The Relationship Between the Personality Traits Agreeableness, Openness and Self versus Other-Orientated Communication and How They Impact Sustainable Consumer Behaviour
Rutger Buhrs, 11823208
Bachelor's Thesis and Thesis Seminar Management in the Digital Age Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Amsterdam
Lita Napitupulu Thesis Group 30 30 June, 2021
Statement of Originality
This document is written by Rutger Buhrs, who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document.
I declare that the text and the work presented in this document are 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.
Abstract
With the increasing importance of solving the climate crisis, the question “How to get consumers to behave more sustainably?” is a crucial one. In order to try to explain when people show higher intention for behaving sustainably, we draw on communication and personality theories. The communication theory deals with self and other-orientated messaging. Previous findings suggest that other-orientated messaging works better for communicating sustainability. The personality theory is called the Big Five. Research has shown that people who showcase high levels for two of the Big Five personality traits, agreeable and/or open personality will have a high willingness to behave sustainably. The contribution of this research is the combination of both theories. This research examines what kind of messaging (self or orientated-orientated) will work best when communicating sustainability to people showing different levels of the agreeable and open personality traits. This study hypothesizes that people who score high on agreeable and open personality traits will respond better to other-orientated sustainable communication. The results from this hypothesis is important because finding differences in sustainable intentions for individuals (with different personality traits) will help clarify to whom we should communicate sustainability and how. The previous mentioned hypothesis is tested with a sample collected using convenience-sampling with 113 participants.
Unfortunately, the hypothesis was partly not supported. No evidence found in this research indicates that self or other-orientated messaging has any effect on changing sustainable intentions. However, it was found that people who score high on either agreeableness, openness or/and sustainable intention indeed have a higher willingness of sustainable behaviour. This suggests that people who score high on these personality traits and intentions will need to be targeted when communicating sustainability.
key words: sustainable behavior, personality, Big Five, self oriented communication, other-oriented communication
Table of contents
Statement of Originality...………....2
Abstract....……….3
Introduction.………..5
Theoretical Framework……….6
Research Design and Methodology……….…..8
Results………...10
Discussion………...17
Conclusion………..…..21
Appendix…..……….…...23
Introduction
Sustainability Consumer Behaviour (SCB) is a crucial topic in tackling the rapid changing of the climate. This intention for sustainable consumer behaviour can be fuelled by personal communication.
What and how personalized communication works can be different for every single individual, especially when the communication is being used for a complex topic such as climate change.
However, in order to find communication strategies that work for bigger groups of people, it is convenient to utilize encompassing personality types and traits.
One of the most common ways of analysing the complex human personality is called the
‘NEO Big Five Personality Test’ created by Robert McCrae and Paul Costa (1985). The Big Five personality traits are framed as “ ‘Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism’ and are thus also referred to as the acronym “OCEAN”. Literature has shown that people who exhibit high levels of agreeableness and openness personality traits will, typically, have more sustainable intentions. Research has also shown that other-orientated communication can be prefered for promoting sustainable consumer behaviour in many cases.
The goal of the current study is to combine both bodies of research, thus communication based and personality based research. This will be done in order to figure out how the different personality traits affect the way SCB is interpreted through self or other-orientated communication.
Therefore, the main research question of this paper is: Will showing other versus self-orientated sustainable communication to people who exhibit higher levels of agreeableness or openness result in higher willingness for sustainable consumption?
The start of this thesis dives into both research bodies separately and combines the
information found in order to make the previously mentioned research questions. After this theoretical framework, the methods of data analysis are mentioned. The outcomes of the data analysis can be found in the result section. The conclusions drawn from the data are debated in the discussion. After the discussion, our conclusions are given. This data of this research was gathered through
convenience-sampling with a sample combined of 113 students. Spss was used to analyze this data.
Theoretical Framework
“Civilization has created environmental pollution, especially after the industrial revolution. Air, water, and land in some industrial and developing countries have been heavily polluted to an unacceptable level that Mother Nature can no longer be able to purify itself.” (Hung, Wang, & Shammas, 2014, pp.
7). The increasing threat that climate change puts on the world makes it an increasingly important topic for policy makers (Barr, 2008; Schrader & Thøgersen, 2011). The environment is an important reason why research on personality and how to communicate with different personalities is crucial.
Promoting pro-environmental behavior can best be done with knowledge about the underlying mechanisms (Kals, Schumacher, & Montada, 1999). Knowing why and how people change their behavior is crucial in getting them to actually do it. This research therefore aims to further investigate the interplay between the personality traits and the effectiveness of different types of communication strategies to promote sustainable consumer behaviour.
The first main concept of this research, therefore, is Sustainable Consumer Behaviour (SCB).
This is a concept that has had a variety of terms being used to refer to it, such as ecologically
concerned consumption or sustainable consumption (Luchs & Mooradian, 2011). In short, it describes the behaviour consumers showcase that reflect the broader and longer-term impacts of consumption on society and/or on the environment. Notably, SCB is different from behavior from organisations or countries. Rather, this concept is meant to reflect the sustainable or unsustainable behavior from individual consumers in their daily lives.
A big gap between sustainable intention (SI) and SCB exists in consumers’ attitudes and behaviours in the context of sustainability. For example, research from UNEP (2005) shows that 40%
of consumers are willing to buy green products, but only 4% actually do so. This clearly shows the disparity between intention and actual behavior. However, this does not mean that SI and SCB are completely unrelated. SI can still be found to be a significant predictor of SCB (Luchs, & Mooradian, 2011). Thus, increasing the general remains of importance.
SI and SCB do not stand alone, but can be influenced by, for example, communication strategies with the consumer. A distinction in communication strategy can be made between
other-benefit and self-benefit.. Other-benefit is described as something that motivates an individual, while “the main beneficiary of green consumption being some other individual or the society at large.” (Yang et al., 2015, pp. 2663). In other words, in other-benefit communication, benefits larger than the individual's benefits are central.
Alternatively, a communication strategy can also be focused on the benefit of self.
Communication is self-beneficial when the main beneficiary targetted is the consumer themselves (Fisher, Vandenbosch, & Antia, 2008; Green & Peloza, 2014) Prior research has shown that different communication can significantly affect how and if consumers change their attitude and behavior towards sustainable consumption ( Peloza, White, & Shang, 2013).
This is why it is essential to study different communication strategies in this context.
Therefore, this research will attempt to maximize SI as much as possible via the distinct communication strategies.
Importantly, when studying SI, not only communication strategy should be taken into account, one should also consider how different receivers of the communication react differently to the forms of communication. After all, behind consumers lie complex human beings with diverging personalities.
That is why personality research is also taken into account in this study. More specifically, these ways of communicating to consumers, self-benefit and other-benefit, will be tested in this research and combined with the “The Big Five” personality theory. “The Big Five'' is well known in psychology, as it attempts to classify personalities and their corresponding personality traits. In the Big Five theory, divergences between personalities are well compiled within five broad, high-level traits or domains:
neuroticism (vs. emotional stability), extraversion, agreeableness, openness-to-experience or intellect, and conscientiousness. Those broad domains emerge across raters (self vs. others), instruments, and paradigms (including questionnaire), across lifespan and across languages and cultures. The domains also play a big role in how someone responds to communication and behaves regarding the
environment (Hirsh & Dolderman, 2007). Therefore, it is intrinsically related to communication strategies and SI.
Not all dimensions of the Big Five relate equally strongly to environmental behavioral and communication strategies. Therefore, in this study, the focus will be on two of the Big Five personality traits. Namely, the personality traits agreeableness and openness-to-experience. The reason for this is that a vast amount of research shows that agreeableness and openness-to-experience were the biggest predictors for SCB (Finger, 1994; Kaplan & Kaplan, 1989;) Since these personality traits signal a difference in how people think and behave, this research hypothesizes that these two personality traits will also respond differently to the separate communication strategies. However, this has not been combined with SI before, which is what this study aims to add to the body of existing research. Hence, this research aims to combine the agreeableness and openness personality traits and communication strategies in terms of self versus other benefit in relation to SI in order to answer the following question:
To what extent does the effectiveness of the other versus self-oriented messages on SCB change between people that score differently on agreeableness and openness?
I hypothesize that people that score high on agreeableness and/or openness-to-experience are more willing to purchase at a “green” supermarket when seeing the “other-benefit” communication form.
care more about others and the environment (Hirsh & Dolderman, 2007). Thus communication that is aimed at the benefit of others, should get them engaged.
3. Research Design and Methodology
3.1 Data collection
The relevant data of this research was collected via a survey, which was spread with the use of convenience-sampling. In order to try and ensure high reliability, this survey was spread to as many students as possible. Additionally, the study was designed as a between-subjects in order to reduce spill-over effects that might occur when both scenarios are presented to the same population. The data was collected over a period of 2 weeks.
3.2 Measures
The participants were gathered with a survey made in qualtrics. The survey had the following order:
first, the participants were asked if they were indeed a student. They were not allowed to continue if they did not meet this criteria. The second page concerned their demographics. This part included questions regarding gender, age and level of education. Then, the next questions were regarding sustainable consumption. This was to test to what extent the participant is involved in the environment These items were compiled with the use of the articles by Lee (2009) and Roberts and Bacon (1997).
In the next part, the personality questions were asked. The participants were asked to what extent they agreed with the statements. These statements were taken from the BFI 44, but since this study only focuses on agreeableness and openness traits, this part of the survey only contained elements measuring these constructs. This was done because those two are the traits that are most interesting to look at when manipulating sustainability. Another concern for solely including these traits and not taking other traits as control variables had to do with lowering the time needed to fill in the survey.
After this the participants were asked to imagine themselves finding out about a new
supermarket opening. On the next screen, the manipulation was shown. Two seperate posters created to resemble the ones used in Yang et al. (2015). The posters show the same (green) supermarket but use different ways of communication, either self-oriented or other-oriented. This supermarket was one made up by myself compiled of “off-brand” names from degenerate dutch supermarkets. This was done in order for the participants to have an easier time imaging this supermarket but now have their answers skewed when naming it after only one supermarket. This would shape their perceptions because the participants will have their perception of those supermarkets in the back of their minds.
The top of the poster had the name of the supermarket and in the middle a picture of someone separating trash and throwing a bottle in the correct dumpster. This was done in order for the
participant to think of sustainable behavior, and get them in that mindset. After this, the actual manipulation was shown with the separate communication.
The participants were randomly assigned to one of the conditions, which means that they either were shown a poster that used a self-orientated communication strategy or an other-orientated
communication strategy. This was done in a between-subjects experiment.
After one of the posters was shown, participants were asked to answer a 3 item scale
questioning “willingness”. At the end of the survey, respondents had to answer two control measures.
These were placed in order to check if respondents understood and properly looked at the manipulation. Both scales were copied from the research made by Yang et al. (2015).
3.3 Analytical Plan
To test Hypothesis 1, the relationship between communication type and willingness to purchase will be investigated using linear regression with an independent sample t-test. Communication type will be the independent variable and willingness to purchase as the dependent variable.
The second hypothesis focuses on the first of three interaction effects. This is the interaction effect between communication type and agreeableness on the willingness to purchase. It is presumed that people who have a more agreeable character will respond better to the other-orientated
communication type. The PROCESS macro of Hayes (2018) Model 1 will be utilized with communication type as the independent variable, agreeableness as the moderating variable, and willingness to purchase as the dependent variable.
For Hypothesis 3, the interaction effect between communication type and openness on the willingness to purchase will be investigated. Just like with agreeableness, it is assumed that people who exhibit more openness will show a higher willingness to purchase after being exposed to the other-orientated communication. The PROCESS macro of Hayes (2018) Model 1 will be utilized with communication type as the independent variable, openness as the moderating variable, and
willingness to purchase as the dependent variable.
With hypothesis 4, the last interaction effect will be researched. This is the interaction effect between communication type and sustainable intention on the willingness to purchase. It is presumed that people who show that they have more sustainable intentions will respond better to the
other-orientated communication type. Again, the PROCESS macro of Hayes (2018) Model 1 will be utilized with communication type as the independent variable, sustainable intention as the moderating variable, and willingness to purchase as the dependent variable.
4. Results
In order to investigate the relationship between the variables, analysis needs to be done.
During the data collection 160 respondents were gathered, and 113 respondents were eligible to be analyzed. The other 47 participants failed to finish the survey. This analysis was done using SPSS.
All participants of the survey were students.The descriptives for the gender and education level can be seen in table 1 and 2 in the appendix. Notably, most participants of the survey were female at 64.4%. The descriptives for the age of the participants can be seen in table 3 in the
appendix. The youngest participant was 18 and the oldest 58. The average age of the participants was 23. The data was (re)coded and made into the data variables of this research. After this, all of the variables were tested for sufficient internal reliability with Chronbach´s alpha. A table for the Chronbach´s Alpha can be found in the appendix at table 4. After testing the variables´ scales, the correlation table (table 6 in the appendix) was made. This table can be found on the next page.
Using correlations, relationships between variables became more clear. In this table, only the relevant correlations for this research are shown. The variables that did not show any relevant
correlations were removed. This research refrains from talking about the (“Age”, “Level of education'' and the “non- binary” and “prefer not to say” - gender) items any further, since that is not the focus of this research.
Table 1: Correlation, Mean, and SD of Variables. (Appendix 6)
Variable Mean SD Corr.
Var. 1
Corr.
Var. 2
Corr.
Var. 3
Corr.
Var. 4
Corr.
Var. 5
Corr.
Var. 6
Male - - 1
Female - - -.841** 1
Commu nication
0.50 0.502 .045 -.064 1
Agreeab leness
3.74 0.55 .024 .031 -.072 1
Opennes s
3.68 0.53 .253** -.255** -.135 .010 1
Sustaina ble int.
3.30 0.84 -.086 .053 -.061 .175 .140 1
Willing- ness to purch.
5.10 1.33 .006 -.021 .065 .155 .281** .340**
Notes N = 113
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed)
None of the gender variables were significantly correlated with the variables sustainable intention or willingness to purchase at the supermarket. However, both male and female correlated significantly with the openness trait. More specifically, males were weakly positively correlated (r = 0,25, p = ,006), and females were weakly negatively correlated (r= -0,25, p= ,006). Males were more likely to portray the openness trait. Thus, these variables are used as covariates in the model where openness is included.
Sustainable intention did not significantly correlate with almost any of the variables.
It did, however, correlate weakly with willingness to purchase at the green supermarket (r = 0.34, p=,000).
Agreeableness and Openness
Agreeableness was found to very weakly correlate with sustainable intention
(r = 0,175, p = 0,061) and willingness to purchase at the green supermarket (r = 0,16 , p = 0,101).
These correlations were insignificant. Openness is significantly correlated with both male and female (as talked about earlier). Furthermore, it is weakly correlated with willingness to purchase (r=0,28, p=
,003).
Control measures
After looking at the correlations, the control measures for the manipulations were analyzed.
This was done to check if the respondents understood the manipulations. Before a one-way anova was used to test this, two pretest-measures were looked at. The output for these pre-tests can be found in the appendix at table 7 and 8. The shapiro-wilk test for normality was significant for both questions (p = 0,000).The H0 was rejected and we presume the scores are significantly different from a normal distribution. The analysis was continued, however extra caution needs to be shown when looking at the results.
Levene's test showed significance of p = 0,534 and p = 0,493. For both control measure questions, the null was not rejected. There washomogeneity in the variances.This result of the Levene's test means my manipulations do not have statistically significant different variances between the two groups.
The manipulations are not allowed to test for abstracts since they have variances that are too similar.
Testing the hypotheses
In order to test Hypotheses 1, whether the other-oriented communication strategy is positively related with willingness to purchase, an independent samples t-test was used. Before this, it was checked whether my data meets the assumptions for an independent samples t-test. When using a categorical variable (with dummies) as the independent variable in independent samples t-test, most assumptions for linearity are already met by definition. This is because the two points created define a straight line.
What still needs to be investigated is normality and homogeneity. The output tables for these pre-tests can be found in the appendix at 9 and 10. The shapiro-wilk test was done in order to check for normality. It showed a significance of p = 0,000. The H0 was rejected and we presume the scores significantly deviate from a normal distribution.
This means the results of the ANOVA must be looked at with caution. This research continued the analysis in spite of the violation of the assumption.
The Levene's test for equality of variances was used to test whether there is homogeneity in the variances. It showed a significance level of p= 0,091. Since it is greater than 0,05, this value is not significant. The null hypothesis was not rejected. There was homogeneity in the variances.
This result means this research is able to compare the two (communication) groups and we are eligible to perform an independent samples T-test.
Table 2: Output from independent samples T-test. (Appendix 11)
t p CI - Lower CI - Upper
Self versus Other Communication
-0,69, 0,492 -,067 0,32
The result of the independent samples t-test were: (Full output table found at appendix 12) t = -0,69, p = 0,492, 95%CI[-,067; 0,32].
Interpreting the confidence interval shows that with 95% certainty that using other-orientated
communication instead of self-orientated communication, resulted in a change from -0,067 to 0,32 in average willingness to purchase at the supermarket.The insignificant p-value of the ANOVA means that there is no statistically significant difference in the variances in the means between groups.This insignificant p-value of the Anova combined with the significant p-value of the levene's test for the control items mentioned earlier meansthe manipulations have “failed’. The posters did not result in a significant difference in the purchase willingness of the two groups. Thus, this study is not able to confirm that other communication would work better than self communication. However, this research continued by looking at its other aspects.
Hypothesis 2
In order to test the hypotheses 2, whether agreeableness moderates the effect other-orientated
communication has on willingness to purchase, process Hayes (v3.5.3) for moderation (model 1) was utilized. Before actually analyzing, the same pre-tests as used on hypothesis 1 were run. Again, it was tested however whether the values of the variable willingness are statistically significantly different from a normal distribution. The shapiro-wilk test was done and for agreeableness, it showed a significance of p = ,008. The H0 was rejected and we presume the scores for agreeableness significantly deviate from a normal distribution. Thus, we must look at the results of the process Hayes with caution.
It is also needed to test if there is homogeneity in the variances. The levene's test for equality of variances was used for this. It showed a significance level of p = 0,622 . Since it is greater than 0,05, this value is not significant, which leads to an unability to reject the null hypothesis. Moreover, there was homogeneity in the variances. The full output tables for both pre-tests can be found in the
appendix at 13 and 14. Since there was homogeneity in the variances, this hypothesis can be tested by utilizing the Hayes process for moderation.
Table 3: The results of the interaction effect between the (self/other) communication strategy and agreeableness on Willingness to purchase (appendix 15)
b se t p
Constant 5,11 0,12 41,23 0,000
Self versus Other Communication (x)
0,20 0,25 0,82 0,414
Agreeableness (w) 0,38 0,23 1,67 0,097
X*W 0,63 0,45 1,40 0,163
Note
Dependent variable = Willingness to purchase R square = 0,047
N. = 113
For the interaction term, the process showed: t = 1.40, p = 0.163 , 95%CI[-0,26, 1,53]. (Full output table can be found in the appendix at 16). Interpreting the confidence interval shows that with 95%
certainty that going from the self to other-oriented communication moderated by agreeableness will result in a change from -0,26 to 1,53 in willingness to purchase Since the interaction term had a
significance of 0,163, which is higher than p = 0.050. The predictor relationship between communication and willingness was not statistically moderated by agreeableness.
However, when looking at agreeableness separately from the model (the predictor communication type), It shows these results. t = 1,67, p = 0,097, 95%CI[ -0,07; 0,82 ].
Interpreting the confidence interval shows that with 95% certainty that going up 1 value in
agreeableness will result in a change from -0,07 to 0,82 in willingness to purchase. Agreeableness as the independent variable and willingness to purchase as the dependent variable shows some marginal significance since p = 0,097 < p = 0,1.
These results mean the effect agreeableness has on willingness to shop at the supermarket was positive and marginally significant.
Hypothesis 3
In order to test the hypotheses 3, whether openness moderates the effect other-orientated
communication has on willingness to purchase, process Hayes (v3.5.3) for moderation (model 1) was utilized. Before the process Hayes, again, some pre-tests were run. The full output tables for these can be found at table 17 and 18 in the appendix. It was tested whetherthe values of the variable
willingness are statistically significantly different from a normal distribution. The shapiro-wilk test was done and for openness it showed a significance of p = 0,225. The H0 was not rejected and we presume the scores do not significantly deviate from a normal distribution. Homogeneity in the variances was also tested using the levene's test for equality of variances. It showed a significance level of p = ,727. Since it is greater than 0,05, this value is not significant. The null hypothesis was not rejected. There was homogeneity in the variances.
Since, there was homogeneity in the variances, this hypothesis can be tested by utilizing the Hayes process for moderation.
The output can be seen at table 4 on the next page.
Table 4: The results of the interaction effect between the (self/other) communication strategy and openness on Willingness to purchase (Appendix 19)
b se t p
Constant 5,34 0.75 7.14 0.000
Self versus Other Communication (x)
0.29 0.25 1.18 0.241
Openness (w) 0.78 0.24 3.26 0.002
X*W 0.12 0.47 0.25 0.806
Male -0.41 0.78 -0.52 0.605
Female -0.18 0.76 -0.24 0.814
Note
Dependant variable = Willingness to purchase R square = 0,097
N. = 113
For the interaction term, the process showed: t = 0.25 p = .806 , 95%CI[-0.81 ; 1.04]. (The full output table can be found at table 20 in the appendix). Interpreting the confidence interval shows that with 95% certainty that going from the self to other-oriented communication moderated by openness will result in a change from -0.810 to 1.04 in willingness to purchase. Since the interaction term had a significance of p = .806 which is higher than p = .05. The predictor relationship between
communication and willingness was not statistically moderated by openness. However, when looking at openness separately from the model (the predictor communication type), It shows these results. t = 3.26, p = .002, 95%CI[0.31; 1.27]. Interpreting the confidence interval shows that with 95% certainty that going up 1 value in openness will result in a change from 0.31 to 1.27 in willingness to purchase.
Openness as the independent variable and willingness to purchase as the dependent variable shows significance since p 0.002 = < p = 0,050. These results mean the effect openness has on willingness to shop at the supermarket was positive and significant.
Hypothesis 4
In order to test the hypotheses 4, whether sustainable intention moderates the effect other-orientated communication has on willingness to purchase, process Hayes (v3.5.3) for moderation (model 1) was utilized.
Before the process Hayes, again, some pre-tests were run. The full output tables for these pre-tests can be found in the appendix at table 21 and 22. It was tested whetherthe values of the variable willingness are statistically significantly different from a normal distribution.Ths
shapiro-wilk test was done for Sustainable intention and it showed a significance of p = .001. The H0 was rejected and we presume the scores significantly deviate from a normal distribution. Extra caution has to be shown when looking at the output.Homogeneity in the variances was also tested using the levene's test for equality of variances.
It showed a significance level of p = .871, thus showing insignificance. The null hypothesis was not rejected. There was homogeneity in the variances, which means that the hypothesis can be tested utilizing the Hayes process for moderation.
Another PROCESS Hayes was used, In order to test whether the effect communication has on willingness to shop at the supermarket is moderated by sustainable intention
After these control measures, the process was done. The output can be seen in the table 5 below.
Table 5 The results of the interaction effect between the (self/other) communication strategy and sustainable intention on willingness to purchase (appendix 23)
b se t p
Constant 5.11 0.12 43.61 0.000
Self versus Other Communication (x)
0.23 0.23 0.97 0.334
Sustainable intention (w)
0.52 0.14 3.77 0.000
X*W 0.48 0.27 1.75 0.083
Note
Dependent variable = Willingness to purchase R square = 0.147
N. = 113
For the interaction term, the process showed: t = 1,75, p = .083, 95%CI[ -0.06 ; 1.03 ]. (The full output table can be found in the appendix at table 24). Interpreting the confidence interval shows that
with 95% certainty that going from the self to other-oriented communication moderated by sustainable intention will result in a change from -0.06 to 1.03 in willingness to purchase. The interaction term had a significance of 0.083, which is lower than p = 0.100. The predictor relationship between communication and willingness was marginally statistically moderated by sustainable intention.
When looking at sustainable intention separately from the model (the predictor communication type), it shows the following results: t = 3.77, p = .000, 95%CI[0.25 ; 0,79].
Interpreting the confidence interval shows that with 95% certainty that going up 1 value in sustainable intention will result in a change from 0.25 to 0.79 in willingness to purchase. Sustainable intention as the independent variable and willingness to purchase as the dependent variable shows significance since p = 0.000 < p = 0,050. These results mean the effect sustainable intention has on willingness to shop at the supermarket was positive and significant.
5. Discussion
This study aimed to target people with different personality traits (agreeableness/openness) with distinct communication strategies in order to increase Sustainable Consumer Behaviour. People scoring high on the personality traits agreeableness and openness, taken from the Big Five, were found to have the highest chance of portraying sustainable consumer behaviour (Hirsh & Dolderman, 2007; Hirsh, 2010). The communication strategies that were shown to the participants were either aimed at making the individual think of themselves or aimed at making the individual think of others.
This was done in order to investigate which communication style would work best in increasing the willingness of (agreeable or open) consumers to behave sustainably. Previous research has shown that communication has significant effects on the sustainable behaviour/intentions of people (Goldstein et al., 2008).
Yang et al. (2015) compared other versus self-orientated wording in communicating green consumption. The research found that for all the manipulations in their research other-orientated communication worked best. This is why the first research question of this research hypothesized that other-orientated communication instead of self-orientated communication would result in a higher average willingness to behave sustainably. We, unfortunately, were not able to prove this. In other words, the results of this study did not find the positive effect other-orientated communication was expected to have on the participants’ SI. Also, the control questions showed that participants did not notice enough divergence between the manipulations. This means that the manipulation of this study was, perhaps, too similar to show a meaningful difference. However, this failure of manipulation can still be of importance. Namely, by showing the importance of making a clear distinction between the two strategies in order to study them accurately. Therefore, this research has added to the body of research on sustainability, on how not to manipulate self versus other communication. If others were to try and repeat this research, their manipulations need to be created differently and for example needed to be more distinct from each other.
Past research has also found that personality traits have significant effects on the sustainable behaviour/intentions of people. (Hirsh & Dolderman, 2007; Hirsh, 2010; Luchs & Mooradian, 2011).
Thus, this research hypothesized that people who score high on either agreeableness or openness will also score high on willingness to behave sustainably. The results found in this research support this.
The real life usages of these results are that the people who frequently showcase agreeable or open behaviour should be targeted when communicating sustainability. These people will showcase the lowest resistance, one of the main reasons for not changing behaviour (Cialdini, 2016).
The research also hypothesized and found that people with high sustainable intentions also have a higher willingness to purchase products at a “green” supermarket. This in itself does not say a lot, since both variables are linked with sustainable intention. However, the variable willingness to purchase at a “green” supermarket is closer to actual sustainable behaviour than the sustainable
intention variable. This is because we believe that participants were able to envision themselves better in that situation due to the introduction of the manipulation and the poster itself. Thus, the results from this hypothesis show another reason to believe that when people are aware of the importance of sustainability, they will also show more willingness to actually behave more sustainably, as was also found by Sheehan and Atkinson (2012).
To summarize, the most important findings of this research are a confirmation and a disconfirmation.
The conformation is that people who exhibit high levels of agreeableness or openness personality traits have a higher willingness to behave sustainably. The disconfirmation this research found is that other-orientated communication may not have as big an impact (in improving sustainable intention) as thought before. This should be interpreted with caution, since the manipulation check showed that the posters were not perceived significantly different.
The findings in this research seem like an important accomplishment. However, the massive intention-behaviour gap in sustainability needs to be taken into account (Redactie Research, 2019). In order to make a direct link between intention and behavior, this gap needs to be bridged somehow.
Even though this research was not able to find any reason to believe (either self/other-orientated wording/) communication works, researchers still believe this needs to be done with personalized communication (Fowler & Close, 2012). So, it is critical that more research is done in order to find better and more personal communication in order to properly promote sustainable intention and behaviour.
Alternative explanations
There are several alternative reasons to explain the results and findings of this research. Many explanations can be thought of when questioning why the manipulations did not have the expected results. The communication strategy failed to show significant difference. This means that the
communications/manipulation of this study were probably too similar to show a significant difference in the data. There are reasons to believe this was simply because many people actually missed or did not pay attention to the manipulation. This can be due to two reasons. Firstly, the actual manipulation in wording was shown at the bottom of the poster. This in itself should not be that big of a problem.
Unfortunately, when combined with the low average time spent on the survey, it does become a complication. After removing the outliers (with a higher/lower z score of 2,3), the average time taken per survey becomes slightly less than 5 minutes. It was predicted/tested that the survey should take about 10 minutes. This average time of 5 minutes, then, is very low.
Before spreading the survey, it was already thought that participants might spend little time on it. This is because, unfortunately, this happens regularly when utilizing self-reporting. So, measures were taken in order to test if this would indeed be the case. This was done by wording questions in the
survey in “reverse”. These questions were put in the survey in order to make sure people pay attention when answering.
This research looked at the data (cronbach's alpha´s) provided by these questions.
And unfortunately, these questions show (reason to believe) people did not pay sufficient attention to the survey. Coincidentally, this reason could also be why the other hypotheses were found to be (partly) true. The potential low attention paid gives reason to doubt the conclusions made in this research. It could be why the first hypothesis was rejected and the other hypothesis were accepted.
This is because most items in the survey were likert scale and the “positive” answer options were almost on the right side of the screen. Participants (who wanted to finish as quickly as possible) just pressing items could be one of the reasons significant results were found.
This effect could have been strengthened by “response bias”: a frequently found bias in research using self-reporting. Social desirability is a big part of response bias. “Social desirability bias refers to the tendency of research subjects to give socially desirable responses instead of choosing responses that are reflective of their true feelings” (Grimm, 2010, p1.).
The topics of this study may be a touchy subject for many people. Self reporting on your own personality traits and environmental activities may be hard for participants to do honestly.
The effect of social desirability may be strengthened by the use of convenience sampling. The survey was only spread to students with the use of convenience sampling. Many participants are close to me, the researcher. The manipulations perhaps would have worked (better) with different participants.
“Order effects” could be another critique of this study. This critique can be another reason why some hypotheses did receive (partial) support. “Response-order effects can bias evaluations.
Measurement error is introduced by order effects, and this, in turn, can affect associations between variables (Israel & Taylor, 1990, p. 1).
This research used a survey that had questions asked in a single order: Demographics, sustainable intention, personality traits, and finally, the manipulations and the corresponding questions. This order could have biased answers. This order of questions could have resulted in priming. Priming is the influence of past experience on current performance or behavior. This influence is nonconscious (Squire, 1992). For example, participants could have already been primed in an “act sustainable” mindset by the sustainable intention questions when later asked what their willingness to buy products at the supermarket was. The effect of priming could be strengthened by another potential critique of the manipulations.
This critique involves the order in the design of the posters. The poster's only manipulations were the communication types. Both posters showed the same pictures of someone throwing away trash and a “green” supermarket brand/logo. This was done because all participants were supposed to be thinking of sustainability first, before being exposed to the communication. However, sustainability such as the act of throwing away trash is inherently other-orientated. So, both posters could have primed the participants in a other-orientated mindset. This can also be one of the reasons why no
statistical difference between the two groups could be found. Coincidentally, this can be used to make a case for other-orientated messaging and priming. After all, both posters resulted in participants showing high willingness to shop at the supermarket.
Future research
Different researches could be thought of that could rectify the drawbacks of this research.
Plenty of future research can be thought of when looking at the results and drawbacks of this study.
Firstly and most easily, future research can enhance the conclusions from this research by increasing both the sample size and the variety (in the demographics of) participants in the sample. This would increase the statistical power and generality of the research.
Secondly, since no significant results could be found when comparing my manipulation groups, future research could try to change the manipulations. The future manipulations should be made to be more clear and contrasting. As a third, future research can also be made that tests if ordering effects truly have an impact. This research could try to spread two surveys. In one survey, the order should always be the same. The other one should have a randomized order. Then the researchers should test if this difference has significant (positive) results. This effect could then potentially be used for the better with the use of priming or altercasting. This discovery could be used in all sorts of communication in advertisements, commercials in order to help battle climate change. The
communication could be made that firstly primes people into thinking agreeable and/or open before communication sustainability. This way the communication has a higher chance of resulting in sustainable intention.
Lastly, future research on sustainability should test if the results found also work in real life and affect actual behaviour. This is how the intention-behaviour gap in sustainability is going to be bridged (Redactie Research, 2020).
To conclude this discussion, the research question from this thesis will now be answered.
Unfortunately, this research found no reason to believe there is a difference in the effectiveness of self versus other-oriented communication when promoting SCB. However, this research did find
confirmation that people who score high on the agreeableness and/or openness traits from the Big Five will have a higher intention for SCB.
6. Conclusion
Preceding research on self/other-orientated communication strategies claim that other-orientated communication is better when promoting Sustainable Consumer Behaviour. The results of this research, however, gives reason to believe that might not be the case. Therefore, this research examined the promotion of SCB using the self and other-orientated communication strategies. The strategies were tested on participants with different levels of two personality traits, agreeableness and openness to experience, and their sustainable intention was tested.
Research on SCB is very important, because findings on this topic can help battle climate change. Results of this research were not able to show any significant difference in the outcomes of the communication strategies. However, the results do show more reason to believe that people who exhibit high levels of agreeableness, openness or sustainable intentions will be more susceptible to behave sustainably.
In short, people who display high levels of agreeableness, openness and sustainable intention should be targeted when promoting SCB. However, since no significant results have been found with regards to self versus other-orientated communication, this study is not able to recommend a specific strategy. Therefore, we suggest that future research should look into other communication strategies in order to promote SCB.
7. Appendix i Bibliography
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ii Appendix
1: Frequency table for gender
2: Frequency table for level of education
3: Descriptive table for the age of the participants
4: Chronbachs alpha / Internal reliability for the scales
Item name Chronbach´s Alpha
Sustainable intention 0,906.
Agreeableness 0,714
Openness 0.712
Willingness to purchase 0,921
5: Mean and Standard deviation for the created variables.
6: Correlation table for the variables of interest.
Correlation, Mean, and SD of Variables.
Variable Mean SD Corr.
Var. 1
Corr.
Var. 2
Corr.
Var. 3
Corr.
Var. 4
Corr.
Var. 5
Corr.
Var. 6
Male - - 1
Female - - -.841** 1 Commu
nication
0.50 0.502 .045 -.064 1
Agreeab leness
3.74 0.55 .024 .031 -.072 1
Opennes s
3.68 0.53 .253** -.255** -.135 .010 1
Sustaina ble int.
3.30 0.84 -.086 .053 -.061 .175 .140 1
Willing- ness to purch.
5.10 1.33 .006 -.021 .065 .155 .281** .340**
Notes N = 113
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed)
7: Shapiro-Wilk pre-test for the control questions.
8: Levene´s pre-test for the control questions.
The Hypotheses.
9: The shapiro wilk output for self versus other-orientated communication
10: The Levene's pre-test output for self versus other-orientated communication
11: Output from independent samples T-test.
t p CI - Lower CI - Upper Self versus Other
Communication
-0,69, 0,492 -,067 0,32
12: The T-test output for self versus other-orientated communication
Hypothesis 2
13: The shapiro wilk output for agreeableness:
14: The Levene's test output for agreeableness:
15 : The results of the interaction effect between the (self/other) communication strategy and agreeableness on Willingness to purchase
b se t p
Constant 5,11 0,12 41,23 0,000
Self versus Other Communication (x)
0,20 0,25 0,82 0,414
Agreeableness (w) 0,38 0,23 1,67 0,097
X*W 0,63 0,45 1,40 0,163
Note
Dependant variable = Willingness to purchase R square = 0,047
N. = 113
16: The Hayes output for the agreeableness moderated model
17: The Shapiro wilk output for openness:
18: The Levene's test output for openness:
19: The results of the interaction effect between the (self/other) communication strategy and openness on Willingness to purchase
b se t p
Constant 5,34 0.75 7.14 0.000
Self versus Other Communication (x)
0.29 0.25 1.18 0.241
Openness (w) 0.78 0.24 3.26 0.002
X*W 0.12 0.47 0.25 0.806
Male -0.41 0.78 -0.52 0.605
Female -0.18 0.76 -0.24 0.814
Note
Dependant variable = Willingness to purchase R square = 0,097
N. = 113
20: The Hayes output for the model moderated by openness:
Hypothesis 4
21: The shapiro wilk output for sustainable intention :
22: The Levene's test output for sustainable intention :
23: The results of the interaction effect between the (self/other) communication strategy and sustainable intention on willingness to purchase
b se t p
Constant 5.11 0.12 43.61 0.000
Self versus Other Communication (x)
0.23 0.23 0.97 0.334
Sustainable intention (w)
0.52 0.14 3.77 0.000
X*W 0.48 0.27 1.75 0.083
Note
Dependant variable = Willingness to purchase R square = 0.147
N. = 113
24: The hayes output for the model moderated by sustainable intention
iii Appendix The survey Introduction
Welcome participant,
Thank you for helping me with my thesis!
The objective of this questionnaire/study is to collect information of students about personality and sustainability.
If you aren´t a student, please leave the survey. In answering the questions, please note that there is no right or wrong answer. The best answer is the one that is the closest to your experience or feeling.
The answers are intirely anonymous, results can never be traced back to individual respondents.
This survey should take about 5 minutes to finish.
Your response will only be used for the purpose of my thesis in Business Administration at the University of Amsterdam. If you have any further questions concerning this study please feel free to contact me: Rutger Buhrs at rutgerbuhrs@hotmail.com
You may withdraw your consent at any time by email or by leaving the study. Once you have withdrawn your consent, your personal data will no longer be used.
By continuing, you agree that the above information has been explained to you and that your questions have been answered. You understand that you may ask questions in the future about every aspect of this study. By continuing, you agree to participate in this study.
Are you a student?
yes
No
Sustainable intention scale
The personality Scale
The manipulations
Self-Orientated Communication condition
The Other-orientated Communication Condition
The Willingness Scale
The control items
