University of Twente Student Theses

Login

The prevalence of CSR communication from engineering consultancies and the effects of CSR motives and explicitness on client response.

Vosman, Wieke (2013) The prevalence of CSR communication from engineering consultancies and the effects of CSR motives and explicitness on client response.

[img] PDF
1MB
Abstract:This research is motivated by the lack of corporate social responsibility (CSR) research in the Dutch engineering consultancy sector. The research contains the findings of two studies. Study A evaluated the CSR communication of 78 engineering consultancies based on a content analysis of websites. The study identified that the CSR communication from engineering consultancies is very simplistic with a majority of engineering consultancies not communicating their CSR commitment and impact. A notable finding of the analysis was the difference in levels of explicitness by which engineering consultancies communicate their CSR motives. Study A found explicitness to be an additional motive characteristic and therefore a possible factor of influence on client response which is further explored in study B. A 2 (motive: other-serving and self-serving) x 2 (explicitness: high, moderate and low) between-subjects experimental design with a sample of N=179, that focused on the effects of motives and explicitness on the evaluation from potential clients of a website text, an engineering consultancy and their selection intention was used. The results show that client response towards CSR motives is more complex than traditionally viewed. Respondents attitude towards the organization and selection intention were significant higher when the read the website text with an other-serving motive. However, this only applied if the explicitness of the text was high or moderate. The attitude from respondents towards the text was significantly more positive when the text was written with a high or moderate level of explicitness.
Item Type:Essay (Master)
Clients:
Tauw bv
Faculty:BMS: Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences
Subject:05 communication studies
Programme:Communication Studies MSc (60713)
Link to this item:https://purl.utwente.nl/essays/62714
Export this item as:BibTeX
EndNote
HTML Citation
Reference Manager

 

Repository Staff Only: item control page