Exploring Factors Affecting Sustainable Consumption Behaviour

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

This paper intends to investigate the effect of environmental knowledge, materialism, environmental influences, promotion of sustainable consumption, and sustainable consumption behaviour intention on sustainable consumption behaviour. For that purpose, the authors have collected a total of 489 questionnaire from all regions of Bulgaria between May 2022 and July 2022. The authors have employed the partial least square-structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) and SmartPLS 4 software to test the hypothesized relationships. Their findings argue that environmental knowledge and materialism significantly affected sustainable consumption behaviour. Moreover, this study demonstrated that sustainable consumption behaviour intention significantly mediated the relationship between environmental knowledge and sustainable consumption behaviour and between materialism and sustainable consumption behaviour.

The literature review section is adequately developed, and hypotheses development is well-constructed.

The following are some suggestions for improvement:

·        * The literature review section in what regards the Moderating Role of Age could be better developed.

·   *The authors stated that: “The data were collected with the help of a questionnaire-based online survey. A total of 522 respondents were approached for the study”. My question is: how exactly the sample of respondents were addressed and how the total of questionnaires was collected? Through what kind of channels? It is now very clear for the readers of the study how the sample of respondents was formed.

·        *The results are clearly presented. But the discussion of the results needs more comparison with prior studies. How are the results similar to or different from what has been done before in related papers? This will help highlight any unique findings. What is the new value added provided by this paper? I believe that a discussion of these issues will enhance the value of the paper.

 I hope my comments help you. Good luck with your research!

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

On behalf of the authors’ team, a short note to thank you for all your efforts and valuable comments. All comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Exploring Factors Affecting Sustainable Consumption Behaviour” were valuable to us and were very helpful for revising and improving our paper. Based on your suggestions, we tried to apply all of them in the text focused on increasing the quality of the paper. The uploaded material is in “track changes” mode just to easily address the improvements and corrections in the text. We believe that your comments will contribute to the significant improvement of our paper. We herein present our work on them:

 

1. Referring to your comment: “The literature review section in what regards the Moderating Role of Age could be better developed”.

In the paper, we added text to paragraph 2.5. The Moderating Role of Age, which made it necessary to include four more sources in our references.

 

2. Referring to the comment: “The authors stated that: “The data were collected with the help of a questionnaire-based online survey. A total of 522 respondents were approached for the study”. My question is: how exactly the sample of respondents were addressed and how the total of questionnaires was collected? Through what kind of channels? It is now very clear for the readers of the study how the sample of respondents was formed”.

We added text that the data were collected with the help of a certified sociological agency operating in Bulgaria (BluePoint Ltd.). However, we would also like to specify that we adhered to the following algorithm for the formation of the quota sample we had chosen.

1. The characteristics based on which the sample was formed, and their categories were defined.
2. A quota matrix was formed out of three defined characteristics (gender, age groups and place of living in administrative territorial regions in the country) – the relative share (%) of the units in a population attributed to each category. The quota matrix was enclosed with the request for performance of the service that was submitted to the sociological agency.
3. The required volume of the sample (n’) was planned by taking into account the funds available for the project that finances the research and the population volume.
4. The number of units in the sample that needed to be included in each cell of the quota matrix was calculated.

 

3. Regarding your comment: “The results are clearly presented. But the discussion of the results needs more comparison with prior studies. How are the results like or different from what has been done before in related papers? This will help highlight any unique findings. What is the new value added provided by this paper? I believe that a discussion of these issues will enhance the value of the paper”.

We have rewritten paragraph 4. Discussion and Results in the Discussion part. For this reason, we had to include more sources in our list of references. Please check the expanded discussion and the reference list.

 

Again, we would like to express our gratitude to the detailed guidelines on how to improve our manuscript.

Best regards

Author Response File: Author Response.doc

Reviewer 2 Report

1. The article fills the gap in knowledge about sustainable development in Bulgaria.

2. 489 respondents were surveyed, which led the researchers to significant conclusions.

3. The aim of the article and research tasks were clearly stated.

4. An interesting research model was proposed.

5. A wide literature review was used.

6. There was a slight discussion.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

On behalf of the authors’ team, a short note to thank you for all your efforts and valuable comments. All comments concerning our manuscript entitled “Exploring Factors Affecting Sustainable Consumption Behaviour” were valuable to us and were very helpful for revising and improving our paper. Based on your suggestions, we tried to apply all of them in the text focused on increasing the quality of the paper. The uploaded material is in “track changes” mode just to easily address the improvements and corrections in the text. We believe that your comments will contribute to the significant improvement of our paper. We herein present our work on them:

1. The article fills the gap in knowledge about sustainable development in Bulgaria.
2. 489 respondents were surveyed, which led the researchers to significant conclusions.
3. The aim of the article and research tasks were clearly stated.
4. An interesting research model was proposed.
5. A wide literature review was used.

Thank you for your evaluation. We did our best to fill the gap in knowledge and to provide a valuable paper for the reader. We tried to highlight the results and conclusions and to provide evidence for future research in the field.

 

6. There was a slight discussion.

We have rewritten paragraph 4. Discussion and Results in the Discussion part. For this reason, we had to include more sources in our list of references. Please check the expanded discussion and the reference list.

 

Again, we would like to express our gratitude to the detailed guidelines on how to improve our manuscript.

Best regards

 

Author Response File: Author Response.docx