Business Research Project Phases and Assessment

This article discusses the phases and assessment of a business research project. It covers problem discovery and definition, review of literature, and factors affecting ethical customers' purchase intentions. The research aims to analyze the gap between attitude and behavior of ethical consumers and recommend effective marketing strategies. The article also provides a summary reference list.

Business Research Project Phases and Assessment
Phase 1 and 2

Table of Contents
Phase 1: Problem discovery and definition.....................................................................................1
1.1 Title........................................................................................................................................1
1.2 Background of the study........................................................................................................1
1.3 Research aim, objectives and research questions..................................................................2
Phase 2 Review of Literature...........................................................................................................3
2.1 Introduction............................................................................................................................3
2.2 Description of search process................................................................................................3
2.3 Critical analysis of the literature............................................................................................4
2.3.1 Concept of ethical consumerism.....................................................................................4
2.3.2 Factors affecting ethical customers purchase intentions................................................4
2.3.3 Theory of planned behaviour..........................................................................................6
2.3.4 Attitude-behaviour gap...................................................................................................6
2.4 Implications and Conclusion.................................................................................................7
2.5 Summary reference list..........................................................................................................8
References......................................................................................................................................11
Table of Figures
Figure 1: Flowchart of literature selection procedure......................................................................3

Phase 1: Problem discovery and definition
1.1 Title
The following title has been suggested for the research:
“Gap between attitude and behaviour of ethical consumers: A case of ShopHere’s fashion
products”
1.2 Background of the study
The concerns for environmental and social issues have become imperative among consumers
and organisations in the last two decade. The ethical consumption phenomenon is getting
more attention among scholars (Chen & Hung, 2016). Besides, the growing consumers’
interest in sustainable clothing has provided strong base for sustainable fashion industry
(Lundblad & Davies, 2016). It has been observed that deteriorating environment, animal
welfare, issues of social justice and health for workers engaged in production are among
major ethical concerns which might affect consumers’ choice of a clothing brand (Pollari,
2017). However, as in the case of ShopHere, it appears that there is contradiction between
“consumer attitude” and “purchase behaviour”. Even though consumers have increasing
intentions to buy ethical clothes, only a small fraction of those actually purchases the same.
Scholars termed this discrepancy as the “attitude-behaviour gap” (Lindén, 2017).
The communication advances such as internet and social media coupled with scientific
research in environmental and health concerns have resulted in increased number of ethical
consumers. Moreover, intense competition in apparel industry due to globalisation led to
growing attention of companies towards sustainable production. Besides, ethical marketing
strategy is instrumental in realizing organisational objectives like increasing consumers’
satisfaction while ensuring social welfare (Tey, Brindal & Dibba, 2018). This explains the
reason of why more and more companies give due consideration to ethics in formulating
marketing strategies. The increasing trend of ethical consumerism makes it essential for
retailers like ShopHere to understand the influencing factors affecting the purchase intentions
of consumers. On the other hand, investors of ShopHere might be interested in questions like:
What ethical consumers intend to do at the point of sell? Are they actually buying? How to
minimise the existing discrepancy? Limited research has been conducted to answer these
questions with regards to the apparel industry.
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1.3 Research aim, objectives and research questions
The research aim of this study is to analyse the gap between attitude and behaviour of
ShopHere’s ethical consumers and to recommend effective marketing strategy. The
ShopHere’s management is facing the dilemma of whether to promote ethical consumers or
not. The key here is to understand consumer behaviour because the preference of consumers
is essential for viability of a market. The consumers’ decision-making process should be
analysed to buy ethical products. This understanding would be helpful in understanding the
reason for existing discrepancy and guide the management for further strategy. Therefore,
this study is primarily focused on the research question: What are the key factors that
determine the attitude-behaviour gap in the ethical products purchase? The research has used
the theory of planned behaviour in order to understand the behavioural aspect of consumers
with regards to buying ethical products. With this in mind, following research objectives have
been formulated:
 To analyse the effect of ethical consumerism on marketing strategies of apparel
retailers.
 To examine purchase intention of ethical consumers by investigating the effects of
attitude on buying behaviour.
 To identify attitude-behaviour gap with respect to ethical consumers.
 To recommend ShopHere to minimise attitude-behaviour discrepancy.
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Phase 2 Review of Literature
2.1 Introduction
The below literature review is focusing on the concept of ethical consumerism to determine
its relevance in business environment. It is followed by a discussion of factors that affects
customers purchase intention towards ethical consumption. Moreover, theory of planned
behaviour is defined to understand why customers behave in certain manner and at the end
gap between behaviour and attitude is given. For the purpose of writing the literature, various
scholarly articles published between 2016 to 2019 have been accessed and reviewed to get
novel insights into the subject under consideration.
2.2 Description of search process
The articles included in the literature review have been sourced from keyword-based search
in the ProQuest database and Google Scholar. Keywords like ethical consumer, sustainability,
ethical product, ethical fashion, purchasing behaviour, purchasing choice and theory of
planned behaviour were used to gather and screen related articles published in last two years.
Following diagram presents the selection process for the same.
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Figure 1: Flowchart of literature selection procedure

2.3 Critical analysis of the literature
2.3.1 Concept of ethical consumerism
According to Sudbury-Riley and Kohlbacher (2016), ethical consumption historically was
viewed as the behaviour of very small group of principled buyers. As the ethical brands
number increase along with easy access to information related to ethical commodities, there
is a remarkable diversity in the definition of ethical consumerism. Hoek et al. (2017) referred
ethical consumption to environmental issues because household waste recycling is becoming
a daily behaviour for many people, due to implementation of various recycling programs and
policies in many nations. On the other side, Sudbury-Riley and Kohlbacher (2016) definition
of ethical consumption comprises issues related to human rights and social justice by giving
special emphasis on the exploitation of workers. Rana and Paul (2017) relate ethical
consumerism to the price factor, as many people are unwilling to pay more, in order to
translate their ethical behaviour into purchasing process. Such unwillingness does not
essentially result from incapability to pay premium rate, as ethical behaviour of customer is
unrelated to work status and income.
In the above context, Sudbury-Riley and Kohlbacher (2016) criticised by stating that
although customers’ cares about ethical beliefs, they do not make choices which favours the
ethical brands and punish non-ethical ones. In support of this, Lang and Armstrong (2018)
also stated that customers do not compromise designs when it comes to fashion, in order to
protect the environment. However, while consuming food they likely pay more to choose
ecological items, as it directly influences their well-being and health. Thus, it can be assumed
that customers generally exhibit ethical consumption behaviour for the products that directly
affect their health, while ignoring environmental aspects during the purchase of fashionable
goods.
2.3.2 Factors affecting ethical customers purchase intentions
Expectations and perceptions
According to Lindén (2017), perception and expectation significantly influence satisfaction
of customers for certain products. Customers determine whether the performance of any
product fulfils their expectation on the basis of satisfaction about the existing requirements
for a given commodity. Perceived quality of a product associated with customers’ perception
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and expectation has a direct positive impact on their intention to purchase. Consequently,
when expectation is more than products perceived quality then customers may not purchase
eco-friendly items. Thus, customers are willing to buy green commodities if their expectation
is equal to perception.
Subjective norm
According to Nam, Dong and Lee (2017), the subjective norm is a level to which a person
feels that buying green items are morally responsible for others. It means, when their
referents have negative perceptions for a product, customers are likely adjusting their
purchase intention. In the same way, the purchase intention of buyers would be raised if
others referred the same commodity positively.
Perceived behavioural control (PBC)
According to Lang and Armstrong (2018), PBC reveals perception about access to
opportunities and resources required to accomplish behaviour, including access to time,
money and other resources and self-confidence of focal person in the ability to conduct the
behaviour. As per Nam, Dong and Lee (2017), the PBC of customers towards ethical
consumption positively influences their buying intention. For instance, when buyers consider
eco-friendly products price too high then they buy other traditional commodities. Thus,
ethical consumption of individuals significantly depends on required resources available to
them to practice the behaviour.
Purchase intention and attitude
Nam, Dong and Lee (2017) identified a positive correlation between attitude of customers
and their willingness of paying more for sustainable items. Customers generally engage in a
behaviour when they have more favourable intention and attitude towards completing the
behaviour. Johe and Bhullar (2016) also supported this by claiming that attitude of customers
indirectly mediates the effect of ethical identity on the purchase intentions of consumers.
Therefore, it can be assumed that customers who have more conscious attitude towards
environment are likely to show more ethical behaviour and purchase sustainable products.
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2.3.3 Theory of planned behaviour
According to Lang and Armstrong (2018), theory of planned behaviour takes into account
both social and personal factors. Attitude toward the perceived behavioural control and
behaviour are defined as personal factors, while subjective norm is considered as social
factor. As per this theory, the behavioural intention is believed to be affected by joint effect
of perceived behavioural control, subjective norms and joint effect of attitude. The attitude of
individuals toward undertaking a specific behaviour is related to beliefs that undertaking the
behaviour will produce certain results. Subjective norms are perception of individual about
social pressures place on him/her to carry out the behaviour in question. Also, as per Moon et
al. (2018) perceived behavioural control shows the perceived difficulty or ease of undertaking
a given behaviour. Besides this, personality traits are defined as external variables that
indirectly influence customers’ intention through social-cognitive constructs confined within
theory of planned behaviour. Such personality traits of individual may directly influence their
intentions. However, as inner characteristics, personality traits create influence on customers’
social norms, attitudes and behaviours associated with their environmental and social
behaviour. For instance, a positive relation has been confirmed between attitude towards
ethical behaviour and fashion leadership that reflects that customers with high fashion
leadership would exhibit positive attitude towards ethical consumption.
2.3.4 Gap between consumer attitude and purchase behaviour
Many scholars have observed the gap between consumer attitudes to consume ethical
products and the actual behaviours shown by them at the time of purchase (Lindén, 2017;
Ciasullo et al., 2017). Ciasullo et al. (2017) attempted to analyse effect of social influence,
expectations and importance on consumers’ willingness to purchase sustainable clothing
brand. The second objective of the study was to measure willingness of ethical consumers to
pay for buying ethical clothing products. The study identified that consumers attach most of
the relevance to social opinion in taking decisions to purchase ethical products. However, the
study also identified that consumers are not willing to pay more than 20% price premium for
ethical clothes offered by a retailer.
In contrast, Wiederhold & Martinez (2018) analysed consumer behaviour to identify the
criteria to purchase, particularly in the ethical apparel industry. The objective of the study
was to understand the existing gap between attitude and behaviour. For this study, in‐depth
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interviews of 13 participants were conducted. The study also examined the factors that
prevent consumers in purchasing sustainable fashion products. The study revealed major
variables such as knowledge, availability, price, consumption habits, image and transparency
that obstruct consumers to purchase green fashion. Finally, the study provided useful
recommendations for marketers of apparel retailers to minimise these barriers. The study
advocated to focus on specific attributes of fashion product and to use efficient digital
communication strategy to increase awareness of ethical practices (Wiederhold & Martinez,
2018).
2.4 Implications and Conclusion
This study attempted to respond to the research question: What are the key factors that
determine the attitude-behaviour gap in the ethical products purchase? To achieve the
research objective, systematic literature review was conducted on several recently published
articles. The literature review suggests that effective ethical marketing may help
organisations to reach goals. The Theory of planned behaviour has been found as useful in
finding the key factors that influence the purchase behaviour of ethical consumers. The
analysis showed the importance of analysing attitude-behaviour gap for marketers. Future
marketing strategies should be formulated while giving due consideration to this discrepancy.
2.5 Summary reference list
S.
No.
Author Research design Findings
1. Lang, C., &
Armstrong, C.M.J.
(2018)
Online survey Personality indirectly affects the
intention of using collaborative
consumption.
2. Moon, M.A., Javaid,
B., Kiran, M.,
Awan, H.M., &
Farooq, A. (2018)
Data collected through
self-administered
questionnaire
Hedonic attitude of customers is a
strong predictor of buying intentions
for counterfeit apparel.
3. Nam, C., Dong, H.,
& Lee, Y.A. (2017)
Online survey The purchase intention of customers
towards green products is affected by
factors like subjective norm,
expectation, perception and attitudes.
4. Johe, M.H., &
Bhullar, N. (2016)
Statistical analysis of
survey respondents
Identity-congruent shifts toward
ethical consumerism can be
developed by grooming organic
identity.
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5. Lindén, A. (2017) Online survey Positive attitude toward the outcomes
of ethical consumption is the key
predictor of purchase intention.
6. Sudbury-Riley, L. &
Kohlbacher, F.
(2016)
Constructing and
testing ethically
minded consumer
behaviour scale
Ethical behaviour of customers takes
place in cultural and social
environment governed by different
and complex policies, laws, values,
regulations, norms and rules.
7. Hoek, A.C.,
Pearson, D., James,
S.W., Lawrence,
M.A., & Friel, S.
(2017)
In-depth interviews The findings revealed that in
comparison to health, relationship
between environment and food is
considered rarely by the customers.
8. Rana, J. & Paul, J.
(2017)
Literature analysis The results revealed that health-
conscious buyers exhibit more
preference for organic food over the
food that is conventionally grown.
9. Tey, Y. S., Brindal,
M., & Dibba, H.
(2018)
Vote count analysis The customers while buying products
resists premium rates unless they
perceive tangible advantages equal to
the price paid.
10. Ciasullo, M. V.,
Maione, G., Torre,
C., & Troisi, O.
(2017)
Testing of research
hypotheses through
survey questionnaire.
The social influence has major
impact on consumers’ willingness to
purchase ethical clothing products.
11. Wiederhold, M., &
Martinez, L. F.
(2018)
In‐depth interviews The study finds factors like
knowledge, availability, price,
consumption habits, image and
transparency which significantly
affect consumers’ decision to
purchase sustainable fashion
products.
12. Pollari, M. (2017) Quantitative cross-
sectional research using
structured online
questionnaire survey
The study finds that environmental
issues are the most influencing
factors that influence consumers’
attitude towards ethical fashion
products.
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References
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green products: An extension of theory of planned behavior. Technological
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Ciasullo, M. V., Maione, G., Torre, C., & Troisi, O. (2017). What about Sustainability? An
Empirical Analysis of Consumers’ Purchasing Behavior in Fashion
Context. Sustainability, 9(9), 1617.
Hoek, A. C., Pearson, D., James, S. W., Lawrence, M. A., & Friel, S. (2017). Shrinking the
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Economics, 128, 99-105.
Lang, C., & Armstrong, C. M. J. (2018). Collaborative consumption: The influence of
fashion leadership, need for uniqueness, and materialism on female consumers’
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Liu, S., & Tiger, B. (2017). Antecedents of buying intention towards bio-cotton clothing: A
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Lundblad, L., & Davies, I. A. (2016). The values and motivations behind sustainable fashion
consumption. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 15(2), 149-162.
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Moon, M. A., Javaid, B., Kiran, M., Awan, H. M., & Farooq, A. (2018). Consumer
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