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An increasing body of research addresses consumers' green product purchasing behavior, and yet little work has examined how consumers form perceptions of the greenness of products in the first place. Drawing on theories of attribute centrality (the degree to which an attribute is integral in defining an object), the authors argue that products with identical environmental benefits will be judged more or less green depending on whether the benefit stems from a central versus a peripheral attribute. They present four studies that support the hypotheses and explore factors that influence the effect of central attributes, including product category membership and integration of the green attribute with other elements of the product. They include controls for firm motivations and importance of the attribute to the individual consumer. The authors conclude the article with managerial and public policy implications, such as advice for firms on where to make green investments for maximum consumer impact and insight for public policy makers on the need for consumer assistance in objectively evaluating products with identical environmental benefits that achieve those benefits in different ways.
Gershoff et al. (Fri,) studied this question.