How do Socially Responsible Consumers Consider Consumption? An Approach with the Free Associations Method

Socially responsible consumption, that is the incorporation by individuals of social and environmental concerns in their consumption choices, is growing. Is this new tendency a consequence of a new way of considering consumption? The aim of this research is to verify the existence of different profiles of socially conscious consumers and to study their social representation of consumption. In order to meet these objectives, a study was conducted with 392 respondents. The free association technique was used to induce social representations while involvement in socially responsible consumption was measured with the François-Lecompte (2005) scale. Data analysis shows the existence of four groups of socially responsible consumers with different social representations of consumption.