The effect of environmental concern, greenwashing and brand hate relationship on purchase intention

The present research investigates the influence of environmental concern, greenwashing, and consumer captivity on brand hate and purchase intention in the airline sector. It addresses Turkish consumers with an airline transportation purchase experience. Based on survey data collected from 445 participants, the observations demonstrate the positive effect of environmental concern on greenwashing and of greenwashing on brand hate. However, the hypothesis for the positive impact of environmental concern on brand hate and the moderator effect of consumer captivity between brand hate and purchase intention cannot be verified. The hypothesized relationships were partially confirmed, and the model proposed in this paper is partially applicable. Therefore, the study suggests that airlines eliminate their greenwashing behaviors to improve their consumers' purchase intentions and diminish their brand hate because environmental concern affects greenwashing when consumers do not feel captivated or are less captivated. If airlines want to reduce the negative effects of environmental concern and consumer captivity, they should decrease their greenwashing. This research enhances the current knowledge by assessing the relationship between greenwashing, environmental concern, and brand hate, together with consumer captivity as a moderator of brand hate and purchase intention in the air transportation of Turkish passengers.