Moderating Effect of Collectivism on Chinese Consumers’ Intention to Adopt Electric Vehicles—An Adoption of VBN Framework

Abstract

Vehicle electrification has been promoted as an effective way to tackle environmental issues and the energy crisis worldwide. Being the largest auto market, China witnessed a dramatic increase of sale volume and market share of electric vehicles recently, while the incentives kept decreasing. Normative factors have been found to effectively explain consumers’ intention to adopt electric vehicles, but the mechanism remains to be discovered. One of the culture’s orientations, namely collectivism, has been proved to have significant impact on consumption behaviors, but the influence of collectivism on intention to adopt electric vehicles in China needs further discussion. Based on 433 questionnaires collected from Chinese consumers, this study adopted the Value–Belief–Norm (VBN) framework and examined collectivism as a moderator variable on the relationship between personal norms and intention to adopt electric vehicles. Data were analyzed using IBM SPSS 27 and PLS-SEM (SmartPLS 3). The results show that the VBN framework successfully explains the intention to adopt electric vehicles of Chinese consumers, and collectivism has a significant positive moderating effect on the relationship between personal norms and intention to adopt electric vehicles. Insights and suggestions from theoretical and managerial perspectives on how to accelerate electric vehicle adoption are discussed for marketers, policymakers and industry practitioners.