Efficacy beliefs regarding purchases of environmentally friendly products on holiday

ABSTRACT

This study focuses on the relative importance of different facets of efficacy beliefs in explaining the purchasing of products with environmentally friendly attributes. These facets differed based on whether they addressed individual versus collective action, in addition to whether they focused on behavioural execution versus goal attainment. Separate explanatory models were tested for organic food, refillable products, and bio-degradable food, each including goal attractiveness as a covariate. Behavioural self-efficacy was significantly associated with all types of purchases, but behavioural collective efficacy and goal self-efficacy showed only significant associations with purchases of bio-degradable food. Goal collective efficacy and goal attractiveness did not explain additional variance in any of the purchases considered. These findings align with past literature suggesting that efficacy beliefs can have a part in explaining purchasing behaviour, though stressing that the predictive value of specific facets may not generalize across different product types. Future research could investigate these beliefs for other forms of exerting influence as a consumer and/or in respect to social and economic issues related to sustainable development.

KEYWORDS:

• Sustainable tourism
• purchasing behaviour
• self-efficacy
• collective efficacy
• goal attractiveness

Ethical clearance

This research complied with the general guidelines for research ethics by the Norwegian National Committee for Research Ethics in the Social Sciences and the Humanities (NESH). Formal approval by an ethics committee was not required as per applicable institutional guidelines and regulations. Informed consent was inferred by participants filling out the survey.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the Meltzer foundation.

Notes

1 Bandura (1997) refers to this as perceived self-efficacy and outcome expectation, respectively.

2 The theoretical rationale behind is that peoples’ perceptions of their ability to engage in behaviours required to attain desired goals, in conjunction with their expectancies regarding the outcomes of their actions relating to these goals, can motivate them in carrying out demanding tasks (cf. social cognitive theory; Bandura, 1997).

3 For a further discussion on the conceptual distinction between facets of efficacy beliefs that are oriented towards behavioural execution versus facets of efficacy beliefs that are focused on goal attainment, and their application to different actor levels, see Hamann and Reese (2020).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rouven Doran

Rouven Doran is an Associate Professor of General Psychology at the Department of Psychosocial Science, University of Bergen. His research interests are centered on individual and social factors that shape perceptions and responses to environmental issues.

Simen Bø

Simen Bø is a PhD Research Scholar in Psychology and Decision Science at the Department of Strategy and Management, Norwegian School of Economics. In his research, he studies judgment and decision making, with an emphasis on how people think about the future.

Daniel Hanss

Daniel Hanss is Professor of Environmental Psychology and Sustainability at the Department of Social Sciences, Darmstadt University of Applied Sciences. His research interests focus around individual perceptions, decision-making, and behavior in the context of social-ecological transformations.