The Effect Of Awe On Green Consumption Behavior

With the development of industrial civilization,water pollution,air pollution,global warming and other environmental problems have become increasingly prominent.Due to some bad consumption habits,the deterioration of the environment has been more and more severe.Therefore,the implementation of green consumption has become an important measure to solve environmental problems.At the same time,the current severe environmental problems are precisely because people hold unrestrained attitudes and not in awe of nature.In consequences,this study combines psychology with consumer behavior,aiming to explore the effect of awe,a complex emotion,on green consumption behavior,and preliminarily explore its psychological mechanism.This study included three experiments: Experiment 1 preliminarily explored the effect of awe on green consumption behavior.Recall method was used to induce awe and neutral emotions respectively.Then,we measured the purchase tendency of ordinary notebook and environmental notebook,as well as the use and disposal behavior of paper.The results showed that when individuals feel awe,they are more likely to do green consumption behaviors.In Experiment 2,awe was subdivided into positive awe and negative awe.The video task was used to induce corresponding emotions.Besides,we introduced a mediator--Small self so as to further understand the intermediate mechanism of awe's influence on green consumption behavior.The results showed that: firstly,compared with neutral emotions,both in positive and negative awe conditions,the subjects were more likely to show green consumption behavior.Secondly,both positive and negative awe reduced the perceived size of the self.Thirdly,awe could not only influence green consumption behavior through direct path,but also through indirect path of Small self.There is no significant mediating effect between positive awe and green consumption behavior,but there is significant mediating effect between negative awe and green consumption behavior.Based on the conclusion of Experiment 2,Experiment 3 divided the Small self into two dimensions,namely,Vastness vis-à-vis the Self and Self-diminishment,to explore the role of the two dimensions in the relationship between awe and green consumption behavior.The results showed that only the Self-diminishment played a mediating role in the relationship between awe and green consumption behavior,and Vastness vis-à-vis the Self is not its mediating variable.In general,the results of this study revealed the positive effect of awe on green consumption behavior.In addition,it preliminarily investigated the psychological mechanism from the aspect of awe changing the perceived self-size of individuals so as to provide references for further empirical research on awe in the field of consumption.