3.

OBJECTIVES AND HYPOTHESES DEVELOPMENT

As concern about the environment increases it is important to understand in which ways does
this reflect in individual action. It has been shown that a considerable amount of people is willing
to change some of their habits in order to preserve and protect the environment. On the other
hand, companies, for different reasons, do also have the intention of changing their practices to
reach certain ecological standards. Nevertheless, these companies' efforts are not always real or
completely true. As it has been mentioned before, some enterprises market themselves as
sustainable when the reality is not even close. Having this in mind, it is essential to understand
how people’s behavior changes around this matter.

This behavioral change has great implications for two main actors, companies, and governments.
The former needs information on how consumers react to their actions, they need to know if a
consumer will continue buying their brand despite having their reputation questioned. If this is
the case, enterprises do not have an incentive to change their practices. The latter would be the
one who should act and constrain the former’s actions. In many cases, consumers do not have the
power to impact a company’s activities, especially when we talk about conglomerates. So, this
should be the case where governments intervene and punish the negative practices partaken by
businesses.

While there is a growing body of literature trying to understand how consumer variables interact
with greenwashing, there are still some gaps to fill. Some authors have focused on green
marketing and the effect of the different ways it might be showcased, others have studied
greenwashing and its impact on green perceived risk or green trust. Likewise, researchers have
also paid attention to how it might affect the purchase intention of specific products (Barber et
al., 2012). However, there is no research comparing simultaneously if people would behave
differently if presented with green marketing in contrast to greenwashing focusing on one of the
industries that consumers are more exposed to and one with which they constantly interact, the
fashion industry.

Following the evolution of advertisements, society has been exposed to fashion publicity for
centuries, from 17th-century fashion journals to colorful high-quality printed magazines, from
door-to-door dress marketers to influencers promoting clothing brands on the internet. The
current trend is that with the rise of the internet, the popularity of social media, and the
widespread access to audiovisual content, advertisement is more integrated into our daily lives
than ever across all demographic groups. As the type of ads people are exposed to changes with
time, so does the way customers interact with them. Traditional media advertisements like TV
ads, continue to be the most popular way for people to discover a product, followed by word-of-
mouth (Mander, 2021). Nevertheless, the second most common way to find more information
and do research on a product, after search engines, is through social media (Doug, 2022).
Understandably, brands have greatly increased their marketing spending to increment their media
presence and accordingly, the fashion industry has adjusted to the current trends becoming the
higher spender in digital advertising across all industries in countries like the US (Gitnux, 2023)

However, the reasoning behind choosing the fashion industry as the subject to study is not only
limited to its closeness to day-to-day people or its continuous growth rates, but also, because of
its important impact on the planet. This is because while the financial number are positive, they
come hand in hand with other alarming ones: this sector emits more CO2 than shipping and
international flights combined, amounting to 10% of the total world’s emissions, furthermore,
20% of the plastic produced every year is associated to the manufacturing of garment, besides, it
is considered to be one of the primary polluters of clean water due to the dyes used (Dottle & Gu,
2022; Halliday, 2022). While this happens, fashion companies try to deceive consumers and
greenwash their image, which brings us to some outstanding data specific to the sector. Nearly
60% of the “green” claims made by fashion brands are considered to be greenwashing, these
brands do not have easily accessible information that proves their sustainable claims (World Bio
Market Insights, 2021).

Bearing this in mind, the objectives of this paper are the following: to understand if the
increasing importance that is given to the environment and its protection really impacts the
fashion-consuming habits of people; to verify if there is a difference between people who are
exposed to greenwashing in contrast to green marketing in variables such as intention to
purchase, recommend, switch or trust a brand in the fashion context; to identify which
demographic groups are more affected by companies falsifying or exaggerating their
environmentally positive practices; and finally, to have a better understanding of how
greenwashing could be addressed based on the importance given to it by consumers, if it could
be a joint effort between them and institutions or the latter alone.

3.1 Hypotheses

Once the objectives have been presented, the following subsection will describe the hypothesis to
be studied. As the intention of the paper is to verify parallelly the impact of greenwashing in
contrast to green marketing, each consumer variable will be associated to both concepts. So, for
each variable two hypothesis will be explained and described.

3.1.1 Purchase intention

Purchase intention refers to the likelihood of a customer acquiring a particular product or service
(Farris et al., 2010), representing an individual's deliberate intention to exert effort in purchasing
a specific brand (Spears & Singh, 2004). Many factors may influence this variable, such as price,
product quality, or the perceived value (Musharraf & Ali, 2013). But another important factor is
the type of marketing surrounding a product. Marketing has capacity to change the perceptions
and attitudes a consumer has towards a product or service; it can influence the potential buyer
into making a purchase. Understandably, if a company engages in the promotion of false claims,
a negative effect could be expected in consumers perceptions. Studies show a negative
relationship between the attitudes of consumers and deceptive marketing, and the contrary has
been found for honest advertising, both have an effect on purchase intention, the former negative
and the latter positive (Alqaysi & Zahari, 2022; Khan & Rajput, 2014).

The causal mechanism between deceptive or honest marketing and purchase intention works in
different ways. Advertising techniques work by catching a consumers’ attention, creating an
initial interest for the product or service, followed by the creation of a perceived value or benefits
based on the claims made by the brand. However, once a consumer understands or learns that
this information is false, the trust in the brand decreases damaging its reputation and image. This
will make consumer hesitant to purchase the product or even avoid the brand in the future.
Furthermore, consumer backlash could be expected, where they might show their discontent
publicly causing negative publicity. Conversely, the opposite in the positive direction might
happen if the advertising is honest (Verstraten, 2015).
These findings and mechanism could be extrapolated to the subject of this paper. Considering
that greenwashing are false claims and a type of deceptive advertisement, if can be expected that
it will have a negative impact on purchase intention of fashion products. On other hand, the
opposite can be predicted for green marketing, understanding it as a type of honest marketing, it
will have a positive impact on purchase intention. Taking this into consideration, the following
hypotheses have been developed.

H1.a: Greenwashing will negatively affect the probability that a product is purchased.

H1.b: Green marketing will positively affect the probability that a product is purchased.

3.1.2 Brand trust

Brand trust is known as the level of confidence, belief, and reliance that consumers have in a
company or brand. It takes place when a consumer trusts the claims made by a company. It
signifies the consumer's perception that the brand will deliver on its promises, maintain its
integrity, and consistently provide products or services that align with the claims and
representations made by the company (Chaudhuri & Holbrook, 2001). Brand trust in created by
companies through transparency, open communication and their capacity to honor their
commitments. This is directly related to how business present and back their sustainability
claims. If a company falsifies their practices and this is discovered or understood by its
customers, it can be expected that they would feel betrayed and as if they have been deceived by
the brand. Expectedly, this will have negative consequences on brand trust, as clients will
become skeptical of future claims made by the company questioning their integrity and honesty.
Following this logic, the next hypotheses have been developed.

H2.a: Greenwashing will negatively affect brand trust.

H2.b: Green marketing will positively affect brand trust.

3.1.3 Consumer loyalty

Customer loyalty is defined as the inclination of customers to engage in repeated transactions

with a company or brand. It is determined by the level of customer satisfaction, favorable
experiences, and the perceived value of the products or services provided by the business
(McMullan & Gilmore, 2008). Data shows that acquiring a new costumer is more expensive than
retaining a one, it is calculated to be 5 times more costly (Tidey, 2018). Consequently,
companies engage in strategies to promote consumer loyalty.

H3.a: Greenwashing will negatively affect consumer loyalty.

H3.b Green marketing will positively affect consumer loyalty.

The consequences of upholding deceptive marketing practices and its effect on consumers’
related attitudes including consumer loyalty and consumer trust: Evidence from the fashion
industry in the UAE. https://jarssh.com/ojs/index.php/jarssh/article/view/184