Consumer Behavior to Support the Disaster Region and Altruistic Perception

Abstract

This study investigated how consumer behavior to support the disaster region is related to consumer’s altruistic perception using a discrete choice experiment. We found that consumers with higher altruism scale scores are more willing to consume products from the disaster region. We also identified while age and education have negative impacts on such altruistic consumption, male and income have positive impacts. Finally, we discovered that such altruistic consumption is only apparent in Japanese products. We did not see such behavior toward foreign products. Our study shows that enhancing altruistic consumption is at least effective for supporting Japanese regions to recover their damages from natural disaster.