Fairness First, Fashion Second: A quantitative study into the attitude-behaviour gap towards ethics in the Fast Fashion Industry

Abstract

The purpose of this dissertation is to understand the attitude-behaviour gap towards ethics in the fast fashion industry using the Theory of Planned Behaviour to guide the research as it is helpful in understanding consumers decision making. Many consumers claim to be concerned about ethics yet this is not evident in their purchasing decisions. The literature review looked at the growth of the fast fashion industry and the negative impacts it has had thus far. Furthermore, it then considered why consumers are aware of these social and environmental issues but continue to purchase anyway. A quantitative approach using questionnaires was favoured in order to gain insights from a large sample of people and to make the results generalisable to the population. This method is also useful in comparing responses and identifying key trends. The analysis and discussion of the results helped to identify significant themes and trends which could then be linked to the literature. This research project identified that there are a number of issues which influence the attitude-behaviour gap, the key ones being price and lack of knowledge which for the most part linked in with the literature although there were some key disagreements. Based upon these findings and limitations identified, it was recommended that for future research a mixed method approach is considered in order to obtain deeper insights. In terms of analysis, it would be useful to use regression analysis to make predictions about the mean value of the dependent variable.