University of Twente Student Theses

Login
As of Friday, 8 August 2025, the current Student Theses repository is no longer available for thesis uploads. A new Student Theses repository will be available starting Friday, 15 August 2025.

Packed with promises : A study on consumers’ awareness of washing on supermarket products

Breukelman, Lotte (2025) Packed with promises : A study on consumers’ awareness of washing on supermarket products.

[img] PDF
592kB
Abstract:As consumers’ concern regarding health, the environment and animal welfare is growing, the marketing industry tries to adhere to these standards. However, misleading advertising techniques are often used to make consumers think the product adheres to these values, when it does not. This is the concept of washing. This study aims to research to what extent consumers are aware that they are being green-, welfare- or health washed. A qualitative study using twenty funneled semi-structured in-depth interviews was used to answer the research question. The results show that the majority of participants are not aware of washing practices. The few participants who do mention the possibility of being washed, do so as they were further steered into the direction of thinking about the influence of packaging. The participants who do not mention a possibility of being washed, do value their health, the environment and animal welfare and have the intention to buy products that align with these values. This shows that there is a gap between the intentions of consumers and the awareness they have during shopping in the context of washing. These findings contribute to existing literature that concludes that consumers are often not aware of deceived marketing techniques.
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Faculty:BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences
Subject:77 psychology
Programme:Psychology MSc (66604)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/107504
Export this item as:BibTeX
EndNote
HTML Citation
Reference Manager

 

Repository Staff Only: item control page