Understanding socially responsible consumer decisions

Socially responsible consumer decision-making is examined within the framework of an interdisciplinary model of decision-making. The disparity between preferences reflected in survey responses and consumer actions was discussed. Literature on decision theory was reviewed to provide background information for the model. Promotional materials from socially responsible businesses are then compared to materials from businesses without a stated social agenda to determine if the promotional strategies between socially responsible and mainstream businesses are functionally the same or different. By examining the presence or absence of certain promotional tactics, it was determined that promotional materials used by socially responsible businesses contained more items of attribute-based claims, humor, and comparison whereas other companies' promotional materials used relatively more photographic imagery and accentuated social considerations through photographs of people and by placing social references high in the text.