The adventurous tourist amidst a pandemic: Effects of personality, attitudes, and affect

To better understand travel and hospitality consumers’ purchasing behavior amidst a worldwide emergency commonly referenced as COVID-19, the present research set out to assess the impacts of sensation-seeking, consumer affect, and risk-taking attitude on consumers’ willingness to purchase travel-related activities. A sample of 775 adult U.S. consumers were recruited with the help of a professional research consulting company. Simple and multiple regression analyses were performed for the purpose of hypotheses testing. Results demonstrate that individuals with higher sensation-seeking levels, lower negative affectivity, and who identify themselves as risk-takers are more willing to engage in various travel and commercial hospitality activities. Furthermore, sensation-seeking proves to be the most influential factor in driving consumers’ willingness to purchase amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors conclude by proposing a typology (illustrated in two different grids) of consumers based on their levels of sensation-seeking (high vs. low), affect (positive vs. negative), and risk-taking attitude (high vs. low). Theoretically, the model helps predict which consumers are most likely to engage in travel-related activities despite of the challenges posed by global pandemics.

Risk Communication under Conflicting Information: The Role of Confidence in Subjective Risk Assessment

In this study, we develop a model of food consumption with a focus on the subjectively assessed risk of consumers and their degree of confidence in their risk assessment and use it to examine consumer behavior in the chaotic situation created by the Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011. The data were collected in March 2012 using a mail survey for 1300 Japanese women, the primary food purchasers. The respondents were asked to evaluate the cancer risk of eating agricultural products, which were assumed to be grown in the affected area, despite meeting national regulatory standards for radioactive materials, as a measure of their risk assessment and willingness to purchase Fukushima beef. The results show that the effect of confidence in a consumer’s risk assessment on their behavior depends on the stated risk level: when stated risk is below an estimated critical value, termed the switching point, the risk perceived by a consumer without confidence exceeds that of one with confidence. On the other hand, perceived risk is inversely related to confidence when the stated risk exceeds the switching point.

Study on the Intention of Foreign Trade Driven by Cross-Border E-Commerce Based on Blockchain Technology

Cross-border e-commerce is also facing the problems of cross-border goods selling counterfeit, long delivery time of cross-border logistics, and high cross-border payment fee in the process of development. Blockchain technology, with its characteristics of high trustworthiness, traceability, and information immutability, can be applied to the field of cross-border e-commerce, providing a new direction for cross-border e-commerce to solve these problems. At the present stage, scholars at home and abroad mainly study how blockchain technology is applied in cross-border e-commerce, explore the specific mode of combining blockchain technology with cross-border e-commerce, and lay the theoretical foundation for the application of blockchain technology in cross-border e-commerce, while less research is conducted on the application effect of blockchain technology in cross-border e-commerce. Based on this, this paper researches the influence mechanism of the application of blockchain technology in cross-border e-commerce on consumers’ willingness to purchase, explains the current situation of the application of blockchain technology in various fields of cross-border e-commerce, and on this basis, divides the quality of the blockchain system of cross-border e-commerce into three dimensions of commodity information quality, logistics service quality, and payment security.

Enhancing Sustainable Consumption in China: A Seafood Example

In recent years, market surveys on sustainable seafood consumption have analysed Chinese people’s willingness to purchase ecolabelled seafood produced and imported into China. Endogenous and exogenous determinants are thereby unveiled to explore Chinese consumers’ sustainability consciousness, purchasing decisions, and the means of bridging the divide. This article builds upon and adds to these empirical findings with a market-based and information lens. It draws inspiration from analysing the growing interest of younger and middle-class consumers in acquiring seafood information; integrative sourcing and marketing strategies of intermediary businesses to deliver such information; and awakening of public regulators to the imperative of realizing the right to information of less-informed parties. Instead of segregating these stakeholders along a linear supply chain, the study emphasizes the deepening of a consumer-centric information network underpinned by supply chain transparency and traceability. It thus aims to inform a steady shift from a production-oriented to a consumer-oriented seafood management paradigm through systematic reforms of China’s consumer law. To encourage and empower sustainable consumption, the ‘consumer’ notion needs proper broadening and consumers’ right to know should be recognized as a judicial and self-contained legal entitlement with enforcement safeguards.

Impact of ethical certifications and product involvement on consumers decision to purchase ethical products at price premiums in an emerging market context

In emerging markets, instances of increasing consumers focus on ethical aspects of the product are observed. To this end, we aim to examine the influence of two ethical certifications and two product involvement types on consumers willingness to purchase ethical products at price premiums in the Indian market. No animal cruelty certification and no child labor certification are chosen as the ethical certifications, and a shirt and a bar of soap are chosen as high and low involvement product categories. Data is collected from 206 respondents for the experiment, in which consumers willingness to purchase a product is evaluated for different product scenarios. The results of the study indicate that individuals show highest willingness to purchase products (a shirt or a soap) when both certifications (no animal cruelty, no child labor) are present. However, in comparing individual certifications, individuals prefer no animal cruelty certification for a shirt and no child labor certification for a bar of soap. The study provides insights to practitioners regarding consumers present perception of ethical aspects in the product and directions to increase sales of ethical products in the Indian market.

The Willingness to Pay for a Hypothetical Vaccine for the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

This study investigates how people in Japan perceived the severity of and probability of infection from coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), and how their willingness to purchase a hypothetical vaccine depends on these perceptions and their risk attitudes. We conducted a large-scale panel survey three times between 13 March to 13 April 2020 in Japan. By analyzing the data, we found that the perception of COVID-19 became more serious. The estimation of the fixed effect model reveals that a person becomes more willing to pay for a vaccine as the person evaluates COVID-19 as a more severe disease, considers a higher probability of infection, and becomes more risk averse. Since the sensitivity of willingness to pay for the vaccine on risk aversion increased during the period, the change in risk attitude contributed to an increase in willingness through the sensitivity channel, while it decreased through the magnitude channel.

Online Star vs. Celebrity Endorsements: The Role of Self-Concept and Advertising Appeal in Influencing Purchase Intention

Despite the fact that companies increasingly value online star endorsements as Internet celebrity economy booms, scientific knowledge on the effect of online star endorsements on consumers’ purchase intention is limited. Based on the theories of self and construal level theory, this study investigates the impact of online star vs. celebrity endorsements on purchase intention and explores the underlying mechanism as well as boundary conditions. The results of four studies reveal the following: (1) Compared with no endorsement, both celebrity endorsements and online star endorsements lead to increases in consumers’ purchase intention, with no significant difference between the two. (2) Self-concept mediates these relationships; specifically, celebrity and online star endorsements activate the ideal and actual self respectively, and enhance consumers’ willingness to purchase. (3) The effect of endorsements on consumers’ purchase intention is moderated by advertising appeals. That is, celebrity endorsements enhance purchase intention when consumers are exposed to symbolic appeals in advertisements, and online star endorsements enhance purchase intention when it is matched with functional advertising appeals.

US Consumers’ Perceptions of Raw and Cooked Broken Rice

Rice supplies about 20% of the calories to the world’s consumers. Milling removes the outer husk and bran, breaking about 20% of the rice kernels during the milling process that equates to almost 100,000,000 tons of rice annually. Broken rice is discounted in price by almost half or relegated to non-human consumption. This study seeks to understand why this large percentage of rice production is discounted for human consumption. Consumers who routinely consume rice evaluated raw and cooked rice with 5%, 10%, 20%, 30% and 40% levels of brokens. Sensory analysis indicated the appearance of raw rice with high levels of brokens affected the price consumers were willing to pay. Panelists were not able to discern sensory differences amongst cooked rice samples with different brokens percentages despite an eight-fold difference in brokens (p < 0.01). From this, we concluded that the price discounts imposed on broken rice are not because of perceived differences in the eating quality of cooked rice. Overall impression and overall texture were the two most significant determinants in willingness to purchase rice. The five cooked-rice samples with different levels of broken rice inclusion did not differ in terms of willingness to purchase.

Explore Consumers’ Willingness to Purchase Biotechnology Produced Fruit: An International Study

While food biotechnology has been widely applied and benefited the food and agriculture sector, community acceptance of biotechnology is still low. The factors that drive consumer rejection of food biotechnology have been well studied, but knowledge on the factors that drive willingness to purchase, particularly on an international level, is limited. This study aims to identify driving factors for respondents’ willingness to purchase fresh fruit produced with biotechnology, using an international survey conducted in the US, Canada, UK, France, and South Korea. While the overall willingness to purchase biotechnology produced fruit is low across countries, French consumers have the highest rate of willingness to purchase biotechnology produced fresh fruit among studied countries, followed by South Korea. The factors influencing respondents’ willingness to purchase include demographics, lifestyle, and shopping behavior. While respondents behave differently across countries, factors like environmental awareness, self-reported healthiness, and habits of eating away from home, have been found to enhance the willingness to purchase biotechnology produced fruit across countries.