Validating Antecedent Factors Affecting Ethical Purchase Behavior: Comparing the Effect of Customer Citizenship versus Corporate Citizenship

Abstract

The objective of this study was to verify the influence of corporate image and subjective norms on consumers’ purchase intention of a firm’s products. Another important objective was to determine what kind of citizenship—corporate citizenship or customer citizenship—has a greater impact on the relationships between corporate image and purchase intention, and between subjective norms and purchase intention. The findings suggest that both ethical corporate image and subjective norms have positive effects on ethical purchase intention, and that both corporate and customer citizenship significantly moderate this causal relationship. Specifically, we found that corporate citizenship exerted greater impact as a moderator than customer citizenship on ethical purchase behavior. This finding has important theoretical/practical implications as it highlights the weighted attention to be paid to individual versus corporate focus in the study of ethical consumption behavior. In particular, the finding sheds light on the importance of subjective norms as a social peer pressure mechanism since ethical consumption is embedded with socially responsible consumption behavior.

1. Introduction

Recently, consumers’ interest in corporate social responsibility issues, such as enhancing corporate management transparency, practicing ethical management, promoting corporate citizenship, and strengthening corporate ethics, has significantly increased. Coupled with this is the view that the customer and firms should share a two-way reciprocal relationship where customers not only express their opinions on the production and delivery of products or services, but also even actively participate in such processes. Related studies show that positive customer participation behavior improves overall service quality and ultimately contributes to customer satisfaction [1,2].

Customer citizenship behavior refers to activities in which consumers engage in positive purchasing and consumption activities, contributing to organizational interests rather than merely pursuing personal gains. Customer citizenship has been mostly conceived as voluntary customer behavior, such as positive word of mouth and recommendation behavior to other customers [3]. In the past, perceived customer citizenship has drawn attention from many scholars for its role as a normative driver of interaction between companies and consumers, and for its positive influence on other customers [1,4,5]. The main tenet of customer citizenship behavior is the notion that the customer’s discretionary, participatory behavior that occurs in reaction to a company’s corporate activities enhances a company’s sales performance, and is largely composed of three factors, i.e., customer participation, customer cooperation, and brand loyalty [6]. Furthermore, customer citizenship was found to enhance customer loyalty towards the firm [7]. It was previously found that corporate legitimacy, consumer–corporate identification, and trust contribute to customer citizenship behavior [8].

In contrast to customer citizenship, where customers act as agents, corporate citizenship refers to social contribution activities, social investments, philanthropic programs, and participation in public policies initiated by companies [9]. It denotes corporate efforts to fulfill the firm’s obligations as a legal citizen of society, aiming to improve the overall image of the company. Several previous studies already confirmed the effect of enhanced corporate image on increased purchase intention of the citizen companies [10,11,12,13].

Although the locus of action differs for customer citizenship and corporate citizenship, they share the same goal of achieving higher customer loyalty through an evaluation of diverse information sources that relate to a firm’s image as an ethically viable or socially responsible firm.

Based on this theoretical explanation, one can raise a pertinent question as to which of the two citizenship behaviors contributes more to a firm’s overall performance in terms of increased purchase intention of customers.

However, so far, it is difficult to find existing studies that attempted to compare the role of these two concepts in promoting purchase behavior and how these two concepts interact with other aspects of consumers’ evaluations of a firm in order to enhance the firm’s performance. This study incorporated two facets of firm evaluation: one assesses an ethical corporate image perceived by consumers, and the other measures consumer’s self-assessed degree of complying with social norms, that is, subjective norms. Adoption of the two predictors was backed up by a rationale that corporate image would interact closely with corporate citizenship perception, whereas subjective norms would interact with customer citizenship.

The purpose of this study was firstly to verify the influence of corporate image and subjective norms on consumers’ purchase intention of the firm’s products. Another important focus of this study was, as noted earlier, to determine what kind of citizenship, namely corporate citizenship or customer citizenship, has a greater impact on the relationships between corporate image and purchase intention, and between subjective norms and purchase intention. The results of this study could have theoretical as well as practical implications as to whether corporate performance is subject to the locus of citizenship behavior. This finding is particularly important in light of the increased demand of customers to create shared value with firms.

2. Theoretical Background and Hypotheses

2.1. Relationship between Corporate Image and Ethical Purchase Intention

Given the chance, consumers would prefer companies that have the right outlook in terms of legal and ethical aspects of business activities. In view of corporate management activities, good corporate citizens value relationships with key stakeholders such as consumers, employees, and communities, and observe laws. Furthermore, good corporate citizens act in accordance with the rules and regulations of the business ecosystem.

There have been a few studies that investigated the relationship between the corporate image of firms that practice socially responsible business strategies and customers’ increased intention to support such companies [14,15,16]. For instance, CSR activities were found to have a significant positive effect on improving corporate reputation and corporate trust, which eventually increased the purchase intention [17]. In addition, other studies found that the better a company performs charitable and ethical responsibilities, the more it builds corporate trust and enhances corporate reputation [18,19]. Therefore, the image of a company may be viewed in close relation to perceived customer citizenship because the corporate image of a firm displaying desirable traits would influence customers to engage in citizenship behavior such as customer participation, customer cooperation, and loyalty [1,4,6]. However, the existing literature has mostly identified the relationship between corporate image and firm performance from a non-ethical perspective, with few studies proving the impact of the ethical side of corporate image on ethically motivated purchase behavior [16,20]. Hence, this study focuses on the ethical aspect of corporate image to verify whether it influences consumers’ intention to patronize the company.

2.2. Relationship between Subjective Norms and Ethical Purchase Intention

Subjective norms refer to the self-imposed convictions that affect one’s behavior that are reinforced by the desire to comply with referent others [21,22]. This concept has also been approached as one facet of social influence or social pressure to comply with dominant norms [23]. From a behavioral point of view, social norms can be interpreted as the self-imposed perception of social pressure that leads to certain behavior that is socially desirable [24].

According to Fishbein’s [21] Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA), subjective norms are determined by two factors simultaneously: normative beliefs and motivation to comply. Subjective norms have been confirmed to influence purchase behavior in many previous studies [22,25].

Applying subjective norms in the theoretical framework of this study, it is arguable that corporate image does not directly affect purchase behavior, but affects behavior through subjective evaluation of the behavior through social pressure imposed on buying products from ethical firms. With this rationale, this study modified the definition used by Fishbein and Ajzen [21] to conceptually define it as ‘the extent to which one subjects the purchase of ethical firm’s products to the social pressure from the reference group’. It was assumed that subjective norms for ethical companies are significant indicators that induce consumers to engage in desired purchase behavior.

In sum, based on the theoretical arguments discussed so far, this study predicts that not only the corporate image toward ethical companies but also subjective norms will have a significant effect on consumers’ purchase behavior, so the following hypotheses are proposed.

Hypothesis 1a (H1a).

The ethical corporate image of a firm has a positive effect on ethical purchase intention.

Hypothesis 1b (H1b).

Subjective norms of ethical firms have a positive effect on ethical purchase intention.

2.3. Moderating Effect of Corporate Citizenship

Ethically motivated purchase behavior normally takes place through a complex set of antecedents that reflect ethical corporate image and consumers’ moral beliefs. For instance, Hong (2010) classifies ethical consumption based on the consumption process, resource allocation behaviors, and the purchase process of goods and services. This clearly indicates that ethically driven consumer behavior takes different forms and processes. Typically, green consumption and eco-friendly consumption behavior have been cited as the representative behaviors of ethical buyers [20]. In addition, it was found that the more consumers perceive CSR activities by retailers which implement equitable pricing policies, the more consumers show citizenship behavior towards those retailers [3].

Corporate citizenship, as discussed earlier, refers to a company’s core business activities, social investment, charitable programs, and social contribution activities [9]. In other words, it includes a host of socio-economic activities to fulfill the firm’s obligations as a legal citizen of society. Corporate citizenship from the perspective of management is closely related to the degree of fulfillment of economic, legal, ethical, and discretionary responsibilities imposed by stakeholders. As Carroll [14] argued, corporate citizenship is mainly embodied through economic, legal, and ethical corporate citizenship; this view was supported by Maignan and Ferrell [26], who posited that ethical responsibility, in particular, encourages companies to make efforts to uphold social customs, and promotes ethical corporate image. In a similar context, Brown and Dacin [27] contend that corporate citizenship makes consumers feel good about a company or its products and has a positive effect on purchase intention.

These research results support the tenet that the higher the corporate citizenship propensity, the more it plays a role in forming a positive corporate image of an ethical firm, which positively influences consumers’ purchase decision.

To sum up the research findings discussed above, consumers who have a high level of corporate citizenship perception will demand a higher level of ethical corporate image than those who have a lower level of corporate citizenship, and this will lead to stronger purchase intention of goods produced by such firms with ethical corporate image. Based on this rationale, the following hypotheses is proposed.

Hypothesis 2 (H2).

Corporate citizenship positively moderates the relationship between ethical corporate image and ethical purchase intention.

2.4. Moderating Effect of Customer Citizenship

Customer citizenship is conceived as voluntary out-of-role customer behavior, such as positive word of mouth and recommendation behavior to other customers at service points, and has been proven to have a positive effect on service quality by giving feedback to service providers [6,28]. According to social exchange theory, when customers receive recognition for their contribution to the production and delivery of services by the service organization, customers increase their sense of loyalty to the organization and ultimately demonstrate citizen behavior. A study by Ping [29] and Lee [30] demonstrated that the more the customer is satisfied with customer services, the higher the customer’s perceived customer citizenship. In addition, it was found that corporate legitimacy, consumer–corporate identification, and trust have positive effects on customer citizenship behavior [8]. Previous studies also showed that the behavioral outcome of customer citizenship is the enhancement of customer loyalty to the firm [4,5,7].

This study proposes that customer citizenship interacts with consumers’ subjective norms about ethical consumption as a moderator to positively affect ethical purchase behavior. In order to fully appreciate this mechanism, one can take up eco-friendly consumption behavior as an example. Eco-friendly consumption behavior involves purchasing eco-friendly products or eco-friendly and organic agricultural products [31] and thus may be considered as a typical manifestation of citizenship behavior because it is a voluntary activity that enhances societal interests rather than personal gains [32,33]. Thus, it is not difficult to understand that this citizenship behavior is closely linked to one’s subjective norms about environmental concerns or eco-oriented values. That is, people who are highly aware of environmental issues would hold a high degree of social norms or beliefs about environmental problems and readily comply with referent others. Therefore, consumers with a high level of customer citizenship towards environmentally conscious firms as opposed to those with a lower level of customer citizenship would exhibit a stronger intention of purchasing the firm’s products. Based on this theory-based prediction, the following hypothesis is proposed.

Hypothesis 3 (H3).

Customer citizenship positively moderates the relationship between subjective norms and ethical purchase intention.

3. Research Method

3.1. Research Model

The main purpose of this study was to examine the effect of ethical corporate image and subjective norms on consumers’ purchase intention, and to investigate whether corporate citizenship and customer citizenship have moderating effects in these relationships. To this end, a research model was built, shown in Figure 1, drawing on the research hypotheses.

3.2. Research Data

The data used for this study were obtained from a population of the general public (20 years of age or older) who reside in Seoul and Gyeonggi-do, Korea, and who had previous experience participating in ethical consumption within the past 6 months. To anchor this as a sample selection criterion, we provided the following screening statement: ‘Please answer the following question regarding your previous purchase experiences. If you answered ‘yes’ to the following question, please proceed with completing the survey questionnaire: Within the past 6 months, have you bought products while basing your purchase decision on your moral or ethical norm or beliefs about the firm selling the product?’ The survey was conducted after pretesting 50 sampled respondents to ensure the validity of the question items in terms of semantic accuracy and syntax fluency. A total of 330 questionnaires were distributed, and 300 copies were used for data analysis, excluding the questionnaires with low reliability or incomplete answers.

3.3. Study Measures

3.3.1. Operational Definition of Variables

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Ethical Corporate image

Ethical corporate image was defined in this study as ‘an aggregate collection of impressions about a firm’s corporate activities that implements legal and ethical obligations for their customers’, drawing from Carroll’s definition [14]. The measurement scale was drawn from Carroll [14] to reflect legal and moral points of view and perceptions about an ethical firm, and it included the following six items: ‘The quality of the ethical firm will be good’, ‘The price of ethical firm’s products will be reasonable’, ‘The image of ethical firm’s products will be luxurious’, ‘The ethical firm’s products will be reliable’, ‘The ethical firm’s products are recommendable to people’, and ‘The ethical firm’s products are preferable to non-ethical firms’. The items are measured on a 7-point Likert scale.

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Subjective Norms

Subjective norms refer to the degree to which consumers perceive social pressure to use or not use a product or service. The measurement items were adapted from Fishbein and Ajzen’s [21] original scale and include the following five items: ‘I mainly buy products based on my own moral beliefs’, ‘Many people recognize me for my consumption behavior based on moral beliefs’, ‘Many people around me recommend me to use the products of firms that actively carry out social responsibility’, ‘My reference group thinks highly of my eco-friendly consumption behavior’, and ‘My close acquaintances think highly of my purchase of ethical products’. The items were scored on a Likert 7-point scale.

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Corporate Citizenship

Research on perceived corporate citizenship is defined as a collection of corporate activities surrounding economic, legal, ethical, and philanthropic responsibilities. We adapted a scale developed by Maignan [34]. Economic corporate citizenship includes items such as ‘The firm compensates for customer complaints regardless of business procedure’, ‘The firm works hard for the improvement of service and product quality’, ‘The firm successfully realizes maximum profit’, ‘The firm makes an effort to lower production cost’, and ‘The firm closely monitors employee productivity’. Legal citizenship contain items such as ‘The firm managers provide information on business-related laws and regulations’, ‘The firm always implements contracts and agreements honestly’, ‘The firm managers strictly observe laws within the organization’, and ‘The firm has an internal policy to prevent discrimination in employee compensation and promotion’. Ethical corporate citizenship include items such as ‘The firm has a comprehensive and extensive code of ethics’, ‘The firm’s CEO monitors the firm’s potentially negative influences on community welfare’, ‘I consider the firm as a trustworthy organization, and ‘The firm handles employees’ illegal acts prudently through proper procedures’. Finally, philanthropic citizenship items include ‘The firm supports employees who want to get a higher education’, ‘The firm supports the local community activities through employee involvement’, ‘The firm is doing sufficient amount of philanthropy activities (donation, volunteer work)’, ‘We are promoting partnerships with local communities and schools’, and ‘The firm supports sports and cultural and artistic activities’. The scale is measured on a 7-point Likert scale.

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Customer Citizenship

Customer citizenship refers to an individual consumer’s voluntary and discretionary choice behavior regardless of the request or reward expectation. This study adapted a scale developed by Niehoff and Moorman [35] which consists of ten items composed of ethical behavior and consumer participation behavior. The ethical behavior includes items ‘If I hear the impending price hike of a product, I buy a large quantity of them’, ‘I do not pay attention even if unnecessary lights are turned on in the middle of the day’, ‘If there is a campaign to collect milk cartons for recycling, I will actively participate’, ‘If a product is still useful, I hardly replace it with a new one’, and ‘I am willing to share pain if it helps to improve environmental problems’. Next, the scale for consumer participation includes items such as ‘I am willing to exchange information with service providers about my in service experience’, ‘I like sharing positive word of mouth about the good service experience with other customers’, ‘I willingly participate in consumer groups to share information about the firm’, ‘I enjoy being rewarded by the firm for my citizenship behavior’, and ‘I always give the firm my suggestions to improve service productivity’. All of the scale items were constructed on a 7-point Likert scale.

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Ethical Purchase Intention

Ethical purchase intention refers to the socially responsible consumption behavior of individual consumers who have ethical beliefs and values. Ethical consumption in this study drew from a scale developed by Hong [1]. It uses items related to consumption behavior that realizes social responsibility according to consumers’ individual and moral beliefs, with items ‘I am willing to buy ethical products with a view to practicing social responsibility’, ‘I am willing to participate in non-purchase campaign against socially, environmentally detrimental products’, ‘I try hard to patronize ethical products’, and ‘I volunteer to use eco-friendly, recyclable products’. All measures are based on a 7-point Likert scale.

3.3.2. Composition of the Question Items

The questionnaire used in this study consisted of 6 questions on ethical corporate image as an independent variable, 5 questions on subjective norms, 18 questions on corporate citizenship as a moderator variable, 9 questions on customer citizenship, and 4 questions on ethical purchase intention as a dependent variable. It consisted of 48 items in total, including 6 for demographic data.

Table 1. Composition of question items.

Variable	Survey			Source	Reliability (Cronbach’s α)
	Question		Number
Ethical Corporate Image	II	1–6	6	Carroll [14]	0.87
Ethical Consumption (Purchase) Intention		1–4	4	Pension Hong [1]	0.87
Subjective Norms	III	1–5	5	Venkatesh and Davis [22], Lee [36]	0.95
Corporate Citizenship	I	1–18	18	Maignan and Ferrell [26]	0.93
Customer Citizenship	IV	1–10	10	Niehoff and Moorman [35]	0.84
Demographic Characteristics	V	1–5	5
Total			48

shows the scale items used for the questionnaire and the result of the reliability test based on exploratory factor analysis, which confirmed that all of the measured constructs proved to be internally consistent, with Cronbach alphas above 0.84.

4. Results of Analysis

4.1. General Characteristics of the Sample Respondents

The results of the frequency analysis on the general characteristics of the study subjects yielded 188 females (62.7%) and 112 males (37.3%) and age groups of 26–30 years (88, 29.3%), 36–40 years (56, 18.7%), 21–25 years (45, 15.0%), 31–36 years (44, 14.7%), 41–50 years (34, 11.3%), 16–20 years (20, 6.7%), and 50 years (13, 4.3%). As for educational background, 122 people (40.7%) have a college degree, 98 people (32.7%) graduated from high school, 30 (10.0%) have a graduate school degree, and 20 (6.7%) have a middle school degree. By occupation, we have 100 office workers (33.3%), 53 university students (17.7%), 37 graduate students (12.3%), 35 self-employed people (11.7%), 22 professional/research workers (7.3%), 20 others (6.7%), 18 unemployed (6.0%), and 15 housewives (5.0%). Income level was primarily 2.5–3 million Korean won per month (72, 24.0%), 2–2.5 million (56, 18.7%), 1.5–2 million (50, 16.7%), and 1 million or less per month (42, 14.0%), followed by 3–3.5 million (31, 10.3%), 1–1.5 million (27, 9.0%), and 4 million or more (22, 7.3%).

4.2. Descriptive Statistical Analysis

Table 2. Descriptive statistics of study measures.

	N	Average	Standard Deviation
Ethical Corporate Image	300	3.94	0.72
Subjective Norms	300	3.53	0.81
Corporate Citizenship	300	2.55	0.56
Customer Citizenship	300	3.40	1.12
Ethical Purchase Intention	300	3.45	0.56

shows the results of the descriptive analysis. The study respondents showed the highest average score on ethical corporate image (mean = 3.94, SD = 0.72) and the lowest score on corporate citizenship perception (mean = 2.55, SD = 0.56)

4.3. Confirmatory Factor Analysis

To verify the validity of the measures used in this study, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was performed, and to verify reliability, Cronbach’s α coefficients, indicating internal consistency, were calculated. First, in order to judge the suitability of the factor analysis model, the criteria for judging suitability were established. To elaborate this, statistics indicating the basic fit of the model, such as the significance of χ², fitness indexes such as TLI (Tucker Lewis Index) and CFI (Comparative Fit Index), and RMSEA (root mean square error of approximation), were employed as evaluation criteria for the model. In general, the χ² statistic is considered acceptable if the significance probability p is 0.05 or less, TLI and CFI are considered good fit values at 0.90 or more, and RMSEA 0.1 or less can be judged as acceptable. In addition, as a criterion for judging reliability, if Cronbach’s α coefficient is 0.70 or higher, it is deemed reliable.

The results of confirmatory factor analysis revealed χ² = 3792.848 (df = 850, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.82, CFI = 0.83, and RMSEA = 0.09, indicating acceptable fit for the measurement model to proceed with hypothesis testing (see

Table 3. Results of confirmatory factor analysis.

Measures			Estimate	β (Standardization)	SE	t	p	Average (Standard Deviation)	Cronbach’s α
Enterprise Citizen	→	a18	1.00	0.74	0.069	11.76	0.00	2.55 (0.56)	0.93
	→	a17	0.81	0.67	0.083	10.70	0.00
	→	a16	0.88	0.61	0.075	11.79	0.00
	→	a15	0.88	0.67	0.074	9.08	0.00
	→	a14	0.66	0.52	0.072	10.79	0.00
	→	a13	0.77	0.61	0.069	10.81	0.00
	→	a12	0.75	0.62	0.074	8.08	0.00
	→	a11	0.60	0.47	0.076	7.93	0.00
	→	a10	0.60	0.46	0.071	12.89	0.00
	→	a9	0.91	0.72	0.074	13.29	0.00
	→	a8	0.99	0.75	0.072	11.23	0.00
	→	a7	0.81	0.64	0.071	11.37	0.00
	→	a6	0.81	0.65	0.078	12.63	0.00
	→	a5	0.98	0.71	0.066	14.90	0.00
	→	a4	0.98	0.83	0.077	14.16	0.00
	→	a3	1.09	0.79	0.067	12.75	0.00
	→	a2	0.85	0.72	0.065	13.61	0.00
	→	a1	0.88	0.76
Customer Citizenship	→	b10	1.00	0.85	0.050	20.36	0.00	3.40 (1.12)	0.84
	→	b9	1.01	0.87	0.050	18.35	0.00
	→	b8	0.91	0.82	0.049	19.73	0.00
	→	b7	0.97	0.86	0.050	20.04	0.00
	→	b6	1.00	0.86	0.055	15.98	0.00
	→	b5	0.88	0.76	0.056	15.44	0.00
	→	b4	0.86	0.74	0.057	15.27	0.00
	→	b3	0.87	0.73	0.053	14.88	0.00
	→	b2	0.78	0.72	0.057	15.32	0.00
	→	b1	0.87	0.73
Ethical Corporate Image	→	c6	1.00	0.77	0.069	13.14	0.00	3.94 (0.72)	0.87
	→	c5	0.90	0.74	0.062	13.77	0.00
	→	c4	0.85	0.78	0.061	12.91	0.00
	→	c3	0.79	0.73	0.054	12.10	0.00
	→	c2	0.65	0.69	0.057	12.30	0.00
	→	c1	0.70	0.70
Ethical Consumption Intention	→	d4	1.00	0.82	0.061	16.48	0.00	3.45 (0.56)	0.87
	→	d3	1.00	0.84	0.064	13.82	0.00
	→	d2	0.88	0.73	0.05	14.37	0.00
	→	d1	0.82	0.76
Subjective Norms	→	e5	1.00	0.79	0.06	15.16	0.00	3.53 (0.81)	0.95
	→	e4	0.92	0.76	0.05	18.06	0.00
	→	e3	1.04	0.86	0.05	22.17	0.00
	→	e2	1.16	0.98	0.05	21.81	0.00
	→	e1	1.14	0.97
Fit Model: χ2 = 3792.848 (df = 850, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.82, CFI = 0.83, RMSEA = 0.09

).

Confirmatory factor analysis indicates the t values of all measurement items to be 1.96 or higher (p < 0.05), establishing the model’s convergent validity. In this study, corporate citizenship and customer citizenship were adopted as single-dimensional variables without sub-elements, as they were proposed to modulate the relationship between ethical corporate image, subjective norms, and ethical consumption intention.

The reliability analysis indicates that the reliability of corporate citizenship is 0.93, customer citizenship is 0.84, ethical corporate image is 0.87, ethical consumption intention 0.87, and subjective norms is 0.95. Since all measures yielded alpha scores of 0.70 or higher, the reliability of the measurement was confirmed.

4.4. Correlation Analysis

Table 4. Correlation analysis results.

Division	Ethical Business Image	Subjective Canon	Ethical Purchase Intention	Corporate Citizenship	Customer Citizenship
Ethical Corporate Image	One
Subjective Norms	0.28 **	One
Ethical Purchase Intention	0.46 **	0.37 **	One
Corporate Citizenship	0.44 **	0.29 **	0.56 **	One
Customer Citizenship	0.45 **	0.27 **	0.38 **	0.62 **	One

** denote probability of significance at 0.01 level.

shows the results of correlation analysis to confirm the correlations between all the constituent conceptual factors used in the study. All latent factors were found to have a positive (+) correlation with each other, and the correlation coefficient was 0.62 between corporate citizenship and customer citizenship, and 0.62 between ethical purchase intention and corporate citizenship. Conversely, the correlation coefficient between subjective norms and customer citizenship is 0.27, and that between ethical corporate image and subjective norms is 0.28, showing a low level of correlation. Among the correlation coefficients, particularly notable is a significant correlation (0.62) between corporate citizenship and customer citizenship. This result suggests interesting implications in that even if the actors are different, the higher the ethical consumption value given to customers, the higher the social responsibility for the company. Another noteworthy finding is that customer citizenship showed a higher correlation with ethical corporate image than subjective norms. This result has significant implications, in that the perceived level of customer’s personal civic awareness seems to be a more powerful driver of corporate responsibility image, which is less subject to social influence.

4.5. Hypothesis Testing

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Result of Testing H1a and H1b

At first, as shown in

Table 5. Results of hypothesis testing (H1a and H1b).

Path			Estimate	Normalization (β)	SE	CR	p
Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.40	0.31	0.03	7.33	0.00
Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.13	0.38	0.03	4.88	0.00
Model Fit: χ2 = 607.946 (df =88, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.83, CFI = 0.86, RMSEA = 0.09

, covariance structure analysis was performed to confirm the causal relationship between the independent and dependent variables. SEM analysis on the measurement model revealed χ² = 607.946 (df = 88, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.83, CFI = 0.86, and RMSEA = 0.09, indicating that the model was fit for SEM analysis. The estimate for ethical corporate image is 0.40 (standardized = 0.31, CR=7.33, p < 0.05) and the estimate for subjective norms is 0.13 (standardized = 0.38, CR = 4.88, p < 0.05).

A graphical display of the SEM output is given in Figure 2.

Hypotheses 1a and 1b are supported because ethical corporate image and subjective norms had significant positive (+) effects on ethical purchase intention. Specifically, ethical corporate image has a significant impact on ethical purchase intention (est = 0.28; cr = 7.33; p = 0.00), and subjective norms also had a positive impact on ethical purchase intention (est = 0.19; cr = 4.88; p = 0.00). The results indicate that ethical corporate image has a greater impact than subjective norms on ethical purchase intention.

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Result of Testing H2

As for Hypothesis 2, the moderating effect of corporate citizenship was verified through the chi-square test of the unconstrained model using SEM. Specifically, in the process by which ethical corporate image and subjective norms affect ethical purchase intention, the sample group with low corporate citizenship behavior and the one with high corporate citizenship behavior were separated into two groups based on the average score. The moderating effect was verified by using the difference between the chi-square test values of the model and the constrained model.

The results of the SEM analysis of the free model produced χ² = 841.198 (df = 176, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.78, CFI = 0.82, and RMSEA = 0.11, and the fit for the constrained model is χ² = 854.924 (df = 179, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.78, CFI = 0.82, and RMSEA = 0.11. The path analysis results of the free model based on two groups of low/high corporate citizenship in the free model are shown in

Table 6. Results of model path analysis of moderating effect of perceived corporate citizenship behavior.

Model	Group	Path			Estimate	Normalization (β)	SE	CR	p
Free Model	Low	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.18	0.40	0.04	4.29	0.00
		Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.06	0.13	0.03	1.62	0.10
	High	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.24	0.31	0.06	3.64	0.00
		Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.33	0.38	0.07	4.51	0.00
Constrained Model	Low	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.17	0.34	0.02	6.39	0.00
		Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention		0.31
	High	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.17	0.23	0.02	6.39	0.00
		Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention		0.21

.

Next, the chi-square test values of the free model and the constrained model were compared to verify the moderating effect. The free model has 176 degrees of freedom and the constrained model has 179 degrees of freedom, with a difference of 3 degrees of freedom sufficiently larger than the threshold (p = 0.05, df = 3) = 7.81, thus causing a significant difference in the pathway. Therefore, perceived corporate citizenship behavior was judged to moderate the effect of ethical corporate image and subjective norms on ethical purchase intention.

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Result of Testing H3

For the verification of Hypothesis 3, as shown in

Table 7. Results of model path analysis of the moderating effect of perceived customer citizenship behavior.

Model	Group	Path			Estimate	Normalization (β)	SE	CR	p
Free Model	Low	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.28	0.57	0.05	5.54	0.00
		Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.07	0.14	0.03	1.99	0.04
	High	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.19	0.28	0.06	3.18	0.00
		Subjective Norm	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.26	0.33	0.07	3.79	0.00
Constrained Model	Low	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.19	0.40	0.02	7.28	0.00
		Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention		0.34
	High	Ethical Corporate Image	→	Ethical Purchase Intention	0.19	0.29	0.02	7.28	0.00
		Subjective Norms	→	Ethical Purchase Intention		0.25

. the moderating effect of perceived customer citizenship on the effect of ethical corporate image and subjective norms on ethical purchase intention was verified. SEM analysis indicates that the fit for the free model is χ² = 741.757 (df = 176, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.81, CFI = 0.84, and RMSEA = 0.10, and the fit for the constrained model is χ² = 753.468 (df =179, p < 0.001), TLI = 0.81, CFI = 0.84, and RMSEA = 0.10.

Finally, the chi-square test values of the free model and the constrained model were compared to verify the moderating effect. The free model has 176 degrees of freedom and the constrained model has 179 degrees of freedom, with a difference of 3 degrees of freedom. As it is sufficiently larger than the threshold (05, df = 3) = 7.81, the customer citizenship was judged to cause a significant difference in the path. Thus, customer citizenship was verified to moderate the effect of ethical corporate image and subjective norms on ethical purchase intention.

From this finding, a noteworthy implication can be drawn. As discussed earlier, it is important to investigate which of the two variables introduced as the moderating variables exerts more of a moderating influence on ethical purchase intention. To this end, from the previous analysis results, when high groups of the two moderators were selected and compared, the estimates of ethical corporate image and subjective norms were 0.24 and 0.33 in the case of corporate citizenship, respectively, and they were 0.19 and 0.33 in the case of customer citizenship, respectively. In other words, corporate citizenship had a greater influence than customer citizenship.

5. Discussion and Implications

5.1. Academic Contribution of the Study

The main purpose of this study was to discover the antecedent determinants of ethical purchase intention. This study makes an academic contribution in that it expands the theoretical domain of the reasoned behavior theory to ethical consumption behavior. In particular, the comparative importance of the two concepts of corporate citizenship and customer citizenship behavior were examined for their moderation roles. The findings have important theoretical/practical implications. In particular, the finding that corporate citizenship and customer citizenship are correlated suggests interesting research questions that can lead to future studies. One way to expand on this would be to select specific company groups which have distinct corporate images and ask respondents whether their perceived citizenship (corporate versus customer citizenship) plays a different role in inducing ethical purchase behavior.

5.2. Summary of Results and Theoretical Implications

Firstly, the hypothesis that ethical corporate image and subjective norms have a positive effect on ethical purchase intentions was proposed and verified. The result indicates that when consumers make ethical consumption decisions, they consider not only the corporate image of the firms, but also normative influence. In other words, ethical consumption has important implications in that, unlike the general consumption situation, the customer not only activates the image of the company as an ethical firm, but also considers the self-image associated with an ethical consumer that portrays an image of a socially responsible consumer.

Furthermore, ethical corporate image is given a greater weight (in beta value) than subjective norms in the explanatory power affecting ethical purchase intention. This implies that when it comes to ethical purchase decisions, people are more concerned with the image of ethical firms rather than conforming to social norms. In further expansion of this finding, it may be useful to incorporate the theory of planned behavior where research could add a new component: perceived behavioral control.

Secondly, the hypotheses (H2 and H3) that the effect of ethical corporate image and subjective norms on ethical purchase intention would be moderated by corporate citizenship as well as customer citizenship were supported. This result suggests that corporate citizenship and the perceived customer citizenship should be given consideration as potentially important antecedents of ethical consumption decisions.

In addition, this study found that corporate citizenship plays a greater role than customer citizenship in the magnitude of the moderation effect on ethical consumption, which imparts important theoretical and practical implications. To elaborate on this, in the process of making ethical consumption decisions, consumers give more weight to whether the company is implementing corporate activities at a corporate level that may warrant corporate citizenship, than to their own sense of social responsibility process (legal, economic, ethical, and philanthropic) at an individual level. This finding significantly adds to the current literature as it suggests that the corporate citizenship perception should be given greater attention as a potential factor of importance in the study of ethical consumption decisions.

5.3. Practical Implications

Many firms, large or small, are aware of the importance of conducting social responsibility activities (i.e., holding charitable events, sponsoring social functions, engaging in community services, etc.) with a view of creating an ethical image of the company and encouraging employees to have pride in the company. However, in order to create an ethical corporate image, companies must convince the consumers that they are genuinely fulfilling their legal, economic, ethical, and philanthropic responsibilities. The results of this study suggest that when a positive perception of corporate citizenship behavior is established, it plays a positive moderating role in ethical purchase behavior. Therefore, companies should strive to ensure that their corporate image as an ethical firm remains authentic and try to instill in their employees a spirit of corporate citizenship. To achieve this, companies may need to institutionalize an internal evaluation system, which monitors and rewards employees based on their contribution to creating an ethical company image.

In addition, the company must provide opportunities for customers to participate so that customers can not only simply purchase products from the company, but also exhibit voluntary customer citizenship that raises red flags against problematic company practices, and actively participate in corporate affairs. Furthermore, it is essential for companies to develop multi-channel communication strategies to promote and encourage consumer citizenship. For example, through such communication channels, companies can gather customer input to accommodate their suggestions, complaints, and feedback.

5.4. Limitations and Future Research Directions

This study has a few limitations. First, since the study’s sampling location was limited to Seoul and Gyeonggi-do, this hinders the generalization of the study results. Therefore, it is recommended that future research overcome this issue by expanding the geographic focus of the study subjects nationwide. Furthermore, follow-up research should segment products based on pre-determined industry groups to find out which antecedent factors influence ethical purchase behavior in each of the industry fields. Finally, in future studies, it is recommended to take a more realistic approach to ethical consumption behavior by having respondents rate their ethical purchase intentions for existing firms known for their eco-friendly or corporate citizenship image.