions

Together with the objectives and necessity of the research, this thesis answers the
following questions:
1. What factors affect consumer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping?
2. Are there any variables moderate the relations between these factors and
customer purchase intention of cloth bags for shopping?
1.5.

Research scope

This study is conducted in Hanoi City which is the capital of Vietnam where there is
a considerable amount of population with strong purchasing power and high level of
concern for green products and green consumption behavior with the time range
from the end of 2018 to 2019.
1.6.

Structure of the research

This thesis is divided into six chapters, as presented as follow:
 Chapter 1: Introduction
This part introduces briefly about the research, the necessity of it, research
objectives, research questions and scope.
 Chapter 2: Literature review
This chapter provides theoretical framework for the research. It includes
fundamental concepts about green marketing and green consumption behavior as
well as theory of planned behaviors and explanation on research model and the
hypotheses used in this research.
 Chapter 3: Research Methodology
This chapter describes the data collection and analyzing process which are methods
based on previous literature.
10

 Chapter 4: Data presentation and findings
This chapter gives description of data collected, and then show analysis results from
SPSS software, version 20 and then test the proposed hypothesis.
 Chapter 5: Discussions and conclusion
This chapter answers the research questions, discuss research findings as well as
giving some suggestions or any solutions to the found results, limitations and
further research direction.

11


CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1. Green consumptions and related definitions
2.1.1. Sustainable consumption
Due to the rapid growth of every aspect all over the world, the scientific community
started to realize that unsustainable development was a crucial issue which led to
the collapse of the environment and the economy. The Club of Rome first
mentioned the term “sustainable consumption” in their article named “the growth
limits”. (Meadows et al., 1972)
From that point of view, sustainable development is assumed to help mankind
survive in the long run after decades of economic development, which is undeniable
the solution without any alternative. (Seiffert and Loch, 2005). Moreover, in the
area of sustainable development research, consumption has appeared to play a key
role and also the priority position. Consumptions in economics can be understood as
the use of production products such as goods and services in order to satisfy
human’s needs. In common sense, when a person considers their consumption, their
behavior relates to that household’s income and savings. However, consumption is
not only important to economic concepts but also vital to society and the

environment. Many researchers stated that consumption along with production
system is a crucial necessity to establish sustainable development. (Akenji and
Bengtsson, 2014)
From that, sustainable consumption is, therefore, contributing to and leading the
world towards a more sustainable development goal. In 1994, Oslo Symposium on
Sustainable Consumption proposed a definition on sustainable consumption as "the
use of services and related products which respond to basic needs and bring a better
quality of life while minimizing the use of natural resources and toxic materials as
well as emissions of waste and pollutants over the life cycle of the service or
product so as not to jeopardize the needs of future generations." (Norwegian
12


Ministry of the Environment, 1994). The global development research center, on the
other hand, explained the term as the following: “Sustainable consumption is the
consumption of goods and services that have minimal impact upon the environment,
are socially equitable and economically viable whilst meeting the basic needs of
humans, worldwide. Sustainable consumption targets everyone, across all sectors
and all nations, from the individual to governments and multinational
conglomerates.” (Hari Srinivas, 2005).
In the end, different researchers have come up with numerous definitions for the
term “sustainable consumption”, their meaning all contains the following points:
1. Human’s uses of goods and services which satisfy their needs
2. Minimizing the influence on the environment including reduce the use of natural
resources or limit environmental pollution.
3. The concern for the next generation’s future.
4. Consider the products or services life cycle as a whole
In this research, with the idea of finding out what factors can affect the intention of
customer to purchase cloth bag for shopping is one of the solution to help reduce the
negative impacts on the environment and help customers towards a more

sustainable lifestyle, knowing the true meaning of what sustainable consumption is
important.
2.1.2. Green consumption
The concept of green consumption was first mentioned in 1970 and from that
time, many studies have expanded this concept. So far, green consumption is still a
relatively new concept and is defined in many ways. The term itself seems to bring
two opposite definition into one. “Green” normally is associated with conservation
of natural resources while “consumption” going with exploiting those kinds of
resources and at the same time destroy the environment. Traditional consumption
overlaps with other concepts, such as ethical consumerism while green consumption
13


is closely linked to the notions of sustainable development or sustainable
consumption behavior, leading to inconsistency and clarity in the concept in
research materials.
That being said, it emphasizes the environmental factors both in short and
long terms. The concept of green consumption normally assign responsibility or coresponsibility to consumers who address environmental issues by adopting green or
environmental-friendly actions such as using green products (organic goods,
renewable natural energy for example) or avoiding products which are harmful to
environment. (Prothero, 2008). Nguyen Huu Thu (2014) also explained that: Green
consumption behavior is the act of finding, buying and using personal and group
products and services with the aim of reducing waste causing environmental
pollution, ensuring safety for public health, expressed through their awareness,
attitudes and actions. Sisira (2007) also offers a fairly comprehensive definition of
green consumption with the view that this is a process involves social behaviors
such as buying biological foods, recycling, reusing, and limiting excess
consumption or use friendly transport system. According to Lee (2010), green
consumption is an act of consuming products that can be preserved, useful to the
environment and meet environmental concerns. These are products that facilitate the

long-term goal of environmental protection and conservation. Green consumption
involves not only consumer unused goods that damage the natural environment, but
also decides to buy environmentally friendly products and recycled products.
In this research, green consumption is considered and approached in terms of the
following point:
-

Buying green products

-

Adopting environmental-friendly behaviors: recycle the green products

-

Promote green behaviors

14


In Vietnam, researches about green consumption are not a significant amount.
However, there are some should be mentioned, such as “Evaluation of the impact of
green consumption in sustainable development in Vietnam” (2015) which belongs
to “For the cause of environmental protection” program of Ministry of natural
resources and environment. This research showed that green consumption plays an
important part to sustainable consumption - a pillar of green growth and sustainable
development. This is also a strategy that many countries in the world including
Vietnam are pursuing. Green consumption will encourage the development of green
goods and services markets, contributing to reducing waste generation, greenhouse
gas emissions, conserving natural resources and moving towards a sustainable

economy. There are also some studies of green consumption from the perspective of
social psychology such as "Green consumption behavior of Hanoi people by
Nguyen Huu Thu (2014). The author studied the factors affecting green
consumption behavior, from that providing psychological-educational measures to
enhance green consumption behavior, contributing to preventing and reducing
environmental pollution and climate change. Another one is the study by Pham Thi
Lan Huong (2013) on "Predicting the purchase intention of young consumers"
surveyed the cultural and psychological factors affecting the green consumption
behavior of young people. From these studies, it can be said that green consumption
is a prominent topic among Vietnamese researchers, however, the studies mostly
focus on macro general issues rather than any specific cases such as: a type of green
product or a single behavior related to green consumption of consumers. Therefore,
this study will serve as a case looking into a typical type of green product – cloth
bags for shopping.

15