Why people purchase green products
Article Type: News From: International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, Volume 11, Issue 4
New research exploring why people purchase “green” products argues that buying such products can be construed as altruistic, since green products often cost more and are of lower quality than their conventional counterparts, but green goods benefit the environment for everyone. As biologists have observed that altruism might function as a “costly signal” associated with status, the researchers used three experiments to investigate how status motives influenced desire for green products.
Activating status motives led people to choose green products over more luxurious non-green products. Supporting the notion that altruism signals one’s willingness and ability to incur costs for others’ benefit, status motives increased desire for green products when shopping in public (but not private)and when green products cost more (but not less) than non-green products. Findings therefore suggest that status competition can be used to promote pro-environmental behaviour. Further details can be seen at: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20175620
