Consciousness for fair consumption : conceptualization, scale development and empirical validation
Ingo Balderjahn; Mathias Peyer; Marcel Paulssen
In the literature social consciousness of consumers has often been associated with aspects of environmentally friendly consumption and existing measures often confound social and ecological issues. The present study focuses on the social issue of fair labor conditions in the manufacturing and trading process, because it is a major difference if someone prefers a product due to the fact of its less damaging impact on the environment or because it is produced in compliance with international labor standards and social justice. A scale for consciousness for fair consumption (CFC), defined as a latent disposition of consumers to prefer products that are produced and traded according to fair conditions, was conceptualized and tested in an empirical study. Results demonstrate the unidimensionality, reliability and construct validity of the new CFC-scale.