Investigating Sustainable Consumption Behaviours: A US-China Perspective

In this paper we examine the sustainable consumption behaviours of two culturally distinct nations-America and China – utilising an online panel survey of 1,018 adult panel respondents in America and 1025 adult panel respondents in China. We investigate the influence of the multiple constructs of materialism, social consumption motivation, environmental concern and pro-environmental self-identity on American and Chinese consumers' sustainable consumption behaviours and whether pro-environmental self-identity acts as a mediating variable in these relationships. Our findings reveal cultural differences and similarities across our constructs, with pro-environmental self-identity emerging as a mediator, to varying degrees, in both cultures. An important cultural difference in China also materialised, namely the 'positive effect' of materialism on Chinese consumer's sustainable consumption – green materialism-which is counter to Western evidence and raises important questions about the meaning of consuming sustainably. Overall our use of these multiple constructs, combined with Eastern and Western data, enables us to enrich research evidence to increase understanding of (non)sustainable consumption behaviour and how this behaviour can begin to be advanced. It is evident that cultural tailoring of sustainability marketing strategies is necessary, and long-overdue and further cultural research is necessary to inform the effective design and delivery of them.