Consumer Perceptions of Corporate Sustainability Intentions: Should Nonenvironmental Motives Be Acknowledged?

摘要

Corporate investments in environmental sustainability initiatives have become increasingly important in recent years (Carroll and Shabana, 2010; Eweje, 2011) and companies have started to modify their business operations by integrating environmental considerations in their activities (Baner-jee, 2001; Battels, et al., 2015). An important question raises how companies can communicate about their motives for investing in environmental sustainability initiatives. Whereas environmental motives are commonly communicated in advertising, it has been theorized that acknowledging a combination of both environmental and financial motives could reduce consumer skepticism (Du et al, 2010). Nevertheless, little is known about the effects of simultaneously acknowledging multiple motives on consumer perceptions of corporate intentions and the potential effects of acknowledging a legal motive for sustainability initiatives have largely been neglected (De Vries, et al., 2015). Companies tend to experience pressure to conform to legal and institutional standards, due to the more prominent role of environmental regulations on the political agenda (Escobar and Vredenburg, 2011; Nidumolu et al., 2009). Therefore the current research addresses how the acknowledgement of environmental motives in combination with financial and legal motives can affect consumer perceptions of corporate intentions.