Guilt and Pride Emotions and their Influence on the Intention of Purchasing Green Products

Abstract

The aim of this paper was to analyze the influence of feelings of guilt and pride in the intention of buying green products by consumers considered sustainable. Guilt and pride are two constructs that shapes people’s actions to avoid guilt-making behaviors and keep those proud, making it important to assess how these two constructs act when it comes to sustainability-related actions, in this case for green products. For this purpose, a descriptive quantitative research was used, with the survey of data performed through a survey and analyzed through multivariate statistics through the SPSS. The results showed that the emotion of guilt was identified as a stimulus factor for the purchase of green products, as a variable that would prevent the consumer to develop unsustainable behaviors, and the feeling of pride was not identified in the respondents, when researching the influence that exerts in the intention of consumers to buy green products. The result contributes to researches in sustainability field by corroborating and at the same time contrasting with research considered incipient that relate emotions to sustainable consumer behavior, opening opportunities for further research on the influence of emotions in consumers behavior in sustainability area.