The warm glow of sustainable and charitable consumption is not enough to motivate behaviour

The warm glow of charitable and environmentally sustainable actions has received much attention in the academic literature. Some studies suggest the power of the feel-good effect of doing good is severely underrated as a driver of human behaviour. This study curbs the enthusiasm by evaluating whether different forms of warm glow change behaviour across online and field experimental studies. Second-hand clothes shopping is the setting of our investigation because multiple forms of warm glow apply. Behaviour change toward reuse is highly desirable to lower the negative environmental impact of the fashion industry. In line with prior research, we find promising evidence in survey studies that priming the warm glow effect of second-hand shopping could increase second-hand shopping by up to 16%. However, when tested in a field study involving second-hand charity shops, messages communicating the warm glows of second-hand shopping performed no better than a general attention-generating message. Our study shows that charitable and environmentally sustainable behaviour does generate warm glow, but that the perception of warm glow might not be enough to motivate purchasing behaviours.