What Roles Do Attitudes and Recycling Trust Play in the Recycling Behavior of Urban Residents of Used Clothing in China?—An Analysis Based on Extended VBN Theory

The rapid rise of the fast fashion industry not only accelerated the growth of the textile industry, but also caused environmental pollution problems of a large number of waste clothing. As a populous country in the world and has a huge textile industry, China’s urban residents’ willingness to recycle waste clothing plays a vital role in global environmental protection. The purpose of this study is to adopt the value belief norm (VBN) theoretical framework and introduce two additional constructs of attitude and recycling trust to explore their role in promoting residents’ waste clothing recycling behavior. A valid sample of 1,529 was collected by questionnaire survey and analyzed by structural equation model (SEM). The validity of VBN theory and its extended construct attitude and recycling trust in predicting clothing recycling behavior was verified. The results show that the personal norms (PN) significantly indirectly affect the behavior of recycling behavior by affecting its attitude and trust in the recycling system, and the mediating effect of recycling trust is more significant than that of attitude. This shows that strengthening public confidence in the reliability of recycling systems is an important way to promote recycling behavior. This study not only provides a solid theoretical basis for formulating more effective recycling strategies in the future, but also clarifies the specific practical direction, which is of great significance for promoting a wider range of waste clothing recycling actions.