**1. Introduction**

Religion is documented as an essential factor that profoundly influences consumer buying decisions [1]. Religion may serve to link consumers to a style of life that determines the pattern of consumption. Studies examining the e ffect or impact of religion on consumer behavior are based on two aspects: religious a ffiliation and religiosity [2,3]. The religious association mainly explored in comparison with the denominational association or the religious identification of a person (e.g., Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish). Although religiosity (in other words, religious commitment) is a significant construct to identify the e ffect of ethical behavior on a consumer's consumption and purchase behavior [4,5].

Islam, as a religion, presents a comprehensive way of life and controls the behavior of Muslim buyers, to achieve satisfaction with this life and hereafter [6]. Religious beliefs (e.g., concerning halal food) are the best guiding principle to identify food consumption choices for Muslims who actively follow religious guidelines as these rules address the Islamic tenets of food consumption [7]. Over the next 40 years, Islam will grow more rapidly than any other dominant faith. If current trends persist, by 2050, there will be nearly as many Muslims as Christians in the world [8]. This rapid increase of the global Muslim population indicates an opportunity for researchers to investigate more about Islam and Muslim consumers' behavior in various contexts such as food consumption. Investigation of Islamic consumption patterns may add value to the academic literature on consumer behavior [9].

Among Muslim consumers, Islamic rules administer the culture, which assists as a direction in their daily lives. Muslims must spend their money for explicit purposes only such as for general living, education, health, and aiding the poor and those in need. Hence, the concept of moderation is encouraged and Muslims are told to base their usage on strict observance to this practice [10]. The Pakistani population is 97 percent Muslim with di fferent religious beliefs as compared to the western part of the world [11]. In spite of these Islamic guidelines on appropriate food consumption and moderate spending, money spent on western imported food has been increasing in Pakistan [12]. Therefore, it is advantageous to know the consumer perception or motives behind the purchase of western imported food. Especially, as this is an increasing trend as the population grows and the general economy has developed so that there is increased discretional personal spending for the middle and upper classes in Pakistan [12,13].

Pakistani Muslim consumers may have di fferent perceptions about western imported food products (concerning the marketing mix, personal, social, and cultural elements). Their religious commitment indeed expresses the intensity of their faith and is indicated in part through their consumption choices about western imported food products [14]. Hence, it is particularly interesting to investigate the Pakistani Muslim consumer's motives behind the purchase of western imported food products and the role of religiosity in determining their purchase behavior. The reasons for this behavior have scarcely been studied in prior research and ye<sup>t</sup> there is an opportunity to explore the factors mentioned above for the western imported food products in a Muslim dominated country like Pakistan [15–19]. This research proposes an essential contribution to the field of Muslim consumer's behavior, and it also adds value to the literature on consumer behavior by employing a model wherein the single conceptual framework tests the elements, based on the theory of planned behavior. Religion is a critical element of Pakistani culture that directly a ffects the behavior of Pakistani consumers [20].

Furthermore, religion expressively governs cultural and social behaviors in Asian and Middle Eastern societies as compared to western nations. For these reasons, the level of religiosity needs research as an essential factor in shaping Muslim's purchasing behavior regarding western food items in Pakistan. This area is still under-researched and many studies have suggested exploring the influences of religiosity in defining Muslim consumer's purchase behavior in these regions in particular [21–24].

The national religion in Pakistan is Islam, in which 97% of the population is Muslim—numbering 207,774,520 inhabitants [11]. Interestingly, the people of Pakistan spend 42% of their income on food-related items; the total trade and wholesale of 17% consists of food items [11]. Pakistan's middle and upper class spend money on imported western food items [25,26]. Throughout the first six months of the 2018 fiscal year, Pakistan spent US\$312.5 million on the importing of co ffee, tea, beverage whiteners, and spices, the second-largest spending category in the food products sector [27]. Pakistan has spent US\$908.9 million on the import of animal or vegetable fats and oil products. In this period, the country also spent US\$500.9 million on imported oilseeds and 'oleaginous fruit', which is the part of a plant used to produce vegetable oil [27]. It can be a fruits (e.g., olive), seeds (e.g., sesame), or nuts

(e.g., walnut) [27]. Pakistan is an emerging market for the consumption of imported food items [28]. The market context for the study discussed next with an explanation of its research objectives.


### *Integration of Theory of Planned Behavior*

The undertaken study employed the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to know the behavior intentions of Muslim consumers of western imported food products. This study is an attempt to comprehend the purchasing intention of food items consumers using the TPB model from a Pakistani perspective. According to Donald et al. [29] and Armitage and Conner [30], the TPB model mainly dominated by attitude, and several psychological new dimensions have studied with the TPB model. Such as in organic food products' research by Robinson and Smith [31] investigated self-congruity concerning environmental consumerism. Moral obligations are tested for organic food by Arvola et al. [32], Reviews by Armitage and Conner [30] explains that TPB framework accounts for 39–50% variations in intention leading to 27–36% of the di fference in a consumer's behavior. However, Ajzen's [33] original model assumptions verified by several studies that antecedents potentially correlate with each other [34–36]. Hence, the present research has included constructs such as product attributes, price, promotion, brand loyalty, brand trust, customer satisfaction, religiosity, subjective norms, self-concept, personality, lifestyle, and social class besides the TPB factors for evaluating Muslims' customers' purchasing aim in the context of western imported food products. This study is an attempt to comprehend the consumers' purchase behavior employing the TPB framework in the Pakistani Muslim consumer's context. The element of religiosity is a combination of religious dimensions, which was described in Glock and Stark's [37] study. Since this study is based on Muslim consumer behavior in the context of western imported food, the combine notion of beliefs, practices, and knowledge about Islam and its linkage with food buying behavior is presented to explain how Muslim consumers take their food-related purchase decisions. New constructs added to TPB in prolific recent literature [34,35,37] specific to various domains. Extensions of the Ajzen [33] model over a few years have proved an improvement in the explanatory power of the framework.

The rest of the paper organized as follows: Section 2 demonstrates the review of literature and hypotheses formulation, Section 3 deals with materials and methods, Section 4 comprises of results, Section 5 deals with discussions, and Section 6 presents the conclusion. Next, the study presents practical applications and followed by theoretical contributions. Lastly, limitations and future research directions have discussed.

### **2. Literature Review and Hypotheses Development**
