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Consumer
Which are the sustainable understanding
attributes affecting the real and choices

consumption behaviour? Consumer

understanding and choices 1839

Paola Mancini Received 28 November 2016

Revised 20 March 2017
Department of Law, Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods, Accepted 23 March 2017
University of Sannio, Benevento, Italy
Andrea Marchini
Dipartimento di Scienze Agrarie Alimentari e Ambientali,
Universita degli Studi di Perugia, Perugia, Italy, and
Mariarosaria Simeone
Department of Law, Economics, Management and Quantitative Methods,
University of Sannio, Benevento, Italy

Abstract
Purpose – This is an exploratory study on consumer information and behaviour towards green, health, local,
social and environmental credentials on labels. It focusses on many dimensions of sustainability in the food
products that affect consumer choices with a dual purpose: to identify and define “sustainable consumption”
behaviour in broad sense and to investigate empirically the factors affecting the real consumption behaviours.
The purpose of this paper is to shed light on consumers’ understanding, motivation and use of sustainable
labelling in order to understand the role sustainability information plays in the food products market.
Design/methodology/approach – Two focus groups in order to investigate consumer motivation and
behaviour in-depth and to prepare the questionnaire. Identification of the outcomes that could summarize
sustainable consumption combining: purchase of local products, consume only seasonal fruit, prefer products
with recyclable packaging, attention to the fat content in foods, give importance to traceability and purchase
products only in the place of origin. Identification of the “at risk” virtuous consumer, using a binary logistic
regression approach, taking into account demographic characteristics, the food and nutrition value system,
experience, knowledge, institutional factors and marketing.
Findings – Results from the focus groups are mainly in line with the empirical analysis, highlighting the key
role of education in influencing consumer attitude and behaviour. Consumers give little attention to
information provided on the label for sustainable food consumption and environmental protection and have
little knowledge of environmental problems. The virtuous consumer appears to give importance to a better
food nutrition value system, to pay more attention to ingredients and instructions on the label, to be more
attentive to environmental and sustainable attributes, to be concerned about product quality and to be
slightly influenced by brands and special offers.
Research limitations/implications – The findings from the empirical analysis confirm the results from
focus groups even if it was not possible from the empirical analysis to investigate in-depth the marketing
aspects concerning the food choice. This limit probably comes from the low number of observations.
Further research will focus on these marketing aspects.
Practical implications – Products with sustainable attributes can become a strategic variable and allow
companies to gain a competitive advantage, especially for small- and medium-sized enterprises. This may
encourage the development of new marketing channels based on the direct relationship between producer and
the new consumer demand, increasingly sensitive to the food security issues.
Social implications – There is a potential interest and sensitiveness to having sustainable behaviour in a
broad sense, but there is a lack of knowledge about how to behave to be sustainable. In the absence of binding
rules, it is necessary that government promote information and campaigns to generate greater awareness on
sustainability, aiming at increasing knowledge to drive the consumer’s choices. This may lead to virtuous results
British Food Journal
in terms of reducing social costs related to an unhealthy diet, food waste and unsustainable consumption. Vol. 119 No. 8, 2017
Originality/value – The results show that despite the appearance of attention to the environment and to pp. 1839-1853
© Emerald Publishing Limited
healthy food which is associated with this emerging critical consumer in the literature, there remains the 0007-070X
problem of the consumer giving little attention to information provided on the label for sustainable food DOI 10.1108/BFJ-11-2016-0574
BFJ consumption and environmental protection. This is the problem of “rules of thumb” in purchasing decisions
that prevail in the following situations: when consumers have an overload of information that exceeds their
119,8 processing limits; when they tend to base their decision making on heuristics, focussing their choices on
brands as a proxy for high-quality, product-related characteristics.
Keywords Focus group, Environment, Food attributes, Logistic approach, Sustainable products,
Virtuous consumers
Paper type Research paper
1840
1. Introduction
Nowadays consumers are more and more interested in obtaining information about
products, even if it means paying higher prices. Consumer choices depend on consumer
preferences that are related to intrinsic and extrinsic product characteristics. Extrinsic
product characteristics, though not physical, such as brands, indications of origin,
traditional production processes, the use of organic agriculture, animal welfare,
environmental protection and ethical requirements all play important roles in consumer
choices. In this paper, we investigate the importance of the many dimensions of
sustainability in the food products that affect consumer choices.
Sustainability is a “value” word that, similarly to the words quality or well-being, cannot
be investigated with direct questions, as the “acquiescence of the interviewee” could lead to
overestimating the phenomenon, that would be difficult to appraise (Roccato, 2003;
Corbetta, 2003). The sustainability of the relationship between supply and demand in the
food cannot be based on the analysis of beliefs or future availability of the agents, but must
be based on the analysis of production, trade and consumption behaviour.
The goal of this work is to focus on the study of the question with a dual purpose: on the one
hand, to identify and define “sustainable consumption” behaviours in a broad sense; and on the
other hand, to investigate empirically the factors affecting the real consumption behaviours.
There are numerous studies that address sustainability issues related to production
processes and the consumption of quality food products (Cesaretti and Annunziata, 2011).
There are several dimensions to the concept of environmental sustainability associated with
economic development in the food sector (Connolly and Prothero, 2003; Jackson, 2005).
On the food supply side, three major dimensions of sustainability can be identified:
environmental and territorial sustainability, social and generational sustainability, and the
economic sustainability of production processes that can ensure the remuneration of
the production factors and the development of the company. On the demand side, the
dimensions described above are associated also with health attributes of food in the process
of choosing and buying healthy food products. Sustainable consumption not only supports
the sustainability of supply chains; it also incorporates within it the problems of proper
nutrition, the protection of the biological heritage of each individual, the remuneration of the
factors used in the production and, not least, the controlling of the social costs of illnesses
related to an unhealthy diet (Mancini et al., 2016).
Sustainable consumption behaviour comprises many aspects of the food sector. Those of
main interest are: protection of individual health, support of market transparency by
seeking more informative contents and certifications, protection of the environmental and of
intra- and intergenerational biodiversity sustainability, attention to resources waste,
reduction of CO2 emissions and climate change, supporting of local rural communities,
supporting of small businesses and the creation of channels to provide alternatives to the
dominance of multinational corporations. It is possible to act on these elements of
sustainability in two ways: the implementation of specific policies and through conscious
consumer demand.
From the theoretical point of view as pointed out by Grunert, “conscious consumption” is
the expression of a behaviour resulting from a number of factors: the value system of the
individual, the level of knowledge and its intelligibility, the previous experience of Consumer
consumption, the environmental and situational context, and the company marketing understanding
strategies adopted by production and distribution companies. and choices
The research was designed to provide answers to the following research questions:
RQ1. How is it possible to study and analyse the consumer behaviour towards
sustainable consumption?
RQ2. Can virtuous consumers be identified?
1841
RQ3. What factors are associated with virtuous consumer behaviour?
RQ4. When can one speak of sustainable consumption?
RQ5. What does it mean that the food demand evolves towards sustainable consumption
behaviour?
RQ6. Who is the critical/virtuous consumer?
The answers to these research questions make it possible to shed light on consumers’
understanding, motivation and use of sustainable food products in order to comprehend the
role that sustainability information plays in the food products market.
In the following sections the issue of sustainable consumption will be addressed and an
exploratory methodology to answer the research questions will be proposed. More specifically,
the definition of “virtuous consumer” will be proposed and used to analyse consumer
information and behaviour towards green, health, local, social and environmental credentials
on the label.

2. Conceptual background
Consumers are affected by market imperfections, which may stem from the lack of
information they have at the time of purchase. This sometimes leads them to make choices
based on the quality perception of a product without having the possibility of reaching the
desired level of food safety (Henson and Traill, 1993) and understanding which products are
environmentally and socially friendly.
Consumers are increasingly taking on a role in making the food chain more sustainable.
Food consumption choices have an impact on which foods are being produced and how they
are produced. All the actors in the food chain affect the overall sustainability of the chain itself
(Grunert, 2011). Recent studies demonstrate a widespread interest among consumers with
regard to the environmental impacts of their food choices, but when investigating their actions
during everyday shopping their behaviour is not so consistent (Banterle and Ricci, 2013).
Among the attributes that affect food choice, environmental certifications of producers,
such as the water footprint or carbon footprint, are taking on greater importance. Recent
studies have sought to understand to what extent consumers prefer food products labelled
with carbon and water footprints. These studies show that consumer preferences for low
carbon and water footprints differ among unprocessed and processed food products.
Consumer choices depend on consumer preferences that are related to intrinsic and extrinsic
product characteristics. Extrinsic product characteristics, though not physical, such as brands,
indications of origin, traditional production processes, use of organic agriculture, animal welfare,
environmental protection and ethical requirements all play important roles in consumer choices.
Looking at the quality attributes of food products (Peri, 2006), they belong to several classes of
requirements that can be summarized as follows (Hooker and Caswell, 1996): food safety, value
attributes, packaging attributes and process attributes. Food safety concerns are focussed on
nutritional qualities of food (Drichoutis et al., 2006) and properties of unfamiliar foods, such as
genetically modified food.
BFJ The attention of the consumer towards high-quality products and the diversification of
119,8 agricultural activities encourage the development of new marketing channels based on the
direct relationship between producer and consumer (Raffaelli et al., 2009). The short food supply
chain can therefore be treated as an opportunity of competitive advantage for small- and
medium-sized enterprises to meet the new consumer demand, which is increasingly sensitive to
food security issues and to the benefits of traceability and quality that are linked to the territory
1842 that these models favour (Goodman, 2003; Higgens et al., 2008; Riganelli and Marchini, 2016).
There are many actions in the supply chain introducing labels and logos on the labels or in
the store. The objective is to increase transparency along the food chain and to inform the
consumer in such a way as to promote sustainable consumption. Food consumption and dietary
choices can make a contribution in dealing with the emerging environmental challenges.
The purpose of this study is to shed light on consumers’ understanding, motivation and
use of sustainable labelling in order to understand the role that sustainable information
plays in the food products market. The existing literature has focussed on organic
consumption (Hughner et al., 2007; Zakowska-Biemans, 2011), but there is a limited number
of current studies investigating consumer attitudes towards environmental and ethical
aspects of food products.
Vermeir and Verbeke (2006) suggest that sustainable food consumption can be
stimulated by increasing consumer involvement, perceived effectiveness (of sustainable
products) and raising social peer pressure. Many studies have been conducted on fair
trade labelling schemes based mainly on willingness to pay and self-reported purchase
intentions (Grankvist and Biel, 2007; Johnston, 2008). Other studies showed that the main
barrier to the purchase of sustainable products is the perceived high price, especially if we
consider carbon labelling (Röös and Tjärnemo, 2011).
Many studies (Bray et al., 2011; Chatzidakis et al., 2007; De Boer et al., 2009;
Dutra de Barcellos et al., 2011; Krystallis et al., 2009) suggest that the consumer’s
motivation to behave sustainably is quite frequent, but is not directly translated into
sustainable food choices.
Grunert et al. (2014) investigate the relationship between consumer motivation,
understanding and the use of sustainability labels on food products, which are increasingly
appearing on food products. Their results show that respondents expressed concern with
sustainability issues at the general level, but lower levels of concern in the context of concrete
food product choices. This implies that sustainability labels currently do not play a major role
in consumers’ food choices, and future use of these labels will depend on the extent to which
consumers’ general concern about sustainability can be turned into actual behaviour.
Increasing consumer knowledge about the sustainability of food products can act to
create a virtuous circle between private companies and public sector benefits.

3. Empirical analysis
The empirical research was conducted using both a qualitative and quantitative approach,
through focus groups and a survey. We conducted two focus groups and administered a
questionnaire to the household member in charge of food purchases. The aim was to
understand consumers’ motivation and behaviour in the choice of sustainable food
products. The focus groups were allowed to investigate certain issues in-depth, which was
also useful for providing more insights with regard to the existing economic literature in
preparing the questionnaire, which served for the quantitative analysis.
3.1 The qualitative approach
The qualitative analysis was based on the organization of two focus groups, segmented on
the basis of education. Through the two focus groups it was possible to fully investigate
how different levels of education can determine attitudes, motivations and behaviour in
choosing products with sustainable attributes. The focus groups, through the interaction Consumer
among the participants, allowed us to understand how their views converge and/or diverge understanding
and the reasons for this. Few studies based on focus groups make a comparative evaluation and choices
between different education groups. Actually, in most investigative works there is an
in-depth analysis of only one demographic group, such as in the study by Edstrom and
Devine (2001). Dibsdall et al. (2002) analysed women; Paisley et al. (2001),
Ristovski-Slijepcevic and Chapman (2005) studied couples; Wolfe et al. (2003) studied 1843
adults; Croll et al. (2001) studied adolescents; and Hesketh et al. (2005) studied children.
In accordance with the paper proposed by Chambers et al. (2008), on the topic of healthy
eating, and a few others that have followed a comparative approach, studying, for example,
ethnic differences (Cullen et al., 2000), or differences in “age and gender among adolescents”
(Neumark-Sztainer et al., 1999, Bauer et al., 2004), we organized two focus groups segmented
on the basis of education. In this way, we were able to understand and evaluate the reasons
why opinions differ between the two groups and which factors caused the differences.
Protocol. Two focus groups with 12 participants each were formed. In each focus group
the rule pertaining to qualitative studies was followed (Sim, 1998), creating homogeneous
groups in order to facilitate an open discussion among the participants. The recruitment
was carried out through a mailing list that was sent to 50 people, including employees,
professors, professionals, and graduate and undergraduate students at the University of
Benevento. All selected participants are domiciled in the city of Benevento with a
medium-low education. The second group was composed of 12 well-educated participants,
mainly professionals and two entrepreneurs.
The study focussed on the city of Benevento[1], which is an area of great interest for
many reasons. It is a prominent city from an art perspective, and it benefits from important
tourist flows, has a rural tradition, a deep cultural identity, and the local university has
helped to further enrich the social and human capital.
Outline of the discussion. In the initial phase of the group formation, participants were
invited to introduce themselves to the group. The discussion was concentrated on the
importance of attributes in food choice. The focus groups were organized in three rounds,
designed to analyse: eating habits and unhealthy diet, perception of food production impact
and awareness of products with sustainable attributes, “brand reputation effects” and
attention to the label.
Structure of the Round 1: eating habits and unhealthy diet. Objectives: understanding
participants’ attitudes towards a healthy diet.
Stimuli: in the middle of the first round the article “Salt, sugar and fat, ingredients of the
science of junk food” was read in order to stimulate a discussion on processed foods.
A number of risks associated with unhealthy eating were presented to consumers and
the moderator asked participants to explain her/his eating habits.
Focus Group 1: medium-low education level:
• Little attention to ingredients in the processed food products.
• Food products are bought from local producers, therefore the indications on the
labels are not considered, because consumers have a direct relationship with the
supplier. Therefore, the purchase of a product depends on the seller’s reputation, tied
to a consolidated habit from the past.
• Product identity is of huge importance, but it is possible to detect a lack of knowledge
about healthy eating and the ability to read the label and give attention to the quality
of the ingredients used in the industrial products. They rely on slogans on the label
and on brand communication.
• Frequent consumption of meat.
BFJ Focus Group 2: higher education level:
119,8 • Their style of diet is related to the time needed to prepare foods and they care about
the information from the store.
• Awareness of the several factors affecting an unhealthy diet.
• Participants declare to be informed about healthy diets and try to limit the
1844 consumption of meat. Although there is a good understanding of the quality of
products, most of the participants declare to pay little attention to labels for reasons
of time. Instinctively they choose the best-known brands. They state that they take
care to reduce the habit of frequently consuming meat.
Results for Round 1: the first group, with “medium-low” education level, tends to refer to
direct knowledge of the seller. The second group, on the other hand, refers to the information
obtained not at the time of purchase, but in the previous phase from the media and
newspapers. In the store this consumer seems to pay little attention to the label. In both
cases they declare not to read the label, but the main difference between the group is given
by the information on the products they buy.
Structure of Round 2: “sustainability”. Objective: checking the degree of sensitivity of
participants towards environmental impacts of food choices.
Stimuli: during the discussion an informative video was shown on the double
food-environmental pyramid: www.barillacfn.com/talk/tk-doppia-piramide/
In the last part of discussion the sustainability trademarks on the labels were shown.
Focus Group 1: medium-low education level:
• Unawareness of the environmental sustainability concept of food production. The
attention to food waste comes mainly from an interest of economic loss.
• Lack of knowledge of the sustainability trademarks. Even after the moderator had
shown the water footprint, carbon footprint and Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)
logo, he detected a general difficulty among the panel to understand their meaning.
The only exception was a woman who works in this field. Moreover, after discussing
about the topic, the panel did not recognize the higher value of the food products with
sustainable attributes.
• Little attention to organic products, high probability of short chain purchases.
• Little interest in the use of sustainable packaging materials.
• Genetically modified products are not known. They trust the protection of the law.
Focus Group 2: high education level:
• Intuition of the meaning and implications of food sustainability. The panel showed a
good sensitivity to environmental issues. The video screening generated an
interesting debate. Although the participants showed good knowledge and to fully
understand the issues, the video revealed a lack of awareness in this field.
• The level of knowledge of the sustainability trademarks appears low. After showing the
labels, an interest seemed to emerge about environmental impact, which generated a
debate on the topic. Great attention is given to food waste. There arises the importance
of making clear to consumers how to use the information on expired products.
• Sensitiveness to the excessive packaging used for marketing reasons.
• Concerns for the use of genetically modified products but the problem is not very
clear, and they avoid many products because they are not able to understand if are
they are GMO free.
Results of Round 2: both groups have little knowledge of this problem. Divergence Consumer
between the two groups: disinterest in the first group to sustainability. From the beginning understanding
we notice a sensitivity and interest showed by well-educated group, amplified significantly and choices
by the stimuli given.
Structure of Round 3: “brand and label”. Stimuli were provided by showing the
participants three different brands of “frollini” biscuits and two packages of juice
during the discussion, the same used in the research paper by Marotta et al. (2014). 1845
Reference was made to one industrial brand (with vegetable fats, without further
specification of the type or possible hydrogenation), one private label (with extra virgin
olive oil), and a low price product (which states no hydrogenated fats) in order to analyse
the fats used in different brands of biscuits. This stage of the investigation illustrated
the perception that consumers have and the confidence they attach to the different
actors in the supply chain.
Focus Group 1: medium-low education level:
• Preference for the products of the well-known national brand.
• Highly influenced by the “price” variable.
• Importance of nutrition information for calorie intake.
• Attention to the reputation of the brand. Participants said to have problems
understanding the product labels and to distinguish them on the basis of ingredients.
These panel participants seem to rely on the best-known brands because they find the label
does not provide clear indications. Therefore, quality assurance stems from the brand’s
reputation. This is in line with the findings of Marotta et al. (2014) that discuss the trust trap
phenomenon that makes consumers victims of the brand image and of the lack of
information provided. They are sensitive only to the main brands’ marketing
communication. They usually choose leading brand products without reading the label
and, consequently, the ingredients contained in the product.
Focus Group 2: high education level:
(1) Variability in the choice between industrial and commercial brands.
(2) Special attention is shown for:
• packaging; and
• quality of ingredients and their origin.
(3) Knowledge of the information written on the label, although they do not always read
it. This type of consumer is attracted by the slogan. The information on the label is
considered excessive (information overload).
Results of the Round 3: the main difference that arises between the two panels concerns
the importance and reputation of brands purchased, which arises especially for the
medium-low educated participants. In the well-educated panel the participants showed
variability in also choosing private labels in many cases, because they are able to detect
the quality. Their difficulty in reading the label comes from a phenomenon related to the
overload of information provided, and thus the time needed to find the information of
interest. When consumers are overloaded with information that exceeds their processing
limits, they tend to base their decision making on heuristics. One major heuristic that
consumers use is centred on brands (Chrysochou, 2010). As a result, instead of evaluating
products from multiple characteristics, consumers may base their choice on the brand,
which is taken as a proxy for product-related characteristics.
BFJ 3.2 The quantitative approach through a binary logistic regression model
119,8 In order to investigate the phenomenon from an empirical point of view, a survey was then
conducted taking into account the economic literature and the findings from the focus groups.
A total of 240 face-to-face questionnaires were administered in the town of Benevento
(southern Italy) through reasoned choice non-probability sampling. The interviews were
conducted face-to-face in September, October and November 2013 by interviewing the purchaser
1846 after shopping in a major retail shop. In order to have different groups of consumers within the
sample, the questionnaires were administered at three different times: in the morning from 09.30
to 12.30, in the late afternoon from 16:30 to 18:00 and in the evening from 19:00 to 20:30.
The variables selected in the questionnaire are based on the theory identified by the
economic literature in similar studies and from the focus group conducted. The questionnaire
was divided into four parts. The first part contains questions related to consumption habits.
The second part focusses on the intrinsic and extrinsic attributes that affect food choice. In this
stage, the interviewee has to measure the importance he or she attaches to food product
attributes, including: environmental certification, such as water footprint and carbon footprint,
as well as ethical aspects; information on the interviewee’s ability to read the label and the
difficulty in understanding it. There are also questions on the ability to read attributes of an
intrinsic nature, such as the ability to understand GDAs, red traffic light symbols on products,
and the importance given to traceability in the food chain. To this end, during the questionnaire
the interviewer showed the respondents the symbols for certifications. The symbols showed in
the questionnaire were for the carbon footprint, the water footprint, the FSC, fair trade and red
traffic lights. Moreover, to avoid contamination from the brand effect, the interviewer only
showed symbols printed on blank paper rather than showing symbols printed directly on a
specific food product package. In the last part of the questionnaire the consumer’s data are
recorded, including gender, age, educational level, occupation and household characteristics.
The first step in analysing the data was to identify the outcomes that could summarize
sustainable consumption in order to obtain a scale of merit of consumer behaviour. We have
proposed the typology of the virtuous consumer who behaves according to different
sustainable consumption characteristics. On the basis of questionnaire data, we identified
six behaviours that indicate sustainable consumption: purchase of local products, consume
only seasonal fruit, prefer products with recyclable packaging, pay attention to the fat
content in foods, give importance to traceability and purchase products only in the place of
origin. For this purpose two dichotomous variables Y were computed that are able to
combine the different dimensions.
Table I shows the frequency percentage of the responses on the basis of individual behaviour.
In this research framework, in order to identify the dichotomous variable ( y),
we classified the respondent as a “virtuous consumer” when she/he fulfils at least five of the
six choices of consumption shown in Table I. Value 1 ¼ at least five of the aforesaid correct
behaviours and otherwise (value 0). To this end, in order to identify the main determinants
of the virtuous consumer, four binary logistic regression models were constructed. These
models are appropriate when the response takes one of only two possible values
representing success or failure, or more generally the presence or absence of an attribute of
interest. The aim was to identify the main factors determining the “at risk” virtuous
consumer according to: demographic characteristics; food and nutrition value system;
experience, knowledge and the information content of products; and institutional factors
and marketing.
Here are the specifications of the models:

log it ð5; 6corrbehÞ ¼ b0 þb1 agei1 þb2 gender i2 þb3 edlevi3

þb4 childreni4 þb5 residencei5 þei (1)
Sl. no. Sustainable behaviour Answers Frequencies
Consumer
understanding
1 Purchase local product (a) Yes, often or every time 38.7 and choices
(b) Sometimes or never 61.3
2 Eat only seasonal fruit (a) Yes 68.1
(b) No 31.9
3 Prefer products with recyclable packaging (a) Yes, often or every time 19.3
(b) Sometimes 80.7 1847
4 Pay attention to the fat content in foods (a) Enough or a lot 89.1
(b) No or little 10.9
5 Give importance to traceability (a) Yes 79.8
Table I.
(b) No 20.2 Frequencies
6 Purchase products only in the place of origin (a) Yes 64.7 distribution of six
(b) No 35.3 sustainable
Source: The authors’ own elaboration consumption (added)

log it ð5; 6corrbehÞ ¼ b0 þb1 energyi1 þb2 meat i2 þb3 proteinsi3 þb4 salt i4 þei (2)

log it ð5; 6corrbehÞ ¼ b0 þb1 instr i1 þb2 ingred i2 þb3 GM Oi3

þb4 watf oot i4 þb5 carbf oot i5 þb6 bioi6 þei (3)


log it ð5; 6corrbehÞ ¼ b0 þb1 brand i1 þb2 discount i2 þb3 qualityi3 þei (4)

4. Results and discussion

The results according the socio-demographic characteristics reveal that the propensity to
practice virtuous behaviour, irrespective of the presence of children, is higher among women
and adults than in men and elderly people, especially if living in rural areas. Indeed, people
living in the countryside are more conscious of nature and its products, respecting the
seasonal food cycles. Let us remember that the response of the model contains the following
variables: purchase of local products, habit of eating seasonal fruit and vegetables, attention
to traceability and purchase in the place of production. According to the focus groups’ major
findings, the level of education increases awareness and therefore the need to have good
behaviour, such that highly educated people are five times more virtuous than those with a
lower level of education (see Table II).
As can be expected, the virtuous behaviour consumer is very attentive to the energy
value of foods and he/she pays attention to ingredients (e.g. the quantity and type of salt).
Results for the consumers who eat meat daily seem contrary to expectations, also due to the
fact that none of the highly virtuous consumers eats meat every day, but it is also true that
the type of meat was not specified in the survey (there is a nutritional difference between red
and white meat!) (Table III).
Experience, knowledge and the information content of products make a difference,
especially regarding the label’s instructions, the attention paid to ingredients and the
purchase of organic products. Indeed, consumers who are conscious of product information
are twice as likely to be part of the virtuous consumer group; consumers who pays a lot of
attention to ingredients have a five times higher probability of being part of the virtuous
consumer group; and those who often buy organic products have a six times higher
probability. In other words, even if they still consider the instructions on the labels to be
BFJ Variables % of virtuous people Odds ratios Sig.
119,8
Gender
Male 21.6 1
Female 30.5 1.551 *
Age class
1848 Young (19-34) 30.6 ns
Adult (35-59) 29.3 3.638 **
Old (60or over) 8.3 1
Educational level
Upper secondary school 17.4 1
Higher secondary school 24.4 2.265
At least tertiary 35.3 4.196
Children in the household
Yes 26.7 ns
No 28.1 1
Residence
Rural 36.0 3.577 ***
Table II.
Consumer’s virtuous Suburb 35.7 2.832 ***
behaviour according Urban 17.3 1
to socio-demographic Constant 0.020 ***
characteristics Notes: Results of the binary logistic regression model. *p o0.1; **p o0.05; ***p o0.01

Variables % of virtuous people Odds ratios Sig.

Attention paid to salt

Items 1-3 (low-medium) 20.0 1
Items 4-5 (high) 35.6 1.787 **
Attention paid to energetic value
Items 1-3 (low-medium) 7.7 1
Items 4-5 (high) 30.2 5.233 **
Animal vs vegetal proteins
Agree 30.4 ns
Disagree 25.9 1
Read more 26.1 ns
Meat consumption
Everyday 0 ns
Table III.
Consumer’s virtuous 3-4 times per week 34.3 1
behaviour according Less than 3 times per week 20.0 0.433 ***
to value system of Constant 0.850 ***
food and nutrition Notes: Results of the binary logistic regression model. **p o0.05; ***p o0.01

inadequate, they often or always pay attention to the food ingredients for using the food and
they are more prone to buy organic products. The results that did not go in the direction
expected are those related to the variable that measures knowledge of the carbon and water
footprints. Quite often those who do not know what it is would seem more virtuous. It could
be the result of the fact that respondents answered without knowing the meaning of the
questions (see Table IV).
Variables % of virtuous people Odds ratios Sig.
Consumer
understanding
Are the instruction adequate? and choices
Yes 20.9 1
No 36.5 2.283 ***
Attention paid to the ingredients
Rarely or sometimes 11.1 1 1849
Often or every time 34.9 4.747 ***
Need of GMOs label
Yes 29.1 ns
No 11.1 1
Knowledge of water footprint
Yes 23.1 ns
No 28.3 1
Buy bio product Table IV.
Consumer’s virtuous
Often/every time 75.0 7.332 ***
behaviour according
Sometimes 20.9 ns to experience,
Never 33.3 1 knowledge and the
Constant 0.850 *** information content
Notes: Results of the binary logistic regression model. ***p o0.01 of products

The variables in Model 4 (see Table V) are the ones that that showed consumer loyalty to the
brand, consumer appeal to products’ discount and the importance of food product quality in
consumer choices. Emerging from this model is the significance of all variables that go in
the expected direction. The highly virtuous consumer is therefore not attracted by the brand
name and is less sensitive to special offers, but is very focussed on product quality. This is
in line with the economic literature on consumer choices (see e.g. Marotta et al., 2014), which
considers this kind of informed consumer to be able to read the label and understand the
quality without falling in a trust trap.
Thus, the virtuous consumer appears to give importance to a better food nutrition value
system, to pay more attention to ingredients and instructions on the label, to be more
attentive to environmental and sustainable attributes, to be concerned about product quality
and to be slightly influenced by brands and special offers.

Variables % of virtuous people Odds ratios Sig.

Influence of quality
Items 1-3 (low-medium) 17.2 1
Items 4-5 (high) 31.1 2.425 ***
Influence of discount
Items 1-2 (low) 25.0 ns
Item 3 (medium) 37.5 2.085 ***
Items 4-5 (high) 23.9 1
Influence of brand
Table V.
Items 1-2 (low) 20.0 ns
Relative risks of the
Item 3 (medium) 30.2 1.607 consumer’s virtuous
Items 4-5 (high) 27.7 1 behaviour according
Constant 0.135 *** to institutional factors
Notes: Results of the binary logistic regression model. ***p o0.01 and marketing
BFJ 5. Conclusions
119,8 The research was designed to study and analyse consumer behaviour towards sustainable
consumption and, therefore, which the factors are associated with virtuous consumer
behaviour. To this end, after defining the variables of interest from literature we
conducted two focus groups, divided into three rounds, to obtain some more insights for
preparing the questionnaire.
1850 Results from the focus groups are mainly in line with the findings of the empirical
analysis, highlighting the key role of education in influencing consumer attitude and
behaviour. The well-educated people give much more attention to healthy food, and are
better informed and more sensitive to environmental problems. Different is the behaviour of
the less-educated consumers, who only trust brand reputation, prefer the short chain when
possible for their purchases, and do not seem interested in buying products with sustainable
trademarks, even after understanding its meaning. It seems that for this consumer the
problem of understanding is solved by the reputation of the brand and of the distributors.
For many aspects they feel protected by institutional regulations on food production, being
interested only in origin, traceability and safe products. This is in line with the literature
(see e.g. Chrysochou, 2010): when consumers are overloaded with information that exceeds
their processing limits, they tend to base their decision making on heuristics, focussing
their purchase decision on brands as a proxy for product-related characteristics, such as
taste, quality, convenience, origin and so on, instead of evaluating products according to
multiple characteristics.
There also emerges a question linked to the clarity of the label. This problem differently
affects well- and less-educated consumers: the former see an information overload
problem, and quite often there is the problem of time to understand; the second category has
a problem with understanding the label information, and therefore could choose products
only looking at the brand. This is the problem of “rules of thumb” in purchasing decisions
that, as established in cognitive research, prevail in the following situations: when
consumers have an overload of information, when they have little time, when the problem is
not felt to be important, when there is a lack of knowledge and information, and when
specific associations between products and risk come easily to the consumer’s mind
(Pratkanis and Aronson, 1992).
Despite the appearance of attention to the environment and to healthy food, associated in
the literature with this emerging critical consumer, there remains the widespread problem of
the consumer giving little attention to information provided on the label for healthy and
sustainable food consumption and environmental protection. The consumer’s motivation to
behave virtuously is quite frequent, but it is not directly translated into sustainable food
choices. The demand for sustainable attributes is thus a latent demand: in many cases,
indeed, there is also a potential interest and sensitiveness to having sustainable behaviour in
a broad sense, but there is a lack of knowledge about how to behave to be sustainable. In the
absence of binding rules, it is necessary that the government promote information and
campaigns to generate greater awareness on sustainability in a broad sense, aiming at
increasing knowledge to drive the consumer’s choices.
Since the higher educated consumers’ attitudes and behaviour go towards healthier and
more sustainable products, through information it might be possible to generate a virtuous
circle among consumer behaviour, corporate social responsibility and policies for sustainability
with the objective of consumer well-being and reducing social costs. Creating this awareness
could promote the creation of competitive companies based on corporate social responsibility
through behaviour preferred by the virtuous consumer. The objective of environmental
sustainability coincides with the objective of consumer well-being and social cost reductions.
This result emerges from the study; in fact it seems that the virtuous consumer who pays
attention to the environment is concerned about product quality.
 Products with sustainable attributes can become a strategic variable and allow Consumer
companies to gain a competitive advantage, especially for small- and medium-sized understanding
enterprises. This may encourage the development of new marketing channels based on the and choices
direct relationship between the producer and the new consumer demand, increasingly
sensitive to food security issues. This may lead to virtuous results in terms of reducing
social costs related to an unhealthy diet, food waste and unsustainable consumption.
1851
Note
1. The same survey was also conducted in the Sorrento area because the intention was to make a
comparative analysis between consumers living in the inland part of Campania and those living by
the sea. Results showed that there are not significant differences between the two samples.

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Further reading
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Corresponding author
Paola Mancini can be contacted at: pmancini@unisannio.it

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