EXPLORING GREEN CONSUMER BEHAVIOR: THE ROLE OF TRUST AND TRANSPARENCY

Abstract

In the context of escalating environmental degradation, green consumption has emerged as a significant orientation in the behavior of modern consumers. Meanwhile, in Vietnam, there has been a considerable gap between green purchasing intention and green purchasing behavior, particularly in the Food and Beverage (F&B) sector. This study aims to identify the formation of Green Trust, examine the effects of green marketing factors and perceived greenwashing on trust, test the mediating role of Green Trust in green purchasing intention and green purchasing behavior, clarify the moderating influences of transparency, and generate managerial implications for the Vietnamese F&B industry. Based on the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), the Stimulus - Organism - Response (S-O-R) framework, and Signaling Theory, the proposed research model integrates green marketing tools (green advertising, eco-labels, green brand image, and CSR) and perceived greenwashing to explain how these signals establish trust among consumers and affect their green purchasing behavior. A mixed-methods approach was employed, including in-depth interviews with experts to refine measurement scales, a quantitative survey of over 400 F&B consumers in Vietnam (data were collected both online and offline), and PLS-SEM was adopted for data analysis. The findings reveal that the four green marketing tools have positive effects on Green Trust, which enhances both green purchasing intention and green purchasing behavior. Furthermore, Green Trust also mediates the negative effect of perceived greenwashing, though transparency does not significantly moderate most relationships, except in alleviating the adverse impact of greenwashing. The study makes both theoretical and practical contributions by clarifying the role of Green Trust in bridging the intention-behavior gap and by providing managerial insights to support more transparent and effective green marketing strategies in Vietnam’s F&B sector.