Exploring Generation Z’s Socially Responsible Consumption: A Revisit of the KAB Framework

As an expanding segment in the consumer market, Generation Z (Gen Z) is featured by its rising environmental concerns. Utilizing the knowledge-attitude-behavior (KAB) framework, this research investigates and elaborates on the relationships between environmental knowledge, attitude toward socially responsible consumption (SRC), and SRC behaviors through surveys and field experiments across three distinct SRC contexts (Fast fashion, ugly food and food waste, and plastic product consumption) with both cross sectional and longitudinal research design. Our research initially generalizes the baseline KAB model to the context of Gen Z and SRC. More importantly, we reveal three notable extensions of the KAB model. First, we introduce perceived consumer effectiveness (PCE) as an additional antecedent of this model, which helps increase the explanatory power of the current model. Second, we uncover the spillover effects of environmental knowledge, where Gen Z’s prior environmental knowledge positively impacts their present knowledge and subsequently strengthens their attitude toward SRC and SRC behaviors. Lastly, we distinguish between general and specific environmental knowledge, identifying that specific environmental knowledge mitigates the influence of general environmental knowledge on Gen Z’s attitude toward SRC and SRC behaviors. Overall, our research provides insights for marketers who strive to develop strategies to foster SRC with Gen Z.