The Role of Health Consciousness in the Impact of Environmental Concerns on Organic Food Purchase Intention in Türkiye

Özet

Purpose- Egoistic, altruistic, and biospheric value(s) orientations are essential to understanding environmental behavior. This study aims to explore the direct and health consciousness-mediated indirect effects of egoistic, altruistic, and biospheric concerns on organic food purchase intentions using social-cognitive theory and value-belief-norm (VBN) theoretical perspectives. Design/Methodology/Approach- The data were obtained from the participants using the convenience sampling method through an online survey to test the hypotheses. The data was analyzed by confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and the bootstrap-based SPSS PROCESS macro. Results- The results reveal that participants' egoistic and altruistic concerns about the environment positively affect their intentions to purchase organic food, and participants with higher health consciousness have a higher potential to buy organic food. Accordingly, participants' health consciousness mediates the relationship between individuals' egoistic and altruistic concerns towards the environment and their intention to purchase organic food. However, participants' biospheric environmental concerns negatively affect their intention to purchase organic food. Discussion- This study examined the direct effects of individuals' egoistic, altruistic and biospheric environmental concerns on their intention to purchase organic food and their indirect effects through their health consciousness. Accordingly, among participants with different levels of egoistic and altruistic environmental concerns, individuals with higher health consciousness have higher intentions to purchase organic food.