Religious Values as a Predictor of Sustainable Consumption Behaviors: A Cross-Cultural Comparison

Abstract

Many studies have assessed the relationship among basic demographics and psychographics and sustainable purchase behaviors (e.g., McDonald et al. 2006; Tanner and Wölfing Kast 2003), but research has not adequately investigated the potential influence of core religious values on sustainable purchase and non-purchase related behaviors. Therefore, the purposes of this paper are (1) to examine the influence of religion and degree of religious belief on sustainable behaviors and (2) to investigate religion's varying influence on sustainable behaviors requiring various levels of effort, and (3) to show these effects regardless of culture through a sample from two of the most advanced countries in two continents - US consumers in North America and South Korea consumers in Asia.