Ethical Consumption: Systematic Literature Review and Analysis

This report presents a systematic literature review on ethical consumption, analyzing the evolving trends in consumer behavior and their impact on businesses. The study examines unethical practices in various sectors like construction and fashion, detailing their consequences on consumers and the environment. It highlights the rise of ethical consumption driven by environmental concerns and changing dietary preferences, supported by UK market data. The review explores consumer pressure on businesses through social media and boycotts, and government policies influencing purchasing behavior. The findings reveal relationships between unethical practices, environmental issues, and consumer preferences for ethical products. The conclusion emphasizes the power of consumer choices in shaping a better future by supporting ethical brands and practices. The report includes appendices with tables showing ethical spending trends and single-use plastic bag statistics.

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Ethical Consumption Systematic
Literature Review
WeJet Khoo, John Paul Lizarondo, Berfin Temel, Yiwenjun Ma, Sharon Wong
Abstract
Consumers are moving towards a whole new era in which ethical products are an
important figure on their daily purchasing behaviour. Accenture Strategy’s Global
Consumer Pulse research proves that consumers do care about the attitude of the
company in all generations. It shows that more than 6 out of 10 millennials and Gen
Z generation consider the company’s ethical value in their purchasing behaviour
(Anna,2018). This study is to show how ethical consumption has a big impact on
companies and the behaviour of consumers on purchasing products.

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Table of Contents
Introduction ............................................................................... 3
Review Questions ..................................................................... 3
Methods of Review & Searching Strategy ................................. 3
Search strategy ....................................................................... 3
Methods of Review ................................................................. 4
Inclusion Criteria ....................................................................... 4
Findings ..................................................................................... 5
Results ...................................................................................... 6
Discussion & Conclusion ........................................................... 7
Appendices: .............................................................................. 8
References: ............................................................................. 10

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Introduction
Consumer behaviour refers to the selections, purchases, and consumption of goods
and services for the satisfaction of one’s need. Similarly to the behaviour of ethical
consumption, it is the decision making, purchases and other consumption
experiences which are affected by the consumer’s ethical concerns (Cooper-Martin
and Holbrook, 1993). The market research data in the UK shows that, ethical F&B
industry indicates 8% of the total F&B market (Cooperative Bank, 2009) as well as
over 89% of the consumers state that they have concern over the issues of ethics
(Lazzarini & de Mello, 2001). Nevertheless, consumers were increasing to take over
the concerns of the environment, animals and the society through their purchasing
behaviour (De Pelsmacker, Driesen & Rayp, 2005; Shaw & Shui, 2002). Ethical
decision which includes politics, religious, spiritual, environmental, social motives
and etc (Harrison, Newholm & Shaw, 2005) causes the derive by consumers to
make changes through their living behaviour or purchasing behaviour as an impact
which influences organisations to enforce CSR. The objectives for this study are to
evaluate the findings to state that ethical consumption is slowly taking over the
consumer’s behaviour towards the products.
Review Questions
1. What unethical practices have been done by businesses in different sectors
and what were the impacts of those unethical practices on the consumers?
2. What are the trends of Ethical Consumption?
3. What are the various methods and practices that consumers have applied to
pressure businesses to behave or operate ethically?
Methods of Review & Searching Strategy
Search strategy
The search strategy used for this literature review is access through all reliable information
that is published online and it was through 2 steps.
1. This literature review is started with a limited search of ResearchGate, EBSCO,
Ethicalconsumer.org to analyse the keywords contained in title, abstract and subject
descriptions.
2. Phrases identified and synonyms found by corresponding databases will be used in
extensive research of this literature review.

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The search words of this literature review are ‘ethical consumption’, ‘ethical businesses’,
‘ethical methods and practices’ and ‘ethical operation’.
Electronic Data Based ResearchGate
EBSCO
Scholars.unh.edu
Ethicalconsumer.org
TIME
UCD School of Business Databases
JSTOR
Taylor & Francis Online
Gov.UK
RSPCA
ScienceDaily
Copies of information found from research identified and prudently met the inclusion criteria
based on their title, abstract and subject descriptions.
Methods of Review
Quality
Assessment
Databases that were used are assured as non-biased or
misleading content.
Research information was cross referenced with other articles that
were found.
Data Extraction Information was extracted from articles that were found on liable
databases.
CiteThisForMe was used to keep track of references.
Inclusion Criteria
Types of
participants
Considering all studies of the shift in the trends of ethical
consumption and the change within society regarding awareness
in ethical issues, health and diet.

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Types of
studies
This review examined various ethical trends from previous years
through correlational studies to pinpoint certain changes.
Types of
outcome
The outcome of changing ethical consumption and how it affects
an individual, society and the wider environment. Outcomes
relating to pollution, cost of living, life expectancy, etc.
Findings
Construction industry was one of the industries which have unethical practices often
due to the amount of time, money and labour. It was known to have money issues
which could be overbilling, failing to pay wages, etc. The biggest issue was some of
the construction companies tend to cut their costs by not following the safety
regulations of buildings which could cause the workers to have a threat on their life.
According to the International Business Times, 2 buildings which are around 60
stories tall in China were demolished by the government due to the bribing of officials
to turn a blind eye on the unsafe buildings. Beauty or fashion industry was criticised
a lot by the community due to the use of child labour to produce cheaper products.
Brands such as, H&M, Nike, Zara were popular on using child labour and they are
still using it. The ingredients which were used in the industry was also an issue, as
some of the companies use the extinction of certain species of animals or some toxic
ingredients. The World Health Organisation estimated that textiles manufacturing
causes 20% of the industrial water pollution. Meanwhile, people or animals that rely
on the water would have a high risk of receiving cancer or other diseases. Although,
it could bring a cheaper price to consumers, but it destroys the environment and it
could lead back to humans.
Ethical consumption has increasingly become popular in recent years, it is due to a
few factors. Table 1 shows the ethical spending in the UK from 2000 – 2017. The
main reason is due to environmental issues such as global warming, flooding,
landslides etc. Hence, ethical consumerism comes into place to address these
issues. While for consumers, according to a study of Journal of Consumer Research,
consumers’ ethical consumption desire is inspired by their emotional needs, such as
contempt, concern and celebration. In the recent years between 2017 to 2018 there
has been a shift within our society as consumers’ diets changed from predominantly
meat and processed food products to a healthier vegetarian and vegan diet to

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prevent cruelty towards animals being slaughtered for consumption and for overall
higher quality of lifestyle. In the UK the figure shows that the number of people
adopting vegan dietary rose by 153% with the numbers of vegetarians also
increased by 52%. Table 2 shows the growth of ethical food and drink trends.
Furthermore, consumers are more aware of the fight against climate change as they
started to adopt zero waste shopping through purchasing second-hand clothes from
charity shops and online with the market for this sector growing by a substantial
amount of 22.5%. Table 3 shows the growth of consumers in purchasing ethical
personal products. Also, we have seen a 90% reduction of single-use plastics sales
through the introduction of a 5p charge put in place by the government encouraging
consumers to obtain reusable ‘bag for life’ or tote bags which are more
environmentally friendly. Table 4 shows the statistics of single-use plastic bags and
their own shopping bags.
As a consequence of increasing numbers of consumers concerning ethical products,
businesses have received a lot of pressure by the consumers through social media.
According to research, almost half the population of the earth (3.21 billion) are using
social media. Businesses that do not operate ethically will receive negative impact.
Communities like to organize boycotts to force businesses to reconsider their
decisions on social or environment. Boycott is very efficient for a community to hit
the business, as it influences the sales and the image of the company by a lot.
Companies such as Nestle, announced removing artificial colours and flavours from
their products due to the pressure from consumer behaviour. Although the pressure
is not from an organized group, the demand which consumers prefer on buying
natural products causes them to make a change on their products. Therefore,
pressure doesn’t totally come from the consumers making an action on the company
but it could come from the daily purchasing behaviour of the consumer.
Results
• R1: The impact of those unethical practices on the consumers by businesses is
positively related to the unethical practices done by businesses.
• R2: The unethical practices done by businesses is positively related to the
environmental issues.
• R3: Consumers prefer buying ethical products is positively related to environmental
issues.
• R4: Consumers prefer buying ethical products is positively related to the action of the
businesses.
• R5: The policy provided by the government is positively related to the consumer
purchasing behaviour.
• R6: Businesses that operate ethically are positively related to the image of the
businesses.
• R7: Businesses that operate ethically are positively related to the sales of the
businesses.

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• R8: Businesses that operate ethically are positively related to the consumer
purchasing behaviour.
Discussion & Conclusion
In conclusion, ethical consumption consumers are after the wish to protect the
environment; the impact of unethical practices on consumers, are positively caused
by the unethical activities of businesses. In our research, we realise that the way
people spend money will have an impact on the earth. Whenever we shop, we are
voting with our wallet. When we buy from brands that have a positive impact, it is like
voting for a better future. By carefully choosing what we buy, and overlook the brand,
we will have an opportunity to create a positive impact on businesses, environment
and consumers (Sandra J. B. and Sandra J. M., 1993).
Although the issues of ethical consumption can be complicated and diverse, we
found a few examples where shopping ethically can make a difference. Firstly, We
can
help create the type of society we want, through buying from companies that take
their commitments to our communities seriously. Many of the products we buy
have been produced by companies that pay their workers poverty wages and stash
their profits in offshore tax havens. We can help to deal with this by, shopping
for products that carry Fairtrade accreditation or Fair Tax Mark. These
independent accreditation marks can help redirect companies to do the right
thing.
Facing many environmental problems, from global warming to pesticide pollution
(Cori D. and Bill M., 2009), these can be partially solved through more ethical
shopping. For example, we can help combat climate change by switching to green
energy providers or by purchasing organic products to reduce the number of
dangerous pesticides that are killing wild animals and plants. Similarly, ethical
consumption can help improve animal
conditions in several ways (Samantha J., 2011). For instance, many cosmetics
brands are still testing on animals. However, purchasing products from brands that
refuse to test on animals, there will be no animals harmed from the production of
cosmetics.

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Appendices:
Table 1
Table 1 shows the Ethical spending in the UK from 2000ot 2007. There is an obvious
increasing trend on ethical consumption.
Table 2
Table 3
Table 4

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In this table we can see the statistic of single-use bags in Figure A and own shopping bags
in Figure B. Focusing on England, ever since the government imposed the rule of 5p charge
for single-use plastic in 2015, the statistic shows that the mean usage of single-use plastic
bags has fallen from 2.8 to 2.1 between September to November in England. From
November to April, the mean usage of plastic has been continuously reduced from 2.1 to 2.0
with a slow decrease in England. On the other hand, in Figure B we can see a significant
rise in mean usage of own shopping bags from September to November (3.7 to 4.4). Then,
from November to April is a continuous slow decrease in mean usage of own shopping bags
from 4.4 to 4.6.

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