Gaps between valuing and purchasing green-technology products: Product and gender differences

Abstract

Green technology has become an emerging industry to resolve human concerns over energy use, global warming, and sustainable development. At its current stage, people are likely to experience gaps between valuing and purchasing these products. Proponents of green technology may also need to consider the differences between green-technology products so as to produce better product-specific designs and to consider gender differences in designs based on human consideration. Semi-structured interviews with quantitative data collection were conducted with 54 participants in Taiwan. Important findings include: (1) There are positive relations between value and purchase for appliances, but not for vehicles. (2) Value-purchase gaps are strong for both appliances and vehicles. (3) People’s rationales for the gaps include multiplicity, ego, development, economy, and pragmatism approaches. (4) People’s concerns about multiplicity and pragmatism are stronger for vehicles than for appliances. (5) Females’ concern about pragmatism for vehicles is less than males.’