The Discomfort Dilemma: How Pro-environmental Consumption Affects Consumer Trust in Green Social Media Marketing and Engagement Intentions

Worldwide awareness of sustainable development urges consumers to live a sustainable lifestyle.However, consumer intentions have a critical discrepancy with pro-environmental purchase decisions.Thus, new studies must address the inconsistency between consumers' intention to participate in pro-environmental consumption and their actual purchases.This study explores the impact of consumers' uncomfortable feelings about social media pro-environmental messages on their trust and engagement intention.It also explores the moderating role of product involvement within these relations.The hypothesized relations among the variables were tested using an online survey, which used stimuli such as product photos and information about a fictitious green brand.Survey participants were recruited through a professional survey agency and participated in the survey through an online link.Discomfort, trust, engagement intention, and product involvement were measured using three items each.A total of 449 U.S. participants were recruited for an online survey, through an international research company.Data were analyzed using the Statistical Package for SPSS 25.0.A set of hierarchical regression analyses were used to test the hypotheses.The results did not support the hypothesized negative effect of discomfort on a consumer's trust in social media pro-environmental messaging.Contrarily, discomfort positively influenced trust in green marketing.Perceived discomfort did not affect participants' engagement intention.Product involvement played a significant positive moderation role in the relation between discomfort and engagement intention.The results contribute to the literature on proenvironmental consumption by demonstrating an unexpected discomfort mechanism involving consumer trust and engagement intention.