Sustainability awareness and willingness to pay for organic food: Mediating role of self-esteem and self-reward

Abstract

This study aims to examine the influences of sustainability awareness on consumers’ willingness to pay for organic foods with self-esteem and self-reward as mediators. Employing Self-Determination Theory (SDT) as the theoretical framework, the study examines how self-esteem and self-reward impact on sustainable consumer behaviour. Data were obtained from 216 respondents through structural equation modelling (SEM) as this study adopted a quantitative approach. The findings suggest that sustainability awareness has a significant impact on self-esteem and self-reward, which act as a mediator between sustainability awareness and willingness to pay for organic food. By applying the tenets of self-determination theory, this study offers significant theoretical contributions relevant to a novel area of research, namely sustainable consumer behaviour and valuable practical recommendations to marketers and policymakers interested in encouraging the purchase of organic foods. There are significant implications for theory and practice based on the findings, which indicate that increasing the sustainability consciousness and appealing to psychological incentives may result in greater consumer acceptance of premium sustainable goods. The study’s limitations, such as the cross-sectional research design and the focus on a single product category, are also presented, and recommendations for future investigations to consider other contexts and other psychological constructs are provided.