• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.18 no.7
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• pp.37-48
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• 2020

Purpose: There has been an increasing focus on consumer ethics by researchers and practitioners alike with the former seeking to examine the general discrepancy between ethical attitude, intention and actual behaviour by proposing behavioural measures to understand ethical consumption. Research into the effects of generational cohorts and gender, two fundamental demographic factors that shape the consumer habituated repertoire, on consumer ethics has reported mixed findings. The present study investigates if there are differences in ethical consumer behavior by generational cohorts and by gender in the context of an emerging market - Vietnam. Research design, data and methodology: Data was collected using a quantitative survey (a link to the questionnaire was posted on relevant social media platforms). A total of 539 usable responses was used for ANOVAs and independent t-tests to test the hypotheses. Results: a) There are significant differences in terms of ethical consumer behavior between Gen Z and Gens Y/X, but no difference between Gen X and Gen Y; b) There is no gender difference in ethically minded consumer behavior. Conclusion: For consumer ethics, generational effects may be moderated by macroeconomic conditions, while gender alone as a biological variable may not be a reliable predictor.