The sustainability paradox in urban food tourism: dissonance, control, and moral disengagement among Gen Z

Urban food tourism intersects with sustainability agendas, yet informal street-food ecosystems often lack visible environmental practices, creating governance and behavior-formation challenges for pro-sustainability cohorts such as Generation Z (Gen Z). This study examines how unsustainable environmental cues in these settings shape Gen Z tourists’ sustainable street-food consumption intentions. Grounded in the Stimulus–Organism–Response framework, the model specifies cognitive dissonance, sustainability-related moral disengagement, and perceived behavioral control as mechanisms through which sustainability-scarce environments condition intentions. Survey data from Gen Z visitors to Bangkok’s street-food districts were analyzed using covariance-based structural equation modeling, complemented by K-means segmentation and multi-group comparisons. Perceived unsustainable cues are associated with higher cognitive dissonance and stronger perceived behavioral control; both mechanisms show positive associations with sustainable consumption intention, whereas moral disengagement shows a negative association. These positive associations are stronger among a high-awareness segment, while the negative disengagement–intention association remains comparatively stable across segments. The findings extend S-O-R logic to informal food systems where sustainability signals are weak, showing that problem salience can coincide with stronger efficacy perceptions when actionable remedies are salient—a counterintuitive finding that challenges standard TPB predictions about constrained environments. Practically, the results support interventions that increase perceived control at the point of choice, including deposit-return infrastructure, eco-zoned vendor clusters, and bring-your-own incentives, while constraining justificatory space through accountability and norm cues. Overall, the study offers SDG 12-aligned guidance for destinations seeking to preserve street-food livelihoods and cultural vibrancy while accelerating waste-reduction transitions.