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Bridging the intention-behavior gap in mobile phone recycling in China: the effect of consumers’ price sensitivity and proactive personality

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Abstract

Previous studies have dedicated great efforts in elucidating the key factors on e-waste recycling intentions, however, most of them did not involve the discrepancy between recycling intention and actual recycling behavior. This study aims to explore the intention-behavior discrepancy and the role of consumers’ price sensitivity and proactive personality in the intention-behavior transformation toward recycling obsolete mobile phone. Results from a questionnaire survey administered in Jiangsu province confirmed the recycling intention-behavior discrepancy. In terms of focused psychological factors, the results showed that the dimension of “price importance” in price sensitivity has a negative moderating effect (β =  −0.135, p < 0.05) on the recycling intention-behavior relationship, while the dimension of “price comparison” has a positive moderating effect (β = 0.095, p < 0.05) on the relationship between implementation intention and recycling behavior. Proactive personality positively moderates (β = 0.228, p < 0.001) the recycling intention-behavior relationship. A series of measures are then proposed to encourage consumers’ recycling behavior of obsolete mobile phones, including vigorously creating a more favorable atmosphere to help individuals overcome the external obstacles in recycling, further increasing formal recycling reward and enhancing consumers’ perceived value of formal recycling service, etc.

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Acknowledgements

The research was financially supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (41971259), and the Humanities and Social Science Fund of the Ministry of Education in China (19YJCZH252).

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  1. College of Economics and Management, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing, 210037, People’s Republic of China

    Wenchun Ran & Ling Zhang

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Ran, W., Zhang, L. Bridging the intention-behavior gap in mobile phone recycling in China: the effect of consumers’ price sensitivity and proactive personality. Environ Dev Sustain 25, 938–959 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10668-021-02085-6

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