0000000000165258

AUTHOR

Sushant Kumar

The balancing act: How do moral norms and anticipated pride drive food waste/reduction behaviour?

Food waste is a serious problem that impacts the environment and sustainability by increasing greenhouse gas emissions from landfills. Food waste also represents a social challenge because it raises serious concerns about food security. While acknowledging that households waste a great deal of food because they lack a proper routine for reusing leftovers and purchase more food than required, few studies have extensively examined the drivers of leftover reuse and over-ordering. We address this gap using the stimulus-organism-response paradigm. Moral norms and anticipated pride are conceptualised as stimuli that impact the organismic state of intentions against food waste and response in the …

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What drives brand love for natural products? The moderating role of household size

Natural products, including food, cosmetics, and other fast-moving consumer goods, are becoming increasingly popular, and their health-related benefits are widely recognized. Despite the growing awareness and use of natural products, little is known about the enablers and barriers that influence consumers' brand love toward them. The present study attempts to address this gap and better explain consumer behavior toward natural products by utilizing the stimuli-organism-response (S–O-R) theory. The study rests on the premise that certain stimuli influence the internal state of consumers (i.e., the organism), which, in turn, shape their response to products and services. This study uses healt…

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A behavioural reasoning perspective on the consumption of local food. A study on REKO, a social media-based local food distribution system

Consumption of local food is increasing due to its convenience and multiple perceived benefits. However, the factors shaping consumer attitude towards local food and brand love for local food have received limited academic attention. The study thus investigates the under-explored concept of self-identity, attitude towards local food, and brand love, along with contextual variables with respect to local food consumption. Behavioural Reasoning Theory (BRT) is adopted as the theoretical frame in which self-identity is utilised as value, supporting the environment and positive product perception about the food sold by REKO are the reasons for choosing local food, and negative product perception…

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Associations between travel and tourism competitiveness and culture

Abstract In recent years, countries have been competing with each other to attract tourists due to of the unprecedented growth in new tourism destinations. Consequently, these countries have been taking several initiatives to improve the competitiveness of their destinations in comparison to those of other countries. However, it is becoming increasingly difficult for destinations to become the most popular and preferred choice among tourists. Previous literature has highlighted the need for examining the association between the culture of a particular destination and their competitiveness with respect to tourism. Little is known, however, about these associations at the present time. This s…

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What drives brand love and purchase intentions toward the local food distribution system? A study of social media-based REKO (fair consumption) groups

Local food is gaining increasing popularity among consumers due to its association with sustainable consumption. However, for a product to be commercially successful, such growing popularity should translate into high purchase intentions and positive associations with the product post-consumption. Although this success has not yet been reflected for local food consumption, research in this area has remained limited. The present study addresses this gap by examining the antecedents of brand love for both the local food distribution system and the local food it distributes. The study thus employs the stimuli-organism-response (SOR) theory, which indicates that certain environmental stimuli in…

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Purchasing natural personal care products in the era of fake news? The moderation effect of brand trust

Natural personal care products are gaining popularity due to their benefits in terms of health and well-being. However, consumers are wary of these products and are guided by the fake news circulating about them. Since natural product consumption offers several personal and environmental benefits, it would be worthwhile to understand consumers’ tendency to let fake news influence their consumption decisions. Accordingly, the current study examined the association of fake news and purchasing behaviour towards natural personal care products, utilising Stimulus-Organism-Behaviour-Consequence (SOBC) as the theoretical framework. The study proposed openness to change as the stimulus, perceived b…

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What determines a positive attitude towards natural food products? An expectancy theory approach.

Natural food products are becoming increasingly popular worldwide due to their health and environmental benefits. However, these products' increasing anecdotal popularity has not translated into their widespread adoption; in fact, demand for natural food products remains confined to a relatively small segment of consumers. Despite this, little is known about the facilitators and inhibitors of favourable attitude of consumers towards these products. Recognising this gap, our study employed the theoretical lens of expectancy theory to investigate these factors. Through an extensive review of the pro-environmental consumption literature, we identified four facilitating and inhibiting factors: …

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