IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ers/journl/vxxviy2023i4p281-299.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Corporate Social Responsibility as a Factor Influencing Purchasing Decisions of Consumers in Central and Eastern Europe

Author

Listed:
  • Marcinkowska Elzbieta
  • Sawicka Joanna

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to examine the impact of CSR on the purchasing decisions of Polish and Ukrainian consumers against other decision-making criteria. Design/Methodology/Approach: We collected the data through questionnaires. We received them from 836 customers in Poland and Ukraine, which we then analyzed with the IBM SPSS Statistics 26.0 and Microsoft Excel 2019. Findings: The paper presents the results of a study on the influence of CSR on purchasing decisions of Polish and Ukrainian consumers against other decision criteria such as price, quality, opinions of other customers or guarantee conditions. Conclusions from the study indicate that the influence of CSR on purchasing decisions is rather small. More important factors, than CSR, influencing consumer decisions are: quality, price, positive feedback of other customers, warranty terms and conditions as well as repair network. The analysis carried out showed no significant differences in CSR evaluation in relation to demographic variables, apart from gender. It appeared that women rated CSR activities of a company as a more important criterion in purchasing decisions compared to men. Practical Implications: The presented findings can be used by marketing managers who shape the ways in which CSR activities are communicated with stakeholders, including consumers. Companies knowing consumer attitudes towards CSR should work to improve these relationships. Originality/Value: The research adds to the knowledge on consumer perceptions of CSR in Central and Eastern Europe and extends the findings of previous studies.

Suggested Citation

  • Marcinkowska Elzbieta & Sawicka Joanna, 2023. "Corporate Social Responsibility as a Factor Influencing Purchasing Decisions of Consumers in Central and Eastern Europe," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(4), pages 281-299.
    • Handle: RePEc:ers:journl:v:xxvi:y:2023:i:4:p:281-299
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ersj.eu/journal/3285/download
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Joëlle Vanhamme & Valérie Swaen & Guido Berens & Catherine Janssen, 2015. "Playing with fire: aggravating and buffering effects of ex ante CSR communication campaigns for companies facing allegations of social irresponsibility," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 26(4), pages 565-578, December.
    2. Daniela Abrantes Ferreira & Marcos Gonçalves Avila & Marina Dias de Faria, 2010. "Corporate social responsibility and consumers' perception of price," Social Responsibility Journal, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 6(2), pages 208-221, June.
    3. Henri Servaes & Ane Tamayo, 2013. "The Impact of Corporate Social Responsibility on Firm Value: The Role of Customer Awareness," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(5), pages 1045-1061, May.
    4. Izabela Jędrzejowska-Schiffauer & Peter Schiffauer & Eleftherios Thalassinos, 2019. "EU Regulatory Measures Following the Crises: What Impact on Corporate Governance of Financial Institutions?," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(3), pages 432-456.
    5. Dita Hommerová & Karel Šrédl & Lucie Vrbková & Roman Svoboda, 2020. "The Perception of CSR Activities in a Selected Segment of McDonald’s Customers in the Czech Republic and Its Effect on Their Purchasing Behavior—A Case Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(20), pages 1-17, October.
    6. J. Stávková & L. Stejskal & Z. Toufarová, 2008. "Factors influencing consumer behaviour," Agricultural Economics, Czech Academy of Agricultural Sciences, vol. 54(6), pages 276-284.
    7. Paul C. Godfrey & Nile W. Hatch, 2007. "Researching Corporate Social Responsibility: An Agenda for the 21st Century," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 70(1), pages 87-98, January.
    8. Öberseder, Magdalena & Schlegelmilch, Bodo B. & Murphy, Patrick E., 2013. "CSR practices and consumer perceptions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 66(10), pages 1839-1851.
    9. Magdalena Öberseder & Bodo Schlegelmilch & Verena Gruber, 2011. "“Why Don’t Consumers Care About CSR?”: A Qualitative Study Exploring the Role of CSR in Consumption Decisions," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 104(4), pages 449-460, December.
    10. Alexander Dahlsrud, 2008. "How corporate social responsibility is defined: an analysis of 37 definitions," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 15(1), pages 1-13, January.
    11. Palihawadana, Dayananda & Oghazi, Pejvak & Liu, Yeyi, 2016. "Effects of ethical ideologies and perceptions of CSR on consumer behavior," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(11), pages 4964-4969.
    12. Alan Pomering & Sara Dolnicar, 2009. "Assessing the Prerequisite of Successful CSR Implementation: Are Consumers Aware of CSR Initiatives?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 85(2), pages 285-301, April.
    13. Alexander Chernev & Sean Blair, 2015. "Doing Well by Doing Good: The Benevolent Halo of Corporate Social Responsibility," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 41(6), pages 1412-1425.
    14. Baskentli, Sara & Sen, Sankar & Du, Shuili & Bhattacharya, C.B., 2019. "Consumer reactions to corporate social responsibility: The role of CSR domains," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 502-513.
    15. Vicky Zampeta, 2015. "The Impact of Corporate Governance and the Cost of Capital in Shipping," International Journal of Business and Economic Sciences Applied Research (IJBESAR), International Hellenic University (IHU), Kavala Campus, Greece (formerly Eastern Macedonia and Thrace Institute of Technology - EMaTTech), vol. 8(2), pages 19-34, October.
    16. Zhilong Tian & Rui Wang & Wen Yang, 2011. "Consumer Responses to Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in China," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 101(2), pages 197-212, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Magdalena Öberseder & Bodo Schlegelmilch & Patrick Murphy & Verena Gruber, 2014. "Consumers’ Perceptions of Corporate Social Responsibility: Scale Development and Validation," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 124(1), pages 101-115, September.
    2. Orhan Akisik & Graham Gal, 2014. "Financial performance and reviews of corporate social responsibility reports," Mathematical Methods of Operations Research, Springer;Gesellschaft für Operations Research (GOR);Nederlands Genootschap voor Besliskunde (NGB), vol. 25(3), pages 259-288, December.
    3. Qingyu Zhang & Sohail Ahmad, 2021. "Analysis of Corporate Social Responsibility Execution Effects on Purchase Intention with the Moderating Role of Customer Awareness," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(8), pages 1-19, April.
    4. Anjum Amin-Chaudhry & Alan Pomering & Lester W. Johnson, 2019. "Incorporating the Concepts of Sharing-In and Sharing-Out in CSR: Australian Consumers’ Perspective," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-15, May.
    5. Mark Avis & Roman Konopka & Diana Gregory-Smith & Nitha Palakshappa, 2022. "Disentangling Consumers’ CSR Knowledge Types and Effects," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(19), pages 1-20, September.
    6. Montserrat Boronat-Navarro & José Antonio Pérez-Aranda, 2019. "Consumers’ perceived corporate social responsibility evaluation and support: The moderating role of consumer information," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(4), pages 613-638, June.
    7. Luger, Michaela & Hofer, Katharina Maria & Floh, Arne, 2022. "Support for corporate social responsibility among generation Y consumers in advanced versus emerging markets," International Business Review, Elsevier, vol. 31(2).
    8. Lixin Shen & Kannan Govindan & Madan Shankar, 2015. "Evaluation of Barriers of Corporate Social Responsibility Using an Analytical Hierarchy Process under a Fuzzy Environment—A Textile Case," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-22, March.
    9. Magdalena Öberseder & Bodo Schlegelmilch & Verena Gruber, 2011. "“Why Don’t Consumers Care About CSR?”: A Qualitative Study Exploring the Role of CSR in Consumption Decisions," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 104(4), pages 449-460, December.
    10. Percy Marquina & Vincent Charles, 2021. "A Bayesian resampling approach to estimate the difference in effect sizes in consumer social responses to CSR initiatives versus corporate abilities," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 28(6), pages 1680-1699, November.
    11. Esra Alniacik & Charefeddine Moumen & Umit Alniacik, 2020. "The moderating role of personal value orientation on the links between perceived corporate social performance and purchase intentions," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 27(6), pages 2724-2734, November.
    12. Jinhua Li & Yongyi Chen & Qiankai Qing, 2021. "Differentiated consumer responses to corporate social responsibility domains moderated by corporate social responsibility perceptions: A Kano model‐based perspective," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 28(6), pages 1606-1619, November.
    13. Valentina Lagasio & Nicola Cucari & Carl Åberg, 2021. "How corporate social responsibility initiatives affect the choice of a bank: Empirical evidence of Italian context," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 28(4), pages 1348-1359, July.
    14. Ghi-Feng Yen & Hui-Chun Tsao, 2020. "Reexamining Consumers’ Cognition and Evaluation of Corporate Social Responsibility via a DANP and IPA Method," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-26, January.
    15. Petr Parshakov & Iuliia Naidenova & Carlos Gomez-Gonzalez & Cornel Nesseler, 2023. "Do LGBTQ-Supportive Corporate Policies Affect Consumer Behavior? Evidence from the Video Game Industry," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 187(3), pages 421-432, October.
    16. Carolin Plewa & Jodie Conduit & Pascale Quester & Claire Johnson, 2015. "The Impact of Corporate Volunteering on CSR Image: A Consumer Perspective," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 127(3), pages 643-659, March.
    17. Bram Roosens & Nathalie Dens, 2019. "When do social alliances pay off? How the effect on corporate image depends on consumers’ prosocial attitudes," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 26(2), pages 195-208, March.
    18. Alejandro Alvarado-Herrera & Enrique Bigne & Joaquín Aldas-Manzano & Rafael Curras-Perez, 2017. "A Scale for Measuring Consumer Perceptions of Corporate Social Responsibility Following the Sustainable Development Paradigm," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 140(2), pages 243-262, January.
    19. Öberseder, Magdalena & Schlegelmilch, Bodo B. & Murphy, Patrick E., 2013. "CSR practices and consumer perceptions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 66(10), pages 1839-1851.
    20. Kaveh Asiaei & Nick Bontis & Omid Barani & Ruzita Jusoh, 2021. "Corporate social responsibility and sustainability performance measurement systems: implications for organizational performance," Journal of Management Control: Zeitschrift für Planung und Unternehmenssteuerung, Springer, vol. 32(1), pages 85-126, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    CSR; consumer; purchasing decision factors; Poland; Ukraine.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • M14 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - Corporate Culture; Diversity; Social Responsibility
    • M31 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Marketing and Advertising - - - Marketing
    • M50 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Personnel Economics - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ers:journl:v:xxvi:y:2023:i:4:p:281-299. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Marios Agiomavritis (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://ersj.eu/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.