When do consumers value ethical attributes? The role of perceived quality in gift-giving

Abstract

Although research demonstrates the importance of ethical product attributes for consumers, a prior study has not examined the role of consumption target (i.e. self-purchases vs gift-giving) on consumers’ preference for products with ethical attributes. Notably, consumers’ preference for quality can differ between self-purchases and gifts, and the presence of ethical attributes can impact product quality perceptions. The purpose of this paper is to examine how the presence of ethical attributes alters decision-making in a gift-giving context using perceptions of product quality as an explanatory variable for these differences.