Given the conundrum of moral washing in CSR communication, this research examines the effectiveness of narrative richness using storytelling in marketing. In the process, the moderating role of moral imagination is further explored. An online experiment with a 2 (Narrative Richness: High vs. Low) x 2 (Moral Imagination: High vs. Low) between-subjects factorial design was conducted with two well-known companies (Shell vs. Facebook) suffered from a reputation crisis as the target brands. The results (N = 287) showed that the effects of narrative richness on consumer responses, including positive emotion, negative emotion, and behavioral intention, were significant for Facebook whereas its effect on positive emotion was significant for Shell. Most importantly, the two-way interaction between narrative richness and moral imagination on attitude toward the brand was significant for Shell, indicating that the effect of narrative richness on attitude toward the brand was augmented by moral imagination. In other words, consumers with high moral imagination view narrative-rich messages with virtuous thoughts to figure out the conundrum of CSR communication for the company, and vice versa. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.

Digital fashion represents key technologies for the online environment, and it has been used as a new marketing strategy for the fashion industry. As consumer digital experience has been diversified, research on the effect on consumer attitudes and behavior toward digital fashion needs to be investigated. This study examines the effect of visual tactile and presence of VR fashion stores on consumer attitude via consumer surveys. Visual tactile and presence positively influence consumer experience which includes fantasy, feeling, and fun. In addition, these three experiences positively affect consumer attitude. The moderating effect of cyber motion sickness is discussed. Academic and practical implications for digital fashion are provided.

The objectives of this study were: (1) to identify differences in consumer attitudes and intentions to recycle fashion products using three types of recycling (including resale, reform, and donation), and (2) to examine the moderating effects of consumer prosocialness on the relationships between attitude and intention for each type of fashion product recycling. Men and women aged 20 years and over were recruited from a marketing research firm panel. Participants completed an online questionnaire incorporating measures for attitudes and intentions to resale, reform, and donate fashion products, prosocialness, frequency of purchasing fashion products, monthly amount of spending on fashion products, and demographic information. Data from 224 participants were analyzed using SPSS 25.0 and PROCESS macro. The results demonstrated that consumers had significantly different attitudes and intentions depending on type of fashion product recycling. Consumers had more positive attitudes toward donation compared to resale and reform types of recycling. Consumer intentions toward resale and donation were significantly higher than their intention to reform. Furthermore, this study confirmed that the attitude-intention gap in fashion product recycling can be explained by individual prosocialness. The moderating effects of prosocialness on the associations between attitude and intention to recycle were significant. The implications of increasing consumers’ behavior intention to recycle fashion products was discussed and future research suggestions are provided.

This study investigates the association between Food Neophobia and the intention of the consumers to buy fish farmed with insect-based flours. The findings suggest that buying intention is strongly influenced by the attitude of consumers toward this type of fish and both Food Neophobia and Food Technology Neophobia negatively influence consumers’ attitude.

본 연구는 베트남 소비자들이 인식하는 한류브랜드 지역성이 국가 친밀감에 미치는 영향과 국가 친밀감이 한국 기업, 한국 제품에 대한 태도와 구매의도에 어떤 영향을 미치는지 살펴보고자 하였다. 특히 본 연구는 기존 선행 연구들을 바탕으로 한류의 관점에서 베트남 소비자가 인식하는 브랜드 지역성을 살펴보고자 하였다. 최근 한국기 업들은 한국대중문화를 중심으로 전 세계적으로 높은 인기를 얻고 있는 한류현상을 활용하여 한국 제품과 브랜드를 개발함으로서 한류브랜드를 구축하고 있다. 이에 한류지수가 높게 평가된 베트남 현지 소비자를 대상으로 한류를 잘 반영하고 있는 한국 화장품을 대표적인 한류브랜드로 선정하여 조사하였다. 가설검증을 위해 인터넷, 모바일 URL을 통한 응답 방법을 사용하여 베트남 현지 소비자 총 212명의 자료를 수집하였다. 실증분석 결과, 한 류브랜드 지역성은 국가 친밀감에 정(+)의 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다. 또한 베트남 소비자들이 한국에 대해 긍정적 감정인 친밀감이 형성되면 한국 기업과 제품에 대한 태도에 정(+)의 영향을 미치는 것으로 밝혀졌다. 이러한 소비자태도는 구매의도에 긍정적인 영향을 미치는 것으로 나타났다.

In many mature markets competition keeps growing. As a result, products are increasingly becoming similar, which often prompts price reductions and other promotional tools to ensure profit margins and the long-term marketing viability. Another solution frequently employed to win the competition is the use of emotional advertising (Rossiter & Percy, 1997). This is because products sharing the same or similar attributes can generate different emotion, therefore, be perceived different. However, the frequent use of emotional advertising has led to the situation that not only products but also their ads become similar primarily because consumers buying products of the same category tend to prefer similar effects. Such similarity of the ads is likely to create confusion among the ads so that consumers may not identify the brands of the ads correctly. Impacts of the confusion, however, may differ due to a number of variables. Of the variables, a few critical variables are examined in this study, and several propositions are suggested for the future study.

With the increasing popularity of social media, opinion leaders who have lots of followers have recently created strong advertising effects and generated greater sales. The emergence of online stars, Wang Hong in China, comes at a time when self-media gains popularity and e-commerce requires innovative ways to endorse brands in fashion industry. This study examines how these influencers impact consumers’ attitude toward the products they use and recommend. Specifically, this study investigates whether and how source attributes, social media content characteristics and judgment of product fit affect attitude of Chinese fashion consumers. As the perceived fit between the endorser and the product positively affect source credibility (Kamins, 1990) as well as consumer attitude toward the advertised product (Till & Busler, 2000), the present study hypothesized that the fit between the online star and the product will increase the perceived endorser credibility and product attitude of consumers. The effect of the fit between the product and the self-media content on the attitude toward the content or the product was also examined. Implications for managing marketing strategies as well as future research directions are subsequently discussed.

This study identified fashion consumers disposal behavior and analyzed the effects of consumers pursuing values in disposal, environmental awareness, and sustainable fashion consumption attitudes in regards to fashion disposal behavior. A survey questionnaire was developed and data were obtained from 460 consumers in their 20's to 50's in Korea who had experienced fashion disposal behaviors during last 12 months. As a result, there were four different fashion disposal behaviors such as economical, practical, and social disposal as well as hoarding behaviors. Consumers pursuing values in disposal affected fashion disposal behavior. Practical and economical values had positively impacted economical disposal and hoarding behaviors. While hedonic value had a negative impact on economical disposal behavior, it had a positive impact on social disposal behavior. Also, environmental-social values had positively impacted practical and social disposal behaviors. Fashion-related environmental knowledge had positively impacted economical and practical disposal behaviors and PCE affected social disposal behavior, while environmental concerns had a negative impact on economical disposal behavior. Consumers attitude toward usedfashion items, fashion recycling, and fashion innovativeness affected all of fashion disposal behaviors. Although hoarding behavior has been an under researched area, the finding implied that hoarding behavior was affected by consumer's pursuing value in disposal and sustainable consumption attitude. Also, environmental-social values and attitudes toward used-fashion items would induce practical disposal behavior such as reuse by alteration or reform. Consumers economical and hedonic values can promote donations or exchange/resale of unwanted fashion items, which can lead to sustainable consumption.

Using a range of interpretive methods, including focus-group interviews, in-depth interviews, and structured field observations, this study investigates how shopping experiences within sustainable fashion stores may cause consumers to change their attitudes towards sustainable fashion. Heider’s balance theory was applied to interpret the results, whereby we constructed the maps of individual consumers’ positive and negative associations of concepts, events, and outcomes within consumers’ purchasing decisions about sustainable fashion products. Our findings suggest that there could often be a gap between the consumer’s perception of sustainable fashion and their actual purchase behavior, which creates an ‘imbalanced’ state. However, positive store experiences may persuade consumers to achieve a balance by purchasing sustainable fashion products. The study provides important and theoretical and practical insights for sustainable fashion marketing

There is a variety of mobile beauty application specialized services providing information, such as reports on the advantages and disadvantages of a product, as well as tips and recommendations, based on consumers' comments for products that demand much consultation on the part of the consumers to critique the products. From goods purchased through mobile shopping apps, beauty-related products come right after fashion/retail and food/health-related goods, while promotions, followed by review/comments, are known as influential factors when selecting mobile shopping apps. Consumer reviews about a product are seen as important instruments for obtaining a variety of information about a product for those consumers who have not yet used it. Moreover, there is an increasing interest in authentic information instead of purely advertised narrations, while studies are actively in progress to verify the effectiveness of consumer reviews according to their nature and direction. The results vary with each researcher and since online consumer reviews differ, there is a need to research dynamically blended reviews and the forms that they take. Accordingly, this study attempts to observe and identify the factors that affect the perceived authenticity of the information, brand attitude, purchase intention and electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM). The sample consists of 110 respondents in their twenties and thirties who have purchased beauty products online. The respondents were given online and offline questionnaires, and the collected information was analyzed with SPSS 21.0 and AMOS 18.0 using factor analysis, reliability analysis, t-tests, structural equation modeling (SEM) and multi-group analysis. The results show that perceived information authenticity has a significant influence on brand attitude, purchase intention and e-WOM. Positive, negative and subjective evaluations have more significant impact on information authenticity than did only positive and negative reviews, while perceived authenticity has significant relevance to brand attitude, purchase intention and online word-of-mouth. The implications of these findings

By adopting regression and time series analysis, this article tries to quantify people’s enthusiasm towards beauty based on sales performance of cosmetics product in previous years in China. The basic assumption in this paper is that people’s attitude towards beauty is positively associated with their purchase behavior of cosmetics product.

With the advent of the Internet in the United States, Japan, and other developed countries, electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM) consumer reviews have come into vogue. While most studies have shown that negative e-WOM has negative effects on consumer attitude, some recent studies implied that the existence of negative e-WOM on a single website can enhance consumer attitude toward the website. However, no research has not identified the conditions for the positive effects of negative e-WOM. Thus, we investigate the moderating effects of the types of receivers, reviews, and products. Also, we investigate the moderating effects of the order of positive and negative e-WOM reviews posted in a single website. The effects of four factors are investigated —product characteristic (utilitarian vs. hedonic), review characteristic (attribute- vs. benefit-centric), receiver characteristic (expert vs. novice), and the orders of negative e-WOM (top vs. bottom) when the ratios of positive to negative e-WOM reviews are 10:0, 8:2, and 6:4. A laboratory experiment with virtual e-WOM sites is utilized. Four hundred twenty students participate in the experiment. All hypotheses are supported in at least 5% levels. The results of ANOVA show that negative e-WOM has positive effects on consumer attitudes towards products in the case of hedonic products and expert consumers reading attribute-centric review. Moreover, negative e-WOM has a greater positive effect when it is at the top of the website as opposed to at the bottom. This study contributes to our current understanding of e-WOM effects on consumer behavior.

Introduction Consumers throughout the world, including Asia, are showing increased concerns about food safety. Public policy, industry, and academic researchers are turning increased attention to the effects of food labeling requirements. General food labels provide information about serving size, servings per container, total calories per serving, calories from fat, and minimum daily nutritional value. Consumers must then use the food labeling information to make individual dietary choices. Thus it is appropriate for researchers to ask how consumers formulate product choices and evaluations according to food labeling information including calorie counts and standardized nutritional information (Ford et al. 1996; Keller et al. 1997; Roe, Levy, & Derby 1999). Long-term strategies are critically needed to find ways to protect public health and to assure food safety. Health practitioners and governmental regulators have increased their efforts to address the growing problem by sponsoring programs for food safety and by requiring nutritional labeling. In answer to the need for further research in food consumption behavior (RFC), this study was conducted to investigate how manufacturers might use consumers’ perceptions of risks and involvement for planning the most effective food labeling. Theoretical Framework To find ways to promote general and social marketing healthful consumer use of food labels (Lefebvre, 1988; McDermott, 2000), this study utilizes consumer segmentation techniques in which consumers are categorized according to psychological and demographic profiles (Slater, Kelly, & Thackeray, 2006). That is, they are segmented based on essential homogeneous responses (Forthofer, 2000; Kotler, 1971) and demographic characteristics, including age, gender, income and social class, although demographics may be less effective than psychological differences for predicting responses to health promotions (Lefebvre, 1988; Slater, 1991). The psychographics approach to consumer segmentation, derived from marketing techniques, selects variables that predict health behaviors; that is, consumers are segmented according to how they process communication channel properties and message features (Rimal & Adkins, 2003). By focusing on consumer segmentation we elucidate how consumers react to food labeling designed to promote health and food safety. Consumer segmentation should help us understand why consumers might reject risky unhealthful behaviors and adopt protective healthful behaviors (Slater, 2006). The risk perception attitude framework (Garretson & Burton, 2000; Rimal & Real 2003; Turner, Rimal, Morrison &, Kim, 2006) is a theoretical perspective for segmenting consumers based on their perceptions of risk and their beliefs about personal efficacy. According to the risk perception attitude framework, risk perceptions are usually insufficient to motivate behavior, but when high risk perceptions are coupled with strong efficacy beliefs, people are more motivated to engage in self-protective behaviors. Social cognitive theory and the extended parallel process model also support the importance of efficacy beliefs as moderating risk perception effects on self-protective behavior (Bandura 1986; Witte 1994). Using the risk perception attitude framework for purposes of this study, consumers are classified into four groups according to their risk perception and self-efficacy as indicated by their involvement in health concerns. 1) The "indifference" group comprises study participants who have low risk perceptions and low involvement; they believe they face few risks, lack control of their actions, and are thus not motivated to undertake protective behaviors. 2) The "responsive" group comprises study participants who have high risk perceptions and high involvement and thus are motivated to undertake extensive self-protective behaviors. 3) The "proactive" group comprises participants who have low risk perception but high involvement; they believe strongly in their personal abilities to take control, but perceive low risk and are thus not motivated to engage in self-protective behaviors. 4) The "avoidance" group comprises study participants who have high risk perceptions and low involvement; they are concerned about the need to counter risks but lack the self-efficacy and involvement to follow recommendations. Research Questions To examine the risk perception attitude framework in the context of research on food consumption behavior (RFC), three central research questions are posed: RQ1: How are consumers classified according to their level of perceived risk and involvement? RQ2: Do different consumer types show different attitudes toward paying higher prices for safer food and toward paying attention to food labels? RQ3: What factors influence consumer classifications? Methods Data for this study came from research on food consumption behavior (RFC) conducted by Korea Rural Economic Institute (KREI) in 2014. In 2013, the KREI began gathering data regarding food consumption behavior to help the food industry develop more efficient use of food resources. RFC data are appropriate because they include data about various consumption patterns regarding food lifestyles, purchases, and food safety. Specifically, RFC for this study, we gathered data for a stratified sampling of 6,311 consumers, 19 to 75-years-old, living in 16 metropolitan city-regions in South Korea. Table 1 shows general features of the research participants. Among the respondents, 44.2% were men; 55.8% were women; 10.7% were 19 to 25-years-old; 37.6% were high school graduates; 46.9% had lower than middle school graduation levels, 21.9% were college graduates, 2.3% had post-graduate levels, 1.1% were uneducated; 36.5% had average monthly family incomes of 200~399; 1.3% had the highest rate of 1000 and more; 1.0% had low to moderate interest in health; 42.8% reported that they bought food two or three times weekly; 0.7% reported buying food once a month. Respondents reported an average 3.93 regarding risk perceptions for food safety. Their reported average level of involvement was 3.32; average of intention to pay higher prices for safe food was 3.37, and their average likelihood of checking food labels was 3.15. Measurement To score education levels, the uneducated group = 1, less than middle school = 2, high school graduates = 3, college graduates = 4, and postgraduates = 5. A five-point Likert-type scale was used to measure participants’ interest in their health (1 = complete indifference to 5 = very much interested). Also a five-point Likert scale was used to measure perceived risk for twelve items related to food safety: foreign substances, pesticide residue, use of antibiotics in livestock and fish, natural toxicity, food additives, heavy metals, endocrine disruptors, bacterial contamination, livestock disease, GMO, irradiation, packing hazards, and allergens (1 = not concerned at all to 5 = very concerned). Involvement was measured for three questions regarding food origin, food materials, and eco-friendly products (1 = not concerned at all to 5 = very concerned). Intentions to pay higher prices for safe food and to check food labels were measured from 1 = not at all to 5 = very positive. Results Four consumer groups were classified according to their level of perceived risk and involvement. We followed previous RPA model studies (e.g., Sullivan et al., 2008; Jo & Yoo, 2011) and classified groups based on median perceived risk and involvement: (≥4.00) for high perceived risk, (<4.00) for low perceived risk, (≥3.333) for high involvement, and (< 3.33) for low involvement. The responsive group had high perceived risk and high involvement; the proactive group had low perceived risk and high involvement; the avoidance group had high perceived risk and low involvement; and the indifference group had low perceived risk and low involvement. Additionally, ANOVA with post-hoc Tukey test was conducted to examine the average difference among the four groups regarding their intentions to pay higher prices for safe food and to check food labels. Multinomial logit regression was performed to discover the factors that influence classification of consumer types. Classification of consumer types according to perceived risk and involvement Table 1 shows the consumer classifications according to the level of perceived risk and involvement: 1,198 participants, 21.8%, were in the indifference group with low perceived risk and low involvement; 1,254 participants, 22.8%, were in the proactive group with low perceived risk and high involvement; 1,125 participants, 20.5%, were in the avoidance group with high perceived risk and low involvement; 1,924 participants, 35.5%, were in the responsive group with high perceived risk and high involvement. Among the four groups, the responsive group had a statistically significant relatively high ratio: χ2 value for group classification was 79.695 (p <.001). Consumer classification differences in purchase intentions to pay higher prices for safe food and to check food labels Table 2 shows differences in intentions to pay higher prices for safe food and to check food labels. The proactive group showed the highest average intentions to pay higher prices for safe food at 3.52, followed by the responsive group at 3.51, the avoidance group at 3.25, and the indifference group at 3.16. The differences among the groups were statistically significant. A Tukey post-analysis showed that the high involvement group, in contrast with the low involvement group, showed higher average intentions to pay higher prices for safe food. Among the low involvement groups, those with high perceived risk had higher average intentions than those with low perceived risk. The responsive group showed the highest average intentions to check food labels at 3.44, followed by the proactive group at 3.43, the avoidance group at 2.74, and the indifference group at 2.27. The differences among the groups were statistically significant. A Tukey post-analysis showed that high involvement groups, in contrast with low involvement groups, showed higher average intentions to check food labels, but no difference was found according to the level of perceived risk. Influential factors of consumer segmentations Table 3 shows the results of examining the factors of gender, age, education, monthly average family income, and interest in health that are typical in consumer segments. Comparing all groups with the responsive group, the indifference group was most likely to comprise young women who had lower educational levels, lower monthly income, and less interest in health. The proactive group was most likely to be made up of men. The avoidance group was most likely to be made of young men who had lower educational levels, lower monthly incomes, and less interest in health. Discussion This study is an investigation of the theoretical framework of risk perception and involvement according to indifference, proactivity, responsiveness, or avoidance consumer segments. The study centrally indicates that the four risk perception–involvement framework groups differ in their perceptions of risk and the extent of their involvement. By revealing the importance of high involvement as a fruitful intervention strategy, the results suggest practical implications for public policymakers and marketers who strive to devise appropriate food labeling. Social cognitive theory has long stressed the importance of enhancing personal involvement (Bandura 1986). That insight can be applied to the risk perception attitude framework for identifying particular audiences who will respond to involvement-enhancing messages. Our findings suggest that a useful strategy in promoting change is to recognize that consumers will react differently according to their tendencies toward indifference, proactivity, responsiveness, or avoidance.

This study is to explore the effect of music characteristics (i.e., likeliness and familiarity of music) on the relationship between mood and attitude toward the product in the online shopping mall selling hand-made shoes. A total of 319 consumers participated in experiments with online shopping mall stimuli with a variety of background music. In results, consumer mood positively affected attitude toward the hand-made shoe products in the online shopping mall under background music. A moderating effect of music likeliness was found in the relationship between mood and product attitude, indicating that mood more strongly affected product attitude under more liked music than under less liked music. When consumers are listening to more liked music and are in good mood, they may build their attitudes toward products independently from their mood, whereas they may build positive attitude under good mood versus negative attitudes under bad mood if they are listening to less liked music. A moderating effect of music familiarity was not found in the relationship between mood and product attitude. Based on results, it was confirmed that the S-O-R model could be applied to explain the effect of background music on consumer responses in online shopping malls. Marketers may be able to select and adjust the likeliness and familiarity of background music to better serve consumers in diverse shopping conditions, referring to the study findings.

Fashion design itself has an independent artistic value of its own. However, legal protection for fashion design is still lacking. In the fashion market, design piracy and trademark piracy are universal phenomena and the imitation behavior is made by a wide range of subjects in real time. The protection of the authentic holder in the relatively-short-cycled fashion design should be done immediately. Accordingly, this study aims to conduct a comparative research on the laws designed to protect fashion design significantly, to promote the creation of fashion design, and to provide implications for the future fashion design protection. The specific objectives of this study are as follows. First, we aim to examine the market trends relating to the theft of the fashion design between Republic of Korea and the United States. The second objective is to consider current legislation to protect fashion design in Republic of Korea and the United States and to analyze the differences between the two countries. Thirdly, the present study seeks to measure consumers’ perception on counterfeit in order to analyze the current status of design piracy. Our results suggest that both countries cohere in that the market size of counterfeit goods is expanding and fashion products are prominent in the counterfeits market. However, while Republic of Korea is not capable of effectively controlling domestic counterfeit products, the United States is trying to protect the intellectual property rights with regulations of counterfeits through the Customs and Border Protection Agency. In the domain of legal protection for fashion design, the United States enacted individual laws such as DPPA and IDPPA through cooperation with the fashion industry and the legal profession since 2006. On the other hand, the effectiveness of laws for fashion design protection appears to be weaker in Republic of Korea. According to the analysis of consumer perception, Korean consumers continuously buy counterfeit goods, whereas U.S. consumers rarely report having had a counterfeit product purchase experience. Korean consumers have a relatively high level of legal knowledge concerning fashion design protection and, compared to their U.S. counterparts, they are negatively recognized about counterfeit goods. Despite this, they do not hesitate to buy counterfeit products in real life. The results of our analysis of the consumer perception suggest that Korean consumers’ attitudes and purchase behaviors with regard to counterfeit goods are inconsistent; the reason underlying this tendency is that the force of the legal system is insufficient. Therefore, this study suggests to strengthen the rigor of the law-enforcement and to establish the laws that would help enhance consumer awareness in the Korean society.

This paper identifies the key antecedents and moderators with regard to brand attitude and purchase intention of luxury brands. The findings suggest that is a strong importance of status seeking, as well as informational influences towards consumer brand attitude of luxury brands for both subtle and prominent brands. In addition, the moderating results indicate that consumer need for subtle branding only moderated the relationship between informational influences and consumers band attitude for subtly branded luxury products.