Investigating the role of individualism/collectivism as underlying motives and status consumption as a behavioral outcome of LOHAS: Focusing on the moderating effect of materialism

Materialism has been given great attention in the consumer behavior literature. How materialistic tendencies are shaped by advertising has also been documented. Yet, the impact of consumers’ materialism on their perceptions of ads is not clearly understood. The goal of this research is to examine the relationship between an individual’s materialism and his/her perceptions of various kinds of advertising. Using four specific advertising appeals (i.e., interpersonal, prestige/status, achievement, and appearance-related), attitudes toward the ad, and thoughts elicited by the advertisement were measured and compared across high and low materialism groups. Significant differences were found between respondents from the two groups with respect to the evaluation of each type of appeal. When prestige/status, achievement, and appearance-related appeals were used in advertising, they were evaluated more favorably by consumers with high levels of materialism than by consumers with low levels of materialism. In contrast, advertising that used an interpersonal appeal was viewed more favorably by consumers with low levels of materialism. The results of this research provide implications for marketers on three perspectives: the furthering of our conceptualization of the materialism construct, the design of promotional communication for specific target markets, and the public policy dimension of targeting consumers more vulnerable to certain appeals.

The risk of virus contracting during the COVID-19 pandemic has changed consumer preference for online shopping to meet their daily needs than shopping in brick-and-mortar stores. Online shopping presents a different environment, atmosphere, and experience. The possibility of ethical violations is higher during online than face-to-face transactions. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the influence of perceived health risk and customer perception of online retail ethics on consumer online shopping behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic, involving seven variables, namely perceived health risk, security, privacy, non-deception, reliability fulfillment, service recovery, and online shopping behavior. The data were collected through an online survey by employing the purposive sampling technique to a consumer who has shopped online during the COVID-19 pandemic in Indonesia. 315 valid responses were obtained and analyzed through quantitative method using SEM-Amos. The results showed that perceived health risk and four variables of online retail ethics including security, privacy, reliability fulfillment, and service recovery affected online shopping behavior. Meanwhile, non-deception was found to have an insignificant effect. The coefficient value proved perceived health risk to be more dominant in influencing online shopping behavior than the variables of online retail ethics. Thus, consumers pay more concern for their health during online shopping. However, positive consumer perceptions of the behavior of online retail websites in providing services also can encourage consumers to shop online during this pandemic.

The paper deals with the analysis of methodology of Environmental Performance Index. The authors analyzed and systematized the main existing integrated indices, which were used for evaluation of environmental, social and economic situation in the countries. The authors allocated the environmental performance index as a basis for analyzing the environmental policy of the country. In this direction, the authors analysed the main features, structure and indicators of environmental performance index. The authors allocated the world-leader countries with huge level of CO2 emissions. According to the results, the authors aproved that these countries should improve their environmental policy. Accordingly, they occupied less position in environmental performance index. For the purpose to analyze the relation between ecological, social and economic welfare, the authors analyzed score of sustainable development goal index, social progress index and gross domestic product per capita. The comparison analysis of findings showed that countries with good position on environmental performance index have the strong position on sustainable development goal index and social progress index. The authors suggested that Ukraine should orient to the EU countries with purpose to improve the environmental policy.