Published papers

Retail malls thrive not only on foot traffic they attract but also on buyers spending at multiple retailers in the mall. While the importance of shopping momentum, i.e., buyers continuing to shop, is known, few studies have examined how mobile promotions can incentivize buyers to sustain their shopping momentum in a mall. This study examines how a mall operator targets buyers in its loyalty program with a real-time message (RTM) to encourage them to sustain their shopping momentum and spend more at the next retailer. We use a quasi-experimental design and show that the RTM has a stronger effect on heavy than light buyers. Specifically, moderate and heavy buyers are more likely to respond favorably to RTMs by sustaining shopping momentum and increasing spending at the next retailer. In contrast, the RTM has no effect on shopping momentum of light buyers, and if they continue to shop, they lower their subsequent spending. The study has important implications for retailers using mobile applications to target buyers with relevant real-time promotions to achieve desired outcomes.

Consumers increasingly adopt artificial intelligence (AI) enabled voice assistants (VAs) for transactional and non-transactional uses due to these devices’ inherent affordances, such as their ease of use and convenience. Despite the widespread adoption of VAs in recent times, consumers continue to avoid using VAs for transactional purposes. Currently, we have a limited understanding of the various antecedents and consequences of consumer decision avoidance in the context of VAs. This study aims to bridge this gap by adopting the decision avoidance theory as a theoretical lens and a convergent mixed-methods approach to identify the antecedents (i.e. cognitive biases and nudging) and consequences (i.e. rejection of VAs for transactional purposes and intention to adopt VAs for transactional purposes) of consumer decision avoidance (i.e. consumer inertia and procrastination). The study findings suggest a positive association of cognitive biases with consumer inertia, procrastination and rejection. While nudging is positively associated with procrastination and intentions, it shares a negative association with rejection. Consumer inertia is positively associated with rejection and negatively associated with intentions. Meanwhile, procrastination shares a positive association with intention and a negative association with rejection. Technology comfort has a significant moderating (negative) influence on the association between cognitive biases and intentions.

The tourism sector has been deeply ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic as many individuals abstained entirely from travel. Thus, before contemplating the trajectory of the sector's recovery, it is essential to understand individuals’ travel intentions both during and after the pandemic. The present study contributes in this regard by examining the impact of individuals’ personality traits categorised by the five-factor model, or the Big Five, on their leisure travel intentions during and after the pandemic. To this end, we utilised an artificial neural network (ANN) approach to analyse 500 responses from individuals residing in Japan. The results reveal that extraversion has the strongest relative influence on intentions to travel during the pandemic, whereas openness to experience has the strongest influence on travel intentions after the pandemic. This study is the first of its kind to examine the influence of the Big Five personality traits on travel intentions in the context of a pandemic.

The green apparel literature has previously examined the disparity between consumers' positive purchase intentions and their actual purchase behaviour. This dichotomous behaviour represents the critical ‘intention–behaviour gap’, which marketers must seek to reduce to increase sales of their products. The current study thus seeks to identify the drivers of green apparel purchase behaviour that may potentially mitigate this gap. The proposed conceptual model is grounded in the Stimulus–Organism–Behaviour–Consequence (SOBC) paradigm and is tested through an analysis of cross-sectional data collected from 387 green apparel product consumers in Japan who were sourced through Macromill Inc. The findings suggest that optimism as the stimulus is positively associated with labelling satisfaction and labelling desire, which, in turn, are positively associated with purchase intentions, representing behaviour. Furthermore, purchase intentions are positively associated with shopping routine and fully mediate the association between shopping routine and buying behaviour. The study provides interesting strategic inputs for green apparel marketers and retailers.

© 2017 Elsevier Inc. Much remains unknown about the clothing co-consumption practices of mothers and their teenage daughters, especially from a cross-cultural perspective. This study uses social comparison theory to examine how mothers engage in clothing co-consumption practices with their adolescent daughters and the effects on their likelihood of changing brands, stores, or styles. It includes 732 French and Japanese mothers who have adolescent daughters between the ages of 15 and 18 years. The structural equation modeling and qualitative analysis with structural associations reveal that Japanese mothers with high self-esteem enter into strong social comparisons, which lead to co-consumption practices (common shopping, joint purchases, clothing exchanges), whereas regardless of their levels of self-esteem, French mothers engage in social comparison processes that lead them to change their clothing styles, brands, and stores.

Although prior research has explored the relationship between religiosity and sustainable consumption in East versus West cross-cultural contexts, it has presented mixed findings. To gain a clearer and deeper understanding of the relationship between religiosity, spirituality and sustainable consumption such as green purchase intention, we conducted three studies in three diverse eastern cultures, namely India, Japan and Bangladesh, with different breakdowns of religious affiliations. With a focus on educated urban adults in three eastern nations, we extended the theory of planned behaviour by exploring the differential relationships of spirituality, religiosity, green self-identity (GSI) and individual-level cultural values on consumers' green purchase intention. We further explored the religiosity and GSI relationship and tested the mediation effect of Schwartz's personal values in Bangladesh and India. Spirituality generally positively influences green purchase intention across cultures, while religiosity's impact varies significantly, being negative in India, positive in Bangladesh and insignificant in Japan. The religiosity–sustainability pathway is also different for Bangladesh and Japan. The study explains the need for marketers to consider consumers' religiosity and spirituality as well as their cultural values and personal values in tailoring value propositions and positioning green products and communication programmes.

Customer citizenship behavior (CCB) in virtual brand communities is a topic of increasing importance in marketing management research. This type of behavior plays a critical role in the improvement of enterprises' marketing capabilities. In this study, we draw on regulatory focus theory—along with the perspectives of self-presentation and regulatory fit in relation to social identity—to construct and test a model that investigates both the main effects of regulatory foci (promotion and prevention) and the indirect effects of online self-presentation and community identification on CCB. The empirical results based on our online survey between 310 individual members of an well-known online-community in China demonstrate: (1) a promotion focus exerts a positive influence on CCB while a prevention focus exerts a negative impact; (2) the desire for online self-presentation mediates the association between regulatory foci and CCB; and (3) community identification moderates the relationship between regulatory foci and the desire for online self-presentation, as well as the mediation effect. These results have substantial implications for studying CCB within virtual brand communities.

Department stores invest in loyalty strategies that largely focus on retaining current high value customers in response to increasing competition in retail shopping. In this study, we examine the contribution of the top 20% customers for transaction frequency and value (“heavy buyers”) to the total sales, and the consistency of this contribution across departments within a store. We also investigate the heavy buyer stability over time across 3 years, from over 550 million transactions from a department store chain in East Asia. The results show that the Pareto ratio of the top 20% spenders account for 71% of revenue (and 52% of the total transactions), and the top 20% transactors represent 58% of revenue (and 62% of total transactions), which may signal the role of such heavy buyers to overall stores sales. At each department level, the heavy buyers (by value) contribute from 65% to 86% of the department revenue. Despite this, the stability of the top 20% segment over time varies greatly by department from 11% to 74%. Finally, whether high value customers in one department store also translate across departments, depends mainly on the department size in terms of its shopper penetration. The research furthers our knowledge on Pareto Law, with important implications for customer retention strategies and loyalty programs especially for retailers.

Purpose: This study aims to examine customers’ willingness to engage in service interactions enabled by artificial intelligence (AI) controlled voice assistants (VA). Drawing on the tenets of dual-factor theory, this study measures the impact of both enablers and inhibitors – mediated by trust in Alexa – on customers’ intentions to transact through VAs. Design/methodology/approach: Data from a survey of 290 users of VAs from Japan was collected through “Macromill”. The authors used a covariance-based path analysis technique for data analysis after establishing the validity and reliability of the measures. Findings: The results of this study demonstrate that convenience and status-seeking act as enablers and positively influence trust in VAs, whereas risk barrier acts as an inhibitor and negatively influence trust in VAs. In turn, trust in VAs positively influences the intention to use VAs for transactional service interactions. This association is positively moderated by technology comfort. Originality/value: This study applies dual-factor theory to the context of VAs – a context that scholars have, to date, examined solely from a technology adoption perspective. For the first time, the authors adopt a dual-factor approach to identify a new set of antecedents for customers’ intentions to use VAs for transactional service interactions.

The gravity of the electronic waste (e-waste) crisis can be attributed to consumers' low participation in ensuring the proper disposal of such materials. Motivating consumers to recycle e-waste requires a deeper understanding of the dimensions that underlie behavioral intentions. Accordingly, the present study uses the novel framework of Valence Theory (VT) to examine how consumers evaluate their decision to recycle e-waste. The authors propose an extended VT model incorporating consumer values (value compatibility, openness to change, and environmental concerns), which is validated using cross-sectional survey data from 774 Japanese consumers. We also examine the role of different moderators resembling consumers' e-waste recycling behavior. The findings support the moderation hypotheses and suggest that intentions to recycle e-waste are affected by value compatibility, environmental concerns, and the perceived benefits of engaging in this behavior. Thus, the study has important implications for decision-makers, policymakers, and researchers interested in gaining deeper insights into issues surrounding consumers' e-waste recycling intentions.

The consumption of organic food is gaining ground globally due to consumers’ concerns for personal health and food safety. Several countries, such as Japan, are turning their focus to promoting organic food consumption, but research is scarce on Japan's organic food market. Additionally, despite consumers’ positive predisposition, retail sales in Japan for organic food are low, and there is a need to understand the reason for this disparity. The present study addressed this need by examining factors that may drive consumers’ willingness to purchase (WTP) and stated buying behavior (SBB) toward organic food through the Stimulus–Organism–Behavior–Consequence (SOBC) paradigm. The developed model was tested using cross-sectional data collected from 928 Japanese consumers. Study findings suggest that food safety concerns (FSC) and health consciousness are positively related to openness to change, and ethical self-identity. Further, openness to change and ethical self-identity are positively associated with WTP, while SBB is positively associated with WTP. In addition to this, buying frequency positively moderated the association of self-identity with WTP and WTP with SBB. The study offers critical implications for researchers, marketers and retailers.

Consumption patterns across the globe indicate consumers’ rising interest in purchasing organic food due to increasing personal-health consciousness. However, research on organic food shows a low translation of this interest into stated preferences for purchasing organic food. Limited academic research has explored this puzzling buying behavior of consumers, particularly in developed economies such as Japan. Our study addresses this gap by examining the factors that facilitate or inhibit Japanese consumers’ buying behavior toward organic food. We use the Stimulus-Organism-Response framework, Innovation Resistance Theory, and Dual-Factor Theory to examine these factors by analyzing data collected from 928 consumers. We propose that health consciousness is a stimulus that has a positive impact on facilitators (natural content, nutritional content, and ecological welfare) as well as inhibitors (usage, risk, and value barriers). We further argue that stated buying behavior is the outcome of both facilitators and inhibitors. The findings confirm that health consciousness is positively associated with all facilitators and inhibitors. The analysis also reveals that all three facilitators and two inhibitors (value and risk barriers) are associated with stated buying behavior. Furthermore, buying involvement (BI) positively moderates the associations between stated buying behavior and nutritional content (facilitator) as well as risk barrier (inhibitor). Gender moderates the association of all facilitators and risk barrier with stated buying behavior.

Consumers' increased knowledge and awareness of environmental issues have not translated into a pervasive rise in purchasing green apparel, resulting in a phenomenon known as the ‘attitude-behaviour gap’. The current study seeks to explicate this gap by examining the drivers of green apparel buying behaviour. Towards this end, the study examines the association of environmental knowledge, green trust, and environmental concern with environmental attitude and green apparel buying behaviour. It further investigates the association of labelling desire and labelling satisfaction with this type of buying behaviour as well. In addition, the study uses the theoretical lens of the knowledge-attitude-behaviour model and attitude-behaviour-context theory to anchor its hypotheses. Cross-sectional data from 387 Japanese consumers analysed to test the conceptual model revealed that green trust, environmental attitude, and labelling satisfaction are positively associated with green apparel buying behaviour. Furthermore, green trust, environmental concern, and environmental attitude partially mediate the proposed associations, while age and gender moderate the association between environmental knowledge and environmental concern. The study's empirical insights thus lay the foundation for future research in this area and provide strategically relevant inferences for green apparel marketers and retailers.

Each year, millions of tons of electronic waste (or e-waste) are generated worldwide, thus, fueling concerns among scholars, practitioners, policymakers, and governments about e-waste recycling and management. The past few years have witnessed a growing interest among scholars to examine the behavioral issues concerning e-waste recycling. However, most of the existing studies have focused on adopting e-waste recycling and related innovations. It is already known that ‘reasons for’ and ‘reasons against’ the adoption of any innovation are quantitatively different. The current study bridges this gap by utilizing a novel consumer behavior framework called behavioral reasoning theory (BRT) to study e-waste recycling attitudes and intentions. The study examined the relative influence of ‘reasons for’ and ‘reasons against’ in predicting attitude and intentions within the context of e-waste recycling by using a single framework. The developed model was tested using structural equation modeling with 774 Japanese consumers. The study also examined the moderating role of environmental assessment and environmental concerns in influencing the studied associations. The results suggest that ‘reasons for’ was positively associated with attitude and intentions. The consumer values shared negative associations only with ‘reasons against.’ The study findings offer interesting insights for service providers, policymakers, and governments.