Msc THESIS
Finding the right shade of green:
The influence of brand concept on
consumer attitude toward the
product through CSR-CA beliefs.
Finding the right shade of green:
The influence of brand concept on consumer attitude
toward the product through CSR-CA beliefs.
Master thesis by:
Sophie Loos
Student number - 10909885
MSc in Business Administration – Marketing University of Amsterdam
26th of January 2018
Supervisor:
STATEMENT OF ORIGINALITY
This document is written by Sophie Loos who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document. I declare that the text and the work presented in this document is original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it. The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TABLE OF CONTENTS ... 3
ABSTRACT ... 5
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES AND APPENDICES ... 6
CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION ... 7 1.1 BACKGROUND ... 7 1.2RESEARCH QUESTION ... 9 1.3 CONTRIBUTION ... 9 1.3.1. Theoretical Contribution ... 9 1.3.2. Managerial Contribution ... 10 1.4READING GUIDE ... 11
CHAPTER 2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ... 12
2.1THE BRAND CONCEPT OF LUXURY ... 12
2.2CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR) ... 14
2.2.1. The definition of CSR ... 14
2.2.2. CSR types ... 15
2.3CONSUMER RESPONSES TO CSR TYPES ... 17
2.4LUXURY CSR ... 20
2.4.1. Consumer responses to luxury CSR ... 20
2.4.2. The impact of CSR type on consumer responses to (luxury) CSR ... 22
2.5CONCEPTUAL MODEL ... 26 CHAPTER 3. METHODOLOGY ... 27 3.1RESEARCH DESIGN ... 27 3.2PROCEDURE ... 30 3.3STIMULI ... 31 3.3.1. Brand Concept ... 31 3.3.2. CSR Type ... 32 3.4MEASURES ... 34 3.5SAMPLE ... 35 CHAPTER 4. RESULTS ... 37 4.1DATA PREPARATION ... 37
4.2DATA EXPLORATION ... 38
4.2.1. Exploring relationships ... 38
4.2.2. Exploring differences between groups ... 40
4.3TESTING HYPOTHESES ... 43 4.3.1. Hypothesis 1 ... 43 4.3.2. Hypothesis 2 ... 43 4.3.3. Hypothesis 3 ... 44 4.4ADDITIONAL RESULTS ... 48 CHAPTER 5. DISCUSSION ... 51 5.1GENERAL DISCUSSION ... 51
5.2DISCUSSION ADDITIONAL RESULTS ... 53
5.3THEORETICAL IMPLICATIONS ... 55
5.4MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS ... 56
5.5FUTURE RESEARCH AND LIMITATIONS ... 56
5.5.1. Future research ... 57
5.5.2. Limitations ... 58
REFERENCES ... 60
ABSTRACT
Both luxury- and non-luxury brands are increasingly aiming attention at the implementation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives both from an altruistic and a business perspective. Although consumers are becoming more aware about the negative influence of the clothing industry on our environment and our society, previous literature indicates negative consumer responses toward CSR initiatives implemented by luxury brands. This raises the question what factors could possibly attenuate the incompatibility between luxury and CSR. The present study thus explores if CSR type (i.e. product-related CSR, philanthropy, business practices) influences the effectiveness of CSR initiatives for brands with a luxury- and a non-luxury brand concept in terms of consumer attitude toward the product. Moreover, this study tries to find an explanation for this potential influence by examining CSR-CA
beliefs, which is the trade-off consumers often perceive between CSR and corporate ability
(CA), the company’s ability to provide and deliver quality products. This current study shows no significant difference in consumer attitude toward luxury- and non-luxury products. This is found through an experimental vignette study (N = 161) on a shirt from a hypothetical luxury and non-luxury brand conducted through Qualtrics. CSR type shows no significant
moderating effect, which indicates that this could not be a factor that possibly attenuates the incompatibility between luxury and CSR. Also, no significant mediating effect of CSR-CA
beliefs is found. The additional results demonstrate a strong significant negative effect of CSR-CA beliefs on consumer attitude toward the product, as well as a significant indirect
effect of environmental consciousness on consumer attitude toward the product through
CSR-CA beliefs. Furthermore, a significant main effect of CSR type on consumer attitude toward the product was found. The findings of this study are able to provide valuable insights to find
the right shade of green when creating a CSR strategy.
Keywords: Brand concept, CSR type, CSR-CA beliefs, consumer attitude toward the product, corporate social responsibility (CSR), luxury products, environmental consciousness
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES AND APPENDICES Tables
Table 1: Research Design Table 2: Stimuli Brand Concept Table 3: Stimuli CSR Type
Table 4: Measures mediator, dependent variable, and covariates Table 5: Skewness, Kurtosis
Table 6: Means, Standard Deviations, Correlations and Reliabilities Table 7: Descriptive Statistics of the eight groups
Table 8: Tests of Between-Subjects Effects Univariate ANOVA Table 9: Pairwise Comparisons CSR Type Univariate ANOVA Table 10: Planned Comparisons Hypothesis 1 and Hypothesis 2 Table 11: Dummy Coding Brand Concept Hypotheses Testing Table 12: Dummy Coding CSR Type Hypotheses Testing
Table 13: Summary of PROCESS regression model 7 Hypotheses Testing Table 14: Planned Comparisons Additional Results
Table 15: Summary of PROCESS regression model 4 Additional Results Table 16: Dummy Coding CSR Type Additional Results
Figures
Figure 1: Conceptual Model Figure 2: Plot Univariate ANOVA
Figure 3: Statistical Model with estimated model coefficients
Appendices
Appendix A: Luxury characteristics
Appendix B: Product-related CSR and non-product-related CSR initiatives Appendix C: Manipulated characteristics brand concept stimuli
Appendix D: Pre-test Appendix E: Survey
CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background
“Once we know and are aware, we are responsible for our action, and our inaction. We can do something about it or ignore it. Either way, we are still responsible.” - Jean Paul Sartre -
We are living in a world in which clothing is a fundamental part. Clothing is worn by almost everyone, everyday, and for a lot of people it is an important way to show their identity. However, the clothing industry often has a significant negative environmental and societal impact (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017). For example, the fact that the textile industry produces more greenhouse gas emissions than the combination of air and shipping transport shows that the current clothing system is extremely polluting (Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017). Incidents like the collapse of the Rana Plaza factory in Bangladesh in which 1138 workers where killed, have demonstrated the negative impact of the clothing industry on society (Kasperkevic, 2016). Meanwhile, NGO’s are trying to create awareness among consumers about these negative environmental and societal impacts (Kapferer, 2010; Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017). Fashion Revolution, for example, has launched an
international campaign to increase awareness of the way clothing is made (Creasy & McGovern, 2014).
Consumers are becoming more aware of the negative impact of the clothing industry as well as the impact of their (sustainable) decisions on the world around them (Ellen
MacArthur Foundation, 2017; Davies et al., 2012). Consequently, the risk of creating negative buzz when not dealing with the impact on the environment and the society in a good way and, in turn, ruining their reputation has become very high for brands (Davies et al., 2012;
Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2015; Ellen MacArthur Foundation, 2017). It is therefore important for brands to consider sustainability not only from an altruistic perspective, but also from a business perspective, because corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives can positively influence consumer responses to the brand (Brown & Dacin, 1997; Sen & Bhattacharya. 2004; Webb & Mohr, 2005; Kapferer, 2010; Du et al., 2010).
The high visibility and success of luxury means that luxury brands are even more vulnerable to rumours and criticism compared to non-luxury brands, because brand reputation is very important for their pricing power and core characteristics (Kapferer, 2010; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2015). Accordingly, some luxury brands are already going the sustainable
way and, may it be silently, a lot of luxury groups have adopted the goal of becoming a model for sustainable luxury in the entire value chain (Kapferer, 2010). Luxury brands can engage in a range of sustainability activities. For instance, Gucci has focused on philanthropy by having longstanding partnership with UNICEF since 2005. The brand donates a percentage of sales to UNICEF with the purpose of giving children in Africa better access to quality education (UNICEF, 2015). Stella McCartney, on the other hand, approaches sustainable luxury in a different way and has entered a long-term partnership with Parley for the Oceans in 2017, an organization that tries to stop the destruction of marine life. Stella McCartney focuses on product-related CSR and is planning to use Parley’s yarn fibre (made from ocean plastic) instead of woven or recycled plastic in its products (Morby, 2017).
However, luxury brands may take a risk when implementing CSR initiatives in that previous literature found negative consumer responses toward CSR initiatives from luxury brands (Achabou & Dekhili, 2013; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2014; Davies et al., 2012). For example, Achabou & Dekhili (2013) demonstrate that consumers do not like the use of recycled materials in luxury clothing. Regardless of the increased attention about sustainable luxury, there is only some empirical research that explores factors that could possibly
attenuate this incompatibility between luxury and sustainability (Torelli et al., 2012; Janssen et al., 2013; Boenigk & Schuchard, 2013; Janssen et al., 2017). There is also no consensus in the literature in what way luxury brands can best implement sustainability. However, it is important for luxury brands to understand how to implement a successful marketing and CSR strategy, while avoiding the negative outcomes of implementing CSR initiatives (Torelli et al., 2012). In the light of this, the current study will try to fill this research gap and further investigate through what mechanism CSR initiatives have an influence on consumer responses to luxury CSR and what factors have a role in this process.
Since there is ample anecdotal evidence that there is significant heterogeneity in the way consumers respond to different CSR initiatives (Webb & Mohr, 2005; Du et al., 2007; Green & Peloza, 2011; Peloza & Shang, 2011; Phau & Ong, 2007), the CSR type (i.e., product-related CSR; business practices; philanthropy) used by a brand to implement CSR likely matters (Peloza & Shang, 2011). On the consumer side, a quality/performance trade-off is often perceived (i.e. CSR-CA beliefs) when a brand engages in CSR initiatives (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; Luchs et al., 2010). Since the three CSR types are different ways of implementing CSR for a brand, CSR-CA beliefs possibly could be a mechanism that is able to explain the different consumer responses to CSR types. In sum, this study will make an effort to find the right shade of green (i.e. CSR type) that moderates the relationship between brand
concept (i.e. luxury- and non-luxury brands) and consumer attitude toward the product
through CSR-CA beliefs.
1.2 Research Question
The following research question is formulated:
To what extent does CSR type influence the effectiveness of CSR initiatives for both luxury brands and non-luxury brands in terms of consumer attitude toward the product? Is this relationship mediated by CSR-CA Beliefs?
In order to have a guideline in answering the main research question, the following sub-questions are formulated:
1. How is luxury defined?
2. How is Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) defined?
3. What are the different CSR types that are distinguished in the literature? 4. How do consumers respond to CSR?
5. How do consumers respond to luxury CSR?
6. How does CSR type impact consumer responses to luxury CSR?
1.3 Contribution
1.3.1. Theoretical Contribution
This study adds to academic literature in many ways, first by filling the research gap of increasing understanding of the influence of sustainability in the context of luxury by combining the literature on consumer responses to CSR with the literature on luxury (Achabou & Dekhili, 2013). This is still an under researched area in the literature on consumer responses to CSR, but important because of the incompatibility found between luxury and sustainability (Achabou & Dekhili, 2013; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2014; Davies et al., 2012). More specifically, this study will contribute to this research gap by increasing understanding about factors that could potentially help to attenuate this incompatibility.
Secondly, previous literature has indicated that consumer response to CSR may depend on the CSR type (Webb & Mohr, 2005; Du et al., 2007; Green & Peloza, 2011; Peloza
& Shang, 2011; Phau & Ong, 2007). The review of Peloza & Shang (2011) emphasizes the importance of studying CSR types by indicating that studies that compare all three CSR types are very rare, and even absent in the context of luxury. The review also indicates that, on the contrary to philanthropy, there is hardly any knowledge on the effect of business practices and product-related CSR (Peloza & Shang, 2011). Despite this acknowledgment, there is still no consistency as to what CSR types are preferred by consumers in their decision-making. This study will fill this research gap by investigating the interaction of the brand concept (i.e., luxury, non-luxury) and CSR type (i.e., product-related CSR, philanthropy, business practices) on consumer responses.
Thirdly, previous literature has shown that consumers have corporate associations in mind that infer a trade-off between sustainability and product performance (Sen &
Bhattacharya, 2001; Luchs et al., 2010). Therefore, the current study contributes to the literature by using the concept of CSR-CA beliefs as a potential mechanism that could explain the reason of different consumer responses to different CSR types. More specifically, this study will investigate consumers’ response to products that represent different CSR types that might result in a different trade-off between sustainability and product performance.
1.3.2. Managerial Contribution
For luxury brands, the pressure to focus on sustainability is very high nowadays (Kapferer, 2010; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2015). Due to all the innovations in recycling
technologies it might seem like a logical and creative step for a luxury brand to focus on the use of recycled material (product-related CSR) when creating a CSR strategy. However, previous literature has shown that the use of recycled materials in luxury clothing can actually backfire on the brand (Achabou & Dekhili, 2013; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2014; Davies et al., 2012). It is therefore important for luxury brands to better understand how different CSR types result in differentiation and if they result in positive consumer responses or not (Peloza & Shang, 2011). Moreover, by increasing knowledge about CSR-CA beliefs, luxury brand managers will have more insights about when it is important to inform consumers that a certain CSR initiative does not hurt the quality of the product (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001). Thus, the results of this study may give luxury brand managers a foundation to implement a (more) successful CSR strategy. This way, luxury brands are able to act as a leader in sustainability by contributing to a more sustainable world, while at the
same time thinking about the bottom line of the company (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2004; Kapferer, 2010).
1.4 Reading Guide
This thesis encompasses five chapters whereof the first covered the introduction of the research topic. In the second chapter, the relevant literature on luxury and consumer responses to CSR will be reviewed in order to develop a theoretical framework. After this, the conceptual model will be presented. Chapter three will cover the methodology, followed by the results in chapter 4. Lastly, chapter 5 will discuss the results and will shed light on the theoretical and managerial implications. Moreover it will give directions for future research and will outline the limitations of the study.
CHAPTER 2. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
This chapter will draw upon relevant literature on luxury, corporate social responsibility (CSR) and consumer responses to (luxury) CSR. In the beginning, the brand concept of luxury will be explained and a definition of luxury will be proposed. After this an explanation about the theoretical foundation of CSR that is relevant for this study will be given. Subsequently, the relevant literature related to consumer responses to CSR will be explained followed by literature on consumer responses to luxury CSR. Finally, the impact of CSR type on consumer responses to luxury CSR will be discussed. Hypotheses are formulated throughout the entire chapter and the conceptual model will be presented at the end of the chapter.
2.1 The brand concept of luxury
The concept of a brand is the abstract meaning that is unique for a brand and it is derived from a particular construction of product characteristics (e.g., high price, fancy,
exclusiveness, quality, etc.) and the effort of a firm to establish meanings based on these characteristics (Park, 1991).
‘Luxury’ is a common term in our daily life to indicate products, services or a certain lifestyle. Researchers across all disciplines share the idea that luxury is something more than necessary (Bearden & Etzel, 1982). Nowadays however, people spend a lot of money on products that satisfy more than their basic needs, but that does not mean that these products can be called ‘luxury’. There is actually no clear, consistent understanding of what a luxury brand exactly is (Kapferer, 1998). While a Gucci bag could be seen as a luxury product to one student, that same bag might be just an ordinary, non-luxury product to a wealthy person. Tynan et al. (2010) indeed explain that luxury and non-luxury products are on the same continuum, but the exact position of the product on that continuum is different for every individual. This demonstrates that it is difficult to define ‘luxury’ because of the consumer’ subjective perception about the product’s characteristics. Additionally, this perception can change depending on an individual's mood (Davies et. al., 2012).
This results in a large number of definitions of luxury proposed by academic research and managers. Appendix A demonstrates an overview with luxury characteristics used in the most quoted luxury perception scales: Kapferer (1998); Dubois et al. (2001) and Vigneron and Johnson (2004). In order to develop the most complete scale, De Barnier et al. (2012) measured the perceptions of five brands and merged these three most quoted scales. This
resulted in seven common elements identifying luxury: exceptional quality, hedonism (beauty and pleasure), price (expensive), rarity (which is not scarcity), selective distribution and associated personalised services, exclusive character (prestige, privilege), and creativity (art and avant-garde) (De Barnier et al, 2012). Every dimension is fundamental to differentiate luxury from non-luxury (Kapferer & Bastien, 2012).
The elements of De Barnier et al. (2012) show that consumers do not see luxury as immaterial values and images alone. Contradictory to managers, who might sometimes disconnect the product and the brand, consumers perceive the product as an embodiment of the brand (Kapferer, 1998). Since beauty, quality and price are also important characteristics, a luxury brand should always be connected to a tangible product in order to add more
meaning to its product in terms of rarity, prestige and creativity (Kapferer, 1998; De Barnier et al., 2012).
Hence, the following definition of luxury is proposed for this study: “Luxury brands are associated with desirable products. These products have more than necessary and ordinary characteristics, which include a high level of quality, aesthetics, price, rarity, service, prestige, and creativity”. Non-luxury products are opposite to this definition, because non-luxury products exist at the other end of a continuum with luxury products (Tynan et al., 2011).
The beauty of the product and product excellence are the main reason why luxury products induce intense positive response, such as pleasure and excitement (Kapferer, 1998). Past research has already shown that luxury products are able to create more extreme
emotions (e.g., pleasure, desire, joy) than non-luxury products. It is important to point out that non-luxury products might also elicit positive response, but in general these responses are less strong than luxury ones (Pozharliev et al., 2015). Moreover, luxury products are able to satisfy consumer’s functional and social needs better than non-luxury products (Vigneron & Johnson, 2004; Wiedmann et al., 2009). Despite the fact that past research has already found that consumers generally respond more positive to luxury products than to non-luxury products this study aims to replicate the finding in the context of this study and therefore the following hypothesis is formulated:
Hypothesis 1 (H1): When a brand is not engaged in CSR, a luxury product is evaluated more
favourably in terms of consumer attitude toward the product compared to a non-luxury product.
2.2 Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)
To shed light on the theoretical foundations of CSR, this section will provide the definition of CSR and will discuss CSR types.
2.2.1. The definition of CSR
According to Carroll (1979), one of the early CSR theorists, “the social responsibility of business encompasses the economic, legal, ethical, and discretionary expectations that society has of organizations at a given point in time” (p. 500). This set of four responsibilities functions as a model to outline in what way a company should be responsible to the society as a whole. According to this definition of CSR a socially responsible company has to gain enough profits in an efficient and effective way in order to fulfil its economic responsibility, the company has to obey the law and behave ethically in every situation, and has to meet discretionary responsibilities (which are not required by law and not expected in an ethical sense) like philanthropic support and training unemployed people (Carroll, 1979).
Nowadays, there are many definitions for CSR, which makes it unclear for both researchers and practitioners how CSR should exactly be defined (Dahlsrud, 2006). Besides, CSR definitions are often biased toward a specific interest, which prevents the creation and implementation of one overall concept (Van Marrewijk, 2003). In a content analysis of 37 CSR definitions, Dahlsrud (2006) found that the many definitions available are always referring to five dimensions (i.e., environmental, social, economic, stakeholder, voluntariness) (Dahlsrud, 2006). The definitions analysed are phrased in a different way, but their meaning is mostly similar. They are all characterizing a phenomenon and not giving any direction in how to deal with that particular phenomenon. The challenge for brands therefore is not so much how CSR is defined, but to understand what CSR means for the industry they are in and how to integrate this understanding with their business strategy (Dahlsrud, 2006).
The CSR definition of the European Commission (2001) is used in the current study since it is the most widely used definition in literature and it refers to all the five dimensions of Dahlsrud (2006) and thus it is a rather complete conceptualization (Dahlsrud, 2006). CSR is thus defined as “a concept whereby companies integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operations and in their interaction with their stakeholders on a voluntary basis.” This definition seems appropriate, because it includes the role of the stakeholder, be they the government, consumers or producers in emerging countries when serving social and environmental concerns. The economic part is also important, since economic viability is
something luxury does not only do for itself, but also for society at large (Carroll, 1979). The definition also emphasizes that CSR is voluntary, which means that luxury brands can decide for themselves if they want to implement specific CSR types that are not mandated or required by law and not expected of the brand due to ethical reasons.
2.2.2. CSR types
Due to the broad conceptualization of CSR as well as the variety of CSR initiatives brands can engage in, it is not surprising that there is substantial fragmentation in the domains of
CSR types both in research and practice (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; Peloza & Shang, 2011).
These CSR initiatives are different in terms of their stakeholder focus (e.g., consumers; the environment; employees; supply chain), the involvement of the company and their execution (Peloza & Shang, 2011). This makes it hard to make deliberate and precise generalizations in CSR research (Peloza & Shang, 2011). However, it is important to distinguish between different CSR types, because consumers do not have one overall CSR impression of a brand, but observe each CSR initiative in relation to the value it will add to the brand (Green & Peloza, 2011). Consumer value can be seen as a trade-off between the perceived benefits and costs and, accordingly, it is defined as “a consumer’s overall assessment of the utility of a product (or service) based on perceptions of what is received and what is given.” (Zeithaml, 1988, 4). The most effective CSR initiatives are the ones that deliver the most value to consumers and the ones that explain how a certain investment in CSR might result in positive consumer response (Green & Peloza, 2011; Peloza & Shang, 2011)
One example of a categorization of different CSR initiatives that is discussed in previous literature (e.g.,Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; 2004) is The Corporate Social Ratings
Monitor developed by Socrates, that describes and rates over 600 CSR companies in terms of
their CSR initiatives. According to this database CSR initiatives can generally be divided into six different categories: (1) diversity (e.g. race, gender, sexual orientation, disability-based initiatives within and outside the organisation); (2) environment (e.g. environment friendly products, waste management, use of chemicals, animal testing, recycling); (3) community support (e.g. support of arts, health programs, charitable giving); (4) employee support (e.g. job security, safety concerns, employee involvement); (5) product (e.g. product safety, innovation, marketing, antitrust disputes); (6) non-domestic operations (e.g. sweatshop practices, dealing with human rights violations) (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; 2004).
As a means of overcoming fragmentation, Peloza & Shang (2011) examined previous literature in which one or more CSR initiatives are studied. The focus of their systematic review is on the impact of different CSR initiatives, their value to stakeholders (i.e. consumers) and business performance (i.e. attitude; purchase intention). Since the current study also focuses on the effectiveness of different types of CSR on consumer attitude toward
the product, the broad categorization of CSR initiatives by Peloza & Shang (2011) seems
particularly relevant for the current study. They identified 177 actual CSR initiatives, which they divided into 22 single CSR initiatives. Peloza & Shang (2011) made a broad categorization of these single activities in three CSR types, namely (1) philanthropy; (2) business practices; and (3) products. These 22 CSR initiatives are valuable when doing research, because they are defined in a clear way and, since these CSR initiatives are based on a systematic literature review, they are expected to take into account common CSR practices of companies.
Still, the impact of CSR types is controversial in literature. This is illustrated in the analysis of Peloza & Shang (2011) where examinations of philanthropy, business practices and products together only occur in eleven studies (Peloza & Shang, 2011). Moreover, these studies do not use the same measures consistently, which makes it difficult to compare the findings of these studies in terms of consumer responses (Peloza & Shang, 2011). Therefore, Peloza & Shang (2011) call for more precise generalizations in CSR research. This study will answer to this call by distinguishing between product-related CSR types and non-product-related CSR types. This way, this study will hopefully provide more precise guidance for companies in the complex process of finding the right shade of green. Appendix B shows how product- and non-product-related CSR relate to the three CSR types and 22 CSR activities (Peloza & Shang, 2011).
‘Products’ is about product-related features like generating less pollution when used,
product quality and biodegradability (Peloza & Shang, 2011). ‘Product-related’ CSR is directly linked to attributes such as reliability, durability and price, where the first two attributes are often seen as aspects of quality (Green & Peloza, 2011). The articles of Luchs et al. (2010), Achabou & Dekhili (2013) and Janssen et al. (2014) are examples of literature in this area that will be discussed later.
Whereas for product-related CSR the company’s CSR initiative has a direct impact on features (i.e., quality, material) of the product, this is not the case for non-product-related CSR (Peloza & Shang, 2011). The first variant of non-product-related CSR is philanthropy, which includes, amongst others, cause-related marketing (where the donation to a charity
involves a commercial exchange), donations of cash (where the donation to a charity does not involve a commercial exchange), statements of support for charities without exactly mentioning how that support is given, the promotion of a social issue, donations of products, licensing, event sponsorship, customer donations and non-specific support for charities. Examples of CSR literature in the area of philanthropy that will be discussed in the current study are the articles of Brown & Dacin (1997), Boenigk & Schuchard (2013), and Chernev & Blair (2015).
The second variant of non-product-related CSR includes activities related to the business practices of a company where environmental protection practices by companies (e.g., pollution levels) are the most popular (Peloza & Shang, 2011). The paper of Sen & Bhattacharya (200) that will be elaborated upon in chapter 2.4, investigated CSR in the field of business practices.
Although examinations of philanthropy, business practices and products are rare, some literature will be discussed that investigated all three CSR types, namely Sen & Bhattacharya (2004); Webb & Mohr (2005); Du et al. (2007); Phau & Ong (2007); Torelli et al. (2012). Notably absent is literature that focuses on all three CSR types in the context of luxury.
The next section will be about consumer responses to CSR and, more specifically, it will elaborate upon the complex factors and related explanatory mechanisms that influence the heterogeneity of consumer responses to different CSR types.
2.3 Consumer responses to CSR types
Companies should be aware that the implementation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives is not only excellent from a perspective of goodwill, but also from a business perspective (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2004; Du et al., 2010). Consumers are an important stakeholder group that seems to be particularly responsive to the CSR initiatives of a company (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2004). Previous research has shown, in a broad area of consumption contexts, that consumer not only like products they perceive to be socially responsible (Chernev & Blair, 2015; Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001), but the socially responsible behaviour of the company also has a positive impact on the evaluation of the brand (Brown & Dacin, 1997; Sen & Bhattacharya, 2004; Webb & Mohr, 2005; Du et al., 2010). For example, Brown and Dacin (1997) focused on the CSR type philanthropy and influenced the level of a hypothetical brand’s corporate giving and community involvement by giving a score to the
CSR level of the company. They found that high CSR led to higher evaluation of the company than low CSR.
Other literature has demonstrated that consumer responses to CSR tend to be more complex than this. As a matter of fact, there seems to be significant heterogeneity among consumers in their responses to the three different CSR types. Webb & Mohr (2005) illustrate this by manipulating all three CSR types in the context of a non-luxury product (i.e. athletic shoes). The three CSR types were manipulated across two domains: philanthropy (i.e., donations of cash, employee volunteerism, donations of products) and the environment (they applied both business practices in the form of environmental protection practices and product-related CSR in the form of using recycled materials). They found the environmental domain had a more positive impact on purchase intent than philanthropy.
Previous literature has attempted to identify possible factors for this heterogeneity in consumer responses to CSR types. First of all, a high perceived fit between the company and the CSR initiative generally improves consumer responses to both the company and the company’s products (Hamlin & Wilson, 2004; Sen & Bhattacharya, 2004; Peloza & Shang, 2011). Secondly, Phau & Ong (2007) demonstrated that consumer trust is able to evoke more positive consumer responses toward the CSR type and toward the firm. In their study, they asked respondents to rate CSR messages delivered via hang tags attached to mainstream leisure shirts. In terms of non-product-related CSR messages they used a “donation” appeal (i.e., philanthropy) and an “environmental correctness” claim (i.e. business practices). The product-related CSR message was perceived as more credible than the non-product-related CSR messages.
Several consumer-related factors may also have an impact on how consumers respond to CSR types the company offers. Essential when creating consumer responses to CSR initiatives is the consumer’s awareness of a company’s CSR initiatives (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2004; Pomering & Dolnicar, 2009; Du et al., 2007, Du et al., 2010). This is important, because, in general, the effect of CSR on product-evaluation is moderated by consumers’ personal support to the cause that is served by the company’s CSR initiative (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2004). However, literature has indicated low levels of awareness on the part of consumers in terms of knowledge about which companies act sustainable and what CSR types they have implemented. Interestingly, Du et al. (2007) showed that not all CSR types elicit the same consumer response due the way CSR type allows the brand to position itself as a ‘CSR’ brand. Product-related CSR initiatives result in higher levels of awareness and, in turn, more positive consumer responses to the brand. Moreover, no third party is required to
communicate the CSR initiative, because the product serves as the communicator (Du et al., 2007). In order to increase consumer awareness, it is especially important for companies to educate consumers on the non-product related CSR initiatives they implement (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; Auger et al., 2003; Pomering & Dolnicar, 2009; Du et al., 2007, Du et al., 2010).
Evidence in the literature regarding the impact of CSR initiatives on consumer’s perceptions of product performance has offered mixed results. Chernev & Blair (2015) found that philanthropic CSR initiatives (charitable giving), which are irrelevant to the product, may cause a spill-over effect that has the ability to positively change the consumer’s perceived product performance. It is important to note that this effect is undermined when consumers to not trust the benevolence of the brand, but instead believe the brand is implementing CSR initiatives for their own interest (Chernev & Blair, 2015). This spill-over of philanthropy on perceived product performance is explained by the halo effect, which is defined as the “tendency of overall evaluations of a person/object to influence evaluations of the specific properties of that person/object in a way that is consistent with the overall evaluation.” (Chernev & Blair, 2015, p. 1414).
In contrast, other literature has shown that an opposite effect of consumer perception of CSR on consumer perceptions of product performance could occur (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; Luchs et al., 2010; Luchs et al., 2012). Consumers could have corporate associations in mind that infer performance trade-offs between the sustainability of a product and functional performance (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; Luchs et al., 2010) These compensatory inferences are based on the corporate associations consumers have about a company about a company (Brown & Dacin, 1997). To be more precise, the two types of corporate associations that cause these compensatory inferences are the brands’ corporate social responsibility (CSR), “the organization's status and activities with respect to its perceived societal obligations” (Brown & Dacin, 1997, p. 168), and its corporate ability (CA), “the company’s expertise in producing and delivering product and/or service offerings” (Brown & Dacin, 1997, p. 168). In situations in which consumers believe the company has made a trade-off between its CSR initiative and CA efforts (i.e., CSR-CA trade-off/beliefs), the company’s CSR initiative negatively influences the purchase intention of the consumers. This is especially the case when consumers do not believe that the CSR initiative strengthens it CA and that the products of the company are of high quality (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2011).
Luchs et al. (2010) illustrate this CSR-CA trade-off by focusing on the type of benefit the product offers to its consumers. In categories where brands are offering products in which
gentleness-related characteristics are important (e.g., baby soap has to be soft), increasing ethical standards in terms of business practices (such as environmental pollution and employee relations) might increase the evaluation of those products (Luchs et al., 2010). However, when brands score high on these ethical standards in product categories in which strength is an important brand characteristic, such as laundry detergents, car tires or liquid hand sanitizers, consumers are likely to perceive these strength-related attributes as underperforming (Luchs et al., 2010).
To sum it all up, there are several factors that influence the heterogeneity of consumer responses to different CSR types. In terms of company-specific factors, both the perceived fit between the company and the CSR initiative and the perceived credibility of the CSR
initiative impacts consumer response to the CSR type. Consumer-related factors that have an effect on consumer response to the CSR type are consumer awareness of the CSR initiative and the level of personal support to the cause of the CSR initiative. Lastly, the halo effect and
CSR-CA beliefs are important mechanisms, because they influence the consumer’s perceived
product performance.
2.4 Luxury CSR
This section will begin with describing the relevant literature on consumer responses to luxury corporate social responsibility (CSR). Finally, the proposed impact of CSR type on consumer responses to luxury CSR will be discussed.
2.4.1. Consumer responses to luxury CSR
The concept of sustainability has also become important for luxury brands, because consumers are increasingly concerned about these social and environmental values, (Hennings et al., 2013). Beyond the prestigious brand image, the value of luxury is based on the use of rare materials and rare resources (i.e., craftsmanship), which shows that luxury is resource dependent. Luxury brands need to make sure these rare resources are still available in the future and therefore the best way to limit demand is to sell their products for a high price. Also, luxury brands are managed with a long-term perspective (Kapferer, 2010). Take for example the fashion house Chanel that was founded in 1909 by Coco Chanel. Even though new creative directors have been called in to manage and reinterpret the brand, Chanel is still very influential and everything they do refers to a heritage that gives the brand
‘Chanel’ intangible extra value. This demonstrates that durability is not only the heart for sustainability, but also for luxury and therefore luxury is a perfect foundation for creating products that hold fundamental social and environmental values (Kapferer, 2010), so it would be expected that consumers respond favourably to luxury corporate social responsibility (CSR).
On the contrary, a number of studies have highlighted a certain incompatibility between luxury and sustainability the last couple of years (Davies et al., 2012; Achabou & Dekhili, 2013; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2014; Joy et al., 2012; Torelli et al., 2012). For example, Achabou & Dekhili (2013) show that the use of recycled materials in luxury clothing has a negative impact on consumer preferences toward that product, despite the increasing environment concern in the society. Davies et al. (2012) shows that consumers are less willing to consider sustainability for luxury products compared to non-luxury products (Davies et al., 2012). Decision-making for luxury purchases is significantly different from non-luxury purchases (Nia & Zaichhkowsky, 2000; Vigneron & Johnson, 2004). These studies demonstrate that the literature on behavioural responses to CSR cannot simply be generalized to behavioural responses to luxury CSR.
Some literature has already attempted to identify possible factors that could explain this incompatibility between luxury and CSR. The brand concept (i.e. luxury versus non-luxury) plays an important role in behavioural responses to CSR initiatives (Torelli et al., 2012; Davies et al., 2012; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2014). Torelli et al. (2012) show that the self-enhancement concept (i.e., power, richness, ambition) of most luxury brands is contradictory to the self-transcendence concept (i.e., protecting other people; equality, social justice) of CSR. When luxury brands with a self-enhancement concept communicate about their CSR initiative, this results in disfluency or a sense of unease in response to the sustainable luxury product, and this in turn results in lower evaluations of the brand. Consistent with this Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau (2014) found that luxury buyers have ambivalent attitudes toward CSR initiatives from luxury brands. Consumers perceive luxury as promoting superficial lifestyles and creating social unrest (i.e., pollution, over consumption and inequality), and this is contradictory to their perception of sustainability (Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2014).
Yet, according to Janssen et al. (2014), product characteristics can improve the perceived (in)compatibility between luxury and CSR. Luxury products can be perceived as compatible with sustainability, but only when these products are both rare and enduring (i.e., haute couture clothes and diamond jewellery). When rarity is applied to ephemeral products
(e.g. piece of clothing), these products are not perceived as compatible. So, product characteristics are an interesting factor, but it does not solve the issue about incompatibility highlighted in literature, because most of the times real luxury clothing is not haute couture. Achabou & Dekhili (2013), for example, used a (ephemeral) Hermès t-shirt that incorporated recycled materials in their research design, and this still resulted in a negative effect on consumer preferences.
In addition to product characteristics, the branding strategy used to place the product in the market matters is important, where brand conspicuousness is an important element to consider (Janssen et al., 2017). Brand conspicuousness is the degree to which a brand impudently tries to get the attention by placing a logo on products and using colours or designs in order to draw attention (Janssen et al., 2017). An inconspicuous branding strategy results in more favourable CSR beliefs compared to a conspicuous branding strategy. Such a strategy will result in higher levels of perceived self-congruity between consumers with modest to average, instead of extravagant, self-identities and the brand. In turn, both CSR beliefs and perceived self-congruity have a impact on consumer responses toward the brand (Janssen et al., 2017).
In terms of campaign characteristics, Boenigk & Schuchard (2013) studied cause-related marketing partnerships between luxury brands and charities and they show that the donation magnitude and the price of the luxury product influence the purchase intention of the luxury product. These philanthropy initiatives are more successful for lower-priced luxury and when the amount of the donation is perceived to be high.
In sum, Achabou & Dekhili (2013), Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau (2014) and Davies (2012) argue that luxury is incompatible with sustainability, whereas Torelli et al. (2012), Janssen et al. (2013), Boenigk & Schuchard (2013) and Janssen et al. (2017) highlight some factors that might influence the effectiveness of CSR for luxury brands. Where Janssen et al. (2013) focus on product characteristics, Torelli et al. (2012) and Janssen et al. (2017) focus on branding. Boenigk & Schuchard (2013), on the other hand, emphasizes that even campaign characteristics could have an impact. Nevertheless there is no general agreement in the literature what is the best way to implement CSR as a luxury brand.
2.4.2. The impact of CSR type on consumer responses to (luxury) CSR
The heterogeneity of consumer responses to different CSR types has already been described in chapter 2.3. However, chapter 2.4.1 emphasized that the factors and related explanatory
mechanisms that influence this heterogeneity are not necessarily the same for luxury CSR, because the brand concept (luxury versus non-luxury) plays a role in explaining heterogeneity in consumer responses to CSR (Torelli et al., 2012; Davies et al., 2012; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2014). When buying products with a luxury brand concept, consumers focus more on price, quality and prestige, important characteristics of luxury, compared to buying products with a non-luxury brand concept (Davies et al., 2012). Therefore it is proposed that there will be significant heterogeneity among consumer responses to CSR types for luxury- and non-luxury products. The CSR type could thus be another factor that potentially attenuates the (in)compatibility between luxury and CSR.
Chapter 2.3 already described that consumers have CSR and CA associations in mind that infer performance trade-offs between the sustainability of a product and functional performance (Sen & Bhattacharya, 2001; Luchs et al., 2010). Product-related CSR, such as organic and/or green products (Peloza & Shang, 2011), is linked to quality aspects of the product (CA) and directly provides functional value and directly influences consumer response toward the CSR initiative (Green & Peloza, 2011) in terms of perceived product performance (Luchs et al. 2010). When CA is personally important to consumers, having a good CA is necessary in order to get a positive response to CSR (Berens et al., 2007).
When buying luxury products, consumers expect the highest quality (Achabou & Dekhili, 2013) because luxury is related to selling beautiful, rare products with a high level of quality, service, and creativity (Kapferer, 2010; Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2015). Therefore this study argues that CA is especially important in the context of luxury. As a matter of fact, luxury brands have emphasized their focus on quality the last couple of years by intensified communication in this area. Examples are Hermès with their movie ‘Hands of Hermès’, that shines light on the savoir-faire of the different professions that are needed to create their products, and the LVMH group with their ‘Special Days’ through which the group tries to create more transparency in their production process by allowing consumers to discover the skills and crafts of their workforce (Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2015). Despite the fact that recycled fabric used for product-related CSR initiatives can have the same quality as ‘normal’ fabric, recycled materials are reused (Hopewell et al., 2009). This might be contradictory to the rarity characteristic of luxury (Kapferer & Michaut-Denizeau, 2015). Additionally, ecological product characteristics, recycled materials in particular, are perceived as inferior quality, which is in contrast to the quality attributes of luxury clothing (Achabou & Dekhili, 2016). When implementing product-related CSR initiatives, it is
therefore expected that consumers are likely to perceive the quality of the luxury product (its CA) as underperforming.
On the other hand, non-product-related CSR initiatives, such as cause-related marketing and environmental protection (Peloza & Shang, 2011), are, even though they are unrelated to the functional performance of a product, able to have a positive impact on the consumer’s perceptions of product performance due to the halo effect described in chapter 2.3 (Chernev & Blair, 2015). So, consumers infer in these cases that the non-product-related CSR initiative of a brand strengthens its CA (Brown & Dacin, 1997; Sen & Bhattacharaya, 2001). Consumers are generally more likely to use inferential processes such as the halo effect when they cannot use their own expertise to evaluate the performance of a product. The more ambiguous the product experience is, the greater the likelihood that the brands’ non-product-related CSR initiative will positively influence the consumer evaluations of the product (Chernev & Blair, 2015). Luxury products are aspirational and irregularly purchased and have limited availability compared to non-luxury products (De Barnier et al., 2012; Davies et al., 2012) and therefore consumers are expected to be less familiar with the luxury products. Following this line of thought, it is expected that the halo effect occurs when consumers are confronted with non-product-related CSR initiatives of luxury products. This, in turn, is expected to have a positive impact on perceived product performance. It is expected that consumers believe the benevolence (Chernev & Blair, 2015) of the implementation of these non-product-related CSR initiatives, because both the luxury industry and sustainability focus on rarity and beauty (Kapferer, 2010).
In sum, this study argues that implementing product-related CSR initiatives for luxury products could lead to the CSR-CA trade-off (Sen & Bhattacharta, 2001) which leads, in turn, to lower consumer attitude toward the product. Non-product-related CSR initiatives for luxury products, on the other hand, could lead to higher CA, and this increases consumer
attitude toward the product. The following hypotheses are formulated:
Hypothesis 2a (H2a): A luxury product combined with non-product-related CSR is evaluated
more favourably by consumers compared to the same luxury product combined with product-related CSR.
Hypothesis 3 (H3): The interaction of brand concept and CSR type on consumer attitude
toward the product is mediated by CSR-CA beliefs.
Previously described research of Phau & Ong (2007) in chapter 2.3 already demonstrated for non-luxury brands that product-related CSR initiatives are more effective than
non-product-related CSR initiatives in terms of attitude toward the promotional message and toward the brand. In terms of non-product-related CSR initiatives, this study proposes that consumer are quite familiar with “mass-produced” non-luxury products and therefore consumers are able to draw on their own expertise when evaluating a product (Chernev & Blair, 2015). Moreover, the current study argues that consumers may think the brand is acting out of self-interest instead of benevolence (Chernev & Blair, 2015), because they know that the mass production of non-luxury products has a negative influence on, for example, scarcity of resources, pollution and unfair labour practices (Kapferer, 2010). In turn, consumers are less likely to use the halo effect (Chernev & Blair, 2015) and the non-product-related CSR initiative is not expected to strengthen its CA (Brown & Dacin, 1997; Sen & Bhattacharaya, 2001).
Product-related CSR initiatives, on the other hand, might suggest to consumers that the non-luxury brand at least has an environmental and social orientation (Berens et al., 2007). The current study argues that quality (i.e. CA) is relatively less important for non-luxury products and therefore the product-related CSR initiative may even make up for a weak CA and show that the non-luxury product at least has a sustainable orientation (Berens et al., 2007).
To conclude, this study argues that product-related CSR initiatives for non-luxury products could lead to higher CA and this, in turn, increases consumer attitude toward the
product. Non-product-related CSR initiatives, on the other hand, are not expected to have a
(positive) impact on CA. Hence, the following hypotheses are formulated:
Hypothesis 2b (H2b): A non-luxury product combined with product-related CSR is evaluated
more favourably by consumers compared to the same luxury product combined with non-product-related CSR.
Hypothesis 3 (H3): The interaction of brand concept and CSR type on consumer attitude
2.5 Conceptual Model
The conceptual model in figure 1 illustrates the hypotheses suggested in this study.
Figure 1 Conceptual Model Brand Concept (Luxury vs. Non-Luxury) CSR-CA Beliefs Consumer Attitude toward the Product CSR Type (Product-Related vs. Non-Product-Related; No CSR = control)
CHAPTER 3. METHODOLOGY
In this chapter, the empirical part of the study will be discussed. The first part will outlines and justify the characteristics of the research design. Secondly, the procedure of the survey will be explained. Thirdly, both the development of the stimuli and the pre-test of the stimuli will be discussed. Subsequently, the measures of the variables of this study will be reviewed and the sample of the study will be described.
3.1 Research Design
The cornerstone of science is creating knowledge about the causal relationship between variables (Field & Hole, 2002). Understanding these causal links asks for experimental or quasi-experimental research designs (Aguinis & Bradley, 2014). In the context of this study it is not possible to conduct a true experiment due to practical and logistical issues (Aguinis & Bradley, 2014). An experiment is valid when the causal relationship found is only created by the manipulated independent variable (i.e., internal validity) and when the results are
generalizable to situations outside of the experimental context (i.e., external validity) (Onwuegbuzie, 2000).
The benefit of experimental vignette methodology is that it combines the high internal validity of experiments with the high external validity of survey methodology (Atzmüller & Steiner, 2010; Aguinis & Bradley, 2014). Experimental vignette methodology is particularly useful in the context of this study, because it allows the researcher to control the independent variable brand concept and the moderator CSR type in order to gather evidence of a causal effect on the mediator CSR-CA beliefs and the dependent variable consumer attitude toward
the product (Atzmüller & Steiner, 2010; Aguinis & Bradley, 2014). The current study presents by means of an Internet-based survey (appendix E) short, carefully written stimuli (table 2 and table 3) to participants, which strengthens experimental realism (Aguinis & Bradley, 2014).
In order to test the hypotheses a 2 (brand concept: luxury or non-luxury) X 4 (CSR
type: product-related CSR, philanthropy, business practices or no CSR) between-subjects
experimental design was employed by means of an online questionnaire. As table 1 shows, eight stimuli/groups were developed to represent the combinations of each of the factors and comparisons can be made across participants. The participants who started the survey were randomly assigned to one of the eight groups. All participants were not aware of the purpose in this research to prevent biased responses. Table 7 shows how many participants took part
in every group. The survey consist of closed fixed-response questions (except for the
demographic variable age), which makes it easy to compare the responses since participants only have to select an answer from a pre-determined set of answers.
Table 1 Research Design No CSR Product-related CSR Non-product-related CSR Philanthropy Business Practices Luxury Group 1 Group 2 Group 3 Group 4
Non-luxury Group 5 Group 6 Group 7 Group 8
Before opening the survey for participants, a pilot test was undertaken on friends and family to understand how much time it would approximately take to finish the survey, to make sure the instructions and questions are understandable and to double check for any possible mistakes. Some literature on consumer responses to luxury and/or CSR uses pictures of products in their experimental design (Janssen et al., 2014), whilst others describe a
consumption situation and demonstrate the alternatives on a label (Achabou & Dekhili, 2013), or only use written text (Phau & Ong, 2007; Wagner et al., 2009). The original decision was to incorporate both a picture of a real shirt and a picture of a garment hangtag with the CSR message in the experimental design. However, the results of the pilot test demonstrated that using a picture of a real shirt could potentially bias the results. Every person has a different taste and, besides, the same shirt had to be applicable for both luxury and non-luxury, and males and females, which is quite unrealistic in practice. Therefore the decision was made to not use a picture of a real shirt in the experiment of the current study.
Internet-based surveys have several advantages compared to traditional surveys, for example it takes less time to enter the data, the costs are lower, and there are more design options (Fan & Yan, 2010). One disadvantage of conducting an anonymous Internet-based survey is the increased amount of careless responses, which could lead to lower reliability and, in turn, could attenuate correlations. In order to avoid this problem, one instructed response item (bogus variable) was included in the survey to detect careless responses. The bogus variable was phrased as “Respond with ‘strongly agree’ for this item” Before starting with the analysis the researcher properly screened the data for these careless responses (Meade et al., 2012). Another disadvantage of an Internet-based survey is the relatively low
response rate (Fan & Yan, 2010). Therefore, the researcher paid attention to some factors that probably had a positive impact on the response rate (Fan & Yan, 2010). The researcher sent personal invitations and reminders to potential participants and made sure made sure the survey was available on both computers and mobile devices. Also, as explained earlier, the quality and the format of the survey were assessed by means of a pilot test. Moreover, participants are assigned to only one group and therefore the survey did not take take too long.
The researcher tried to strengthen the external validity of the vignette study by improving the level of realism (Aguinis & Bradley, 2014). First of all, the researcher did her own desk research in order to write representative brand concept and CSR type stimuli, which will be elaborated upon in chapter 3.2. Secondly, the CSR type stimuli were presented on pictures of a garment hangtag order to make the described situation more similar to real life. Thirdly, the researcher deliberately chose to investigate “shirts” in this study, because fabric recycling is relevant for these products and both men and women buy them which means the study can focus on a larger population (Achabou & Dekhili, 2013).
Thirdly, participants were able to participate in the vignette in their own environment. This way, the researcher tried to increase the level of immersion that participants were
experiencing during the vignette (Aguinis & Bradley, 2014). Lastly, in order to be able to increase the extent to which the results of the current study are generalizable to the larger population, the goal of the researcher was to obtain a random and large (at least 30 participants per condition) sample (Onwuegbuzie, 2000).
Furthermore, the researcher made an effort to overcome threats to internal validity. The maturation effect occurs when the vignette would lead to psychological changes among the participants such as boredom, fatigue and less motivation that could have an influence on the results (Onwuegbuzie, 2000). Therefore, the researcher made sure the study would not take too much time for the participants by, for example, creating a between-subjects design (Field, 2002). The purpose of this was to overcome the risk of information overload and to make it possible for participants to complete questionnaire in a single session and (Aguinis & Bradley, 2014). Moreover, the written stimuli (table 2 and table 3) were pre-tested with a between-subject survey design on a sample of 30 respondents in the research population. The purpose of the pre-test was to make sure that the stimuli had the desired effect on the
respondents. Chapter 3.2 will elaborate upon the stimuli and the pre-test. The participants of the pre-test were personally asked to participate by the researcher and asked not to participate in the final survey. This was done to avoid pre-test sensitization, in other words, changes that
may take place in the scores of participants when participating in the second survey
(Onwuegbuzie, 2000). In order to avoid the instrumentation threat to internal validity (Onwuegbuzie, 2000), the researcher made sure to use measurement scales with a high reliability, as can be read in chapter 3.3 and table 6. Lastly, in order to overcome selection bias, the current study was conducted in a controlled and randomized way in order to get groups of participants that are different from each other (Onwuegbuzie, 2000),
3.2 Procedure
Survey software platform Qualtrics was used to collect the cross-sectional data. The survey (appendix E) started with a general introduction statement that told the participant, amongst others, the time needed to complete the survey and that participants with questions or other comments about the study could always e-mail the researcher. Since the use of a
questionnaire might lead consumers to submit socially desirable answers it was addressed that there are that there are no right or wrong answers and that the responses will only be used for the purpose of this study.
In a first task, participants had to imagine a consumption situation that entails self-awareness and the opinion of others. In this involved situation they were looking for a shirt for an important event and they had to read about the fictitious brand “Eleganza”. Depending on the experimental group, this description was luxury or non-luxury. In a second task, the participants had to imagine that they went to the Eleganza store and that there was one shirt that immediately caught their eye. To every Eleganza shirt a garment hangtag had been attached and the participants were asked to read this message carefully. Determined by the experimental group the participant was in, this message could be about product-related CSR, philanthropy, business processes, or no CSR. Third, the participants were asked to answer several questions related to the variables of this study. The survey emphasized that the participants had to take into consideration both the Eleganza description and the message on the hangtag. The responses of the participants were completely anonymous, but some demographics were asked at the end of the survey (age, gender, education) to see if the sample was representative for the population of interest.
3.3 Stimuli
In order to come up with written stimuli that are relevant for practice desk research was done, as well as a pre-test to assess the participant’s perception of the written stimuli. The
development of the stimuli will be described respectively in chapter 3.2.1 (brand concept stimuli) and chapter 3.2.2 (CSR type stimuli).
3.3.1. Brand Concept
For the development of the brand concept stimuli, the researcher did her own desk research and draw inspiration from real luxury- and non-luxury brand descriptions (i.e., Hermès, Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Salvatore Ferragamo, Gucci, H&M, Primark, Wibra) and from luxury brand
concept manipulations in previous literature (Janssen et al., 2014; Janssen et al., 2017). These
findings were then linked to luxury characteristics (appendix A) used in four luxury perception scales (Kapferer, 1998; Dubois et al., 2001; Vigneron & Johnson, 2004; De Barnier et al.; 2012). Appendix C shows an overview of these manipulated brand concept characteristics, and the luxury characteristics including source on which this manipulation was based. This shows that the stimuli are sufficiently backed up by the literature and it resulted in carefully written brand concept stimuli shown in table 2. A fictitious brand called ‘Eleganza’ was used in order to make sure that the participants did not have any prior
knowledge that could possibly bias them.
A pre-test (N = 30) (appendix D) was done in a between-subjects design to assess, the consumer’s perception of the luxuriousness of Eleganza. Each respondent was randomly assigned to one of the two brand concept stimuli (luxury or non-luxury) and asked to evaluate the brand on eight items that measured the perceived luxury (e.g. ‘Eleganza is a brand with a rich heritage’) using a 7-point Likert scale (1 = “strongly disagree” to 7 = “strongly agree”). The most right column in appendix C shows how each of the eight items used in the pre-test are linked to the luxury characteristics. As expected, the analysis demonstrated a
substantially higher perception of luxury for the luxury treatment (M = 6.1, SD = 0.60, N = 15) than for the non-luxury treatment (M = 2.4, SD = 0.95, N = 15) and this gives enough confidence to use the fictitious brand descriptions in the final survey. Based on some comments from people in my own network, some corrections were made in the prices mentioned in the stimuli material.
Table 2
Stimuli Brand Concept
BRAND CONCEPT
STIMULI
Luxury Eleganza is a French fashion brand that focuses on clothing and accessories. Since it was founded in 1854, the designers at Eleganza have always created exclusive designs that show the brand’s rich heritage. Eleganza products represent
craftsmanship and are unsurpassed for their exceptional quality and eye for detail. This gives Eleganza a position of superiority in the very competitive world of clothing and accessories. Products are rare and only available in one of the 15 Eleganza stores across the world. The price of an Eleganza shirt starts at €299,-.
Non-Luxury Eleganza is a Spanish fashion brand that focuses on clothing and accessories. Since it was founded in 2007, the designers at Eleganza have always created popular designs that show the brand’s widespread acceptance. Eleganza products are mass-produced and known for being of acceptable quality and decent design. This gives Eleganza a position of superiority in the very competitive world of clothing and accessories. Products are widely available, online and in over 320 Eleganza stores across the world, as well as in department stores. The price of an Eleganza shirt starts at €14,99.
3.3.2. CSR Type
Appendix B shows an overview of all 22 single CSR initiatives found in the meta-analysis of Peloza & Shang (2011) and categorizes them across the three CSR types. The highlighted ones are the activities that are used in the research design. As explained earlier in chapter 2.2.2, this study makes a distinction between product related CSR and non-product-related CSR (business practices and philanthropy) in order to answer to the call in literature for more precise generalizations in CSR research (Peloza & Shang, 2011). This way, this study will hopefully provide more guidance for companies in the complex process of managing CSR activities (Peloza & Shang, 2011). However, the research design in this study will still look at business practices and philanthropy separately and conclusions about the combination will be drawn afterwards.
