Asia Marketing Journal

Korean Marketing Association (한국마케팅학회)
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A Study on Green Consumer Segmentation Based on Socio-Demographics and Behavioral Responses: Renewing the Relationships between Socio-demographics and Green Behavior

  • Kim, Young Doo (Department of Business Administration, Hansei University)
  • Received : 2014.08.18
  • Accepted : 2015.03.11
  • Published : 2015.04.30
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Abstract

In the 21st century, green consumer behavior, playing one of the core roles of sustainability, is still an important issue to green-related stakeholders. Because one of the major objectives of green-consumer research is an improvement of behaviors aligned with greening, this paper revisited socio-demographic variables and shed light on segmenting and profiling green consumers based on their connectedness between socio-demographic variables and green behaviors. Using correlations, factor analysis, analysis of variance, k-means cluster analysis and χ2-tests, this paper shows that socio-demographic variables differentially impact green-consumer behaviors. In order to profile green consumers, this paper additionally attempts to segment green-consumer groups. The results also coincide with former findings that socio-demographic variables relate significantly with segmented green-consumer group behaviors. General findings are summarized as: 1) older people used green practices more strongly than younger people, 2) females demonstrated better energy-saving and recycling practices compared to males, 3) marital status also significantly influenced green-related behaviors, 4) subjective social class had a significant influence on green-related behaviors, 5) education level and income, however, weakly influenced or showed no impact on green-related behaviors, and 6) a green consumer was classified as an 'active green consumer,' 'utilitarian green consumer,' or 'inactivated green consumer.' The utilitarian green consumer group distinctively behaved more strongly in energy-saving and recycling practices compared to the inactivated green consumer group, whereas active green consumers behaved more strongly on the whole, when compared to those in the inactivated green consumer group.

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References

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