Corporate Social Responsibility Activities Need To "match"?

Nowadays, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been a hot topic in both the academic and practice field. More and more companies have realized the importance of CSR from strategic view and regarded it as an effective and efficient investment to enhance the long-term business performance.The studies on CSR, which were focused on corporate ethics for a long time, have caught researchers' attention from the perspective of consumer reaction recently. Based on cognition process and responses of consumers on CSR, these researches are of great help for companies to practise the specific marketing tactics.It is interesting that some CSR initiatives are highly valued by consumers while others go unacknowledged. Due to the increasing expectation from consumers on CSR, the debate about CSR has shifted: it is no longer about whether to make substantial commitments to CSR, but how? It is of great significance to explore what kind of CSR initiatives can help companies build positive evaluation from consumers.Initiatives fitness, the key property of CSR initiatives, has received great attention in the academic field. However, researchers dissent on whether CSR initiatives in high or low fitness should be held by companies. The author thinks that the divergent opinions, based on various theories, are both reasonable. Therefore, this paper establishes an integrated model to offer an alternative explanation on the debate of initiative fit. Two mediating variables (consumer attribution and consumer awareness of consequence) are introduced in the study to link the relationship between initiative fitness and consumer CSR association.Our data supports the conclusion that initiatives fitness significantly influences consumer CSR association through one mediating variable, consumer awareness of consequence. While, there is not significant relationship between initiatives fitness and consumer attribution which has significant influence on consumer CSR association and further influence the consumer willingness to buy. Implication and future research are discussed.