Consumer Perceptions of Transparency: A Scale Development and Validation Gwendolyn Hustvedt and Jiyun Kang Texas State University Transparency is an essential part of the effort to build a socially responsible brand. Communicating with stakeholders about labor violations in manufacturing is an important aspect of this transparency. Previous research has suggested that consumer perception of transparency is related to brand trust, which in turn increases aspects of the consumer–brand relationship such as loyalty. In this study, items measuring consumer attitudes toward the transparency of social responsibility were developed, and multistep analysis was used to demonstrate that the resulting measure called Transparency is reliable and valid. The measure developed in this study can be used to explore consumer perceptions of the social responsibility efforts of brands and other organizations. Keywords: brands; social responsibility; transparency; trust A global movement of consumers and activists has placed pressure on apparel and footwear brands to fix their “sweatshop” problem (Micheletti & Stolle, 2007). While researchers debate the ability of consumers and corporate activity to successfully address the issue of labor violations in apparel and/or footwear manufacturing (Arnold & Hartman, 2005), a number of brands have responded to the concern expressed by this activism, which includes boycotts, by building aggressive social responsibility programs (Klein, Smith & John, 2004). Several brands have joined organizations like the Fair Labor Association (FLA) that lists transparency as a key objective of the organization (Fair Labor Association, 2010). The FLA seeks to use the combined power of their brands to enforce a factory code of conduct related to workers using independent, unannounced inspections of their suppliers. Reports about factory conditions are published and updated with subsequent successes and failures in changing the identified problems. Other brands (e.g., Gap, Inc, 2009) have begun to publish detailed social responsibility reports, often on their corporate websites, that include discussions of the difficulties the brand faces in bringing the conditions of workers along their supply chain up to minimal international standards (Gap, 2009). In a paper on generating brand value from responsibility, Brady (2003) suggested that being transparent about social responsibility efforts, admitting Authors’ Note: Gwendolyn Hustvedt, PhD, School of Family & Consumer Sciences, Texas State University. Jiyun Kang is an Assistant Professor at School of Family and Consumer Sciences, Texas State University. Please address correspondence to Gwendolyn Hustvedt, School of Family & Consumer Sciences, Texas State University, 601 University Drive, San Marcos, TX 78666; e-mail: gh21@txstate.edu. Family and Consumer Sciences Research Journal, Vol. 41, No. 3, March 2013 299–313 DOI: 10.1111/fcsr.12016 © 2013 American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences 299 300 FAMILY AND CONSUMER SCIENCES RESEARCH JOURNAL mistakes, and publically discussing solutions can build brand trust that offsets the competitive disadvantages of transparency. “Successful responsibility management is about trust relationships built on transparency and supported by performance” (Brady, 2003, pp. 288). Some companies have been placed under a legal obligation by court rulings (e.g., Kasky vs. Nike) to be truthful in all their communications with consumers (Brady, 2003). While saying less would be one approach to the requirement that communication be truthful, transparency may be the most sustainable approach to dealing with difficult issues like labor violations in overseas factories. However, little is known about how consumers feel about transparency of social responsibility efforts. An important step in understanding the impact of transparency on the relationship that consumers have with brands is to develop a measure of transparency that focuses on the social responsibility efforts of brands. REVIEW OF LITERATURE When the connection between brands and consumers is conceptualized as an interpersonal relationship, concepts like intimacy, commitment, trust, and revelation of the true self can be used to describe the ‘relationship’ consumers have with brands. Where does transparency fit in the relationship between socially responsible brands and consumers? Brand Relationship and Trust Guides for communicating corporate social responsibility efforts begin with the suggestion that brands should “be credible, transparent, and honest” (Middlemiss, 2003, p. 359). In a model of the citizen brand, Willmott (2003) suggests that transparency is an important aspect of the relationship built by brand trust, along with communication and perceived good citizenship. Trust has long been identified as a mediator of consumer relationships with brands, along with commitment or loyalty (Fournier, 1998; Morgan & Hunt, 1994). Some researchers have suggested that an important outcome of conscientious behavior by brands is that it builds trust that can indirectly increase brand loyalty by consumers (Willmott, 2003). Chaudhuri and Holbrook (2001) found that along with brand affect, brand trust was the most significant predictor of brand loyalty. Breaking this trust can threaten the brand–consumer relationship (Fournier, 1998). Ring and van de Ven (1994) who define trust as “faith in the moral integrity or goodwill of others” (pp. 93) have suggested that while people may believe in the trustworthiness of organizations, deciding whether to rely on this trustworthiness is a situational decision (Ring & van de Ven, 1994). In their psychosociological model of brand trust, Elliott and Yannopoulou (2007) state that familiarity with a brand is a precondition for trust. However, their consumer interviews suggest that low-risk purchase decisions require only brand familiarity, while higher-risk or symbolic decisions require brand trust (Elliott & Yannopoulou, 2007). Several studies have found that a belief in the competence and credibility of a brand are important antecedents for brand trust. For example, Erdem and Swait Hustvedt and Kang / PERCEPTIONS OF TRANSPARENCY 301 (2004) and Sichtmann (2007) found that competence and credibility produced brand trust which in turn produced positive “word of mouth” by consumers. Erdem and Swait (2004) found that brand credibility (measured with items focusing on the brand keeping promises and making believable claims) had a greater impact on the brands that participants considered or chose in a choice set than brand competence (measured by items focusing on brand ability). Transparency Kitchin (2003) suggested that brand trust is built not only by the overt or transparent actions of the brand, but also by the consumer’s subjective estimation of how the brand is behaving in situations where actions cannot be transparent. This means that brand trust is built not only by transparency, but also from the perceptions that consumers have of the intentions of the brand in every situation, transparent or not. Morgan and Hunt (1994) defined trust as being present when there is confidence in the reliability and integrity of an exchange partner. They explained that reliability and integrity are associated with consistency, competency, honesty, fairness, responsibility, helpfulness, and benevolence. They argued that the behavioral intention of willingness to act is inherent in their definition of trust. Delgado-Ballester, Munuera-Aleman and Yague-Guillen (2003) defined brand trust as “the confident expectations of the brand’s reliability and intentions in situations entailing risk to the consumer” (p. 37). Delgado-Ballester et al., (2003) suggested that brand trust is comprised of two distinct elements, brand reliability and brand intentions. Brand reliability refers to the belief of the consumer that the brand will satisfy the consumer’s needs. Brand intentions refer to the consumer’s belief that the brand’s actions and behavior are motivated by positive intentions toward the consumer’s interest or welfare. Developing brand trust is an important part of building the brand–consumer relationship. However, brands with public social responsibility efforts are in a unique position. They are not merely asking consumers to trust that the products will be satisfying or to trust that returns or complaints will be handled fairly. Socially responsible apparel and footwear brands are asking consumers to trust both their transparent communications and their unobserved intentions to act in a socially responsible manner. The purpose of this study was to develop an exploratory measure of consumer perceptions of transparency that focuses on the efforts of the brand to be responsible in the manufacturing and labor-related processes. A second purpose was to examine how this measure interacts with the general relationship that consumers have with brands and also to the attitudes that consumers have toward social responsibility. METHODOLOGY The scale development procedure was based on these steps: scale development, purification, and validation. Approval for the work with human subjects was obtained from the Institutional Review Board. All individuals at each stage of the study gave their informed consent prior to their inclusion in this study. No details that might disclose the identity of the subjects in this study were included in this article. 302 FAMILY AND CONSUMER SCIENCES RESEARCH JOURNAL Scale Development Construct definition. The first step was to define the construct of interest— consumer perceptions of the transparency of social responsibility efforts. Based on review of the literature and communication with apparel and footwear industry professionals, the focus of this construct was narrowed to consumer perceptions of the transparency related to the labor and manufacturing processes of the production of apparel and footwear. There are many other areas of the manufacturing, sourcing, transportation, and retailing of consumer goods that require the full faith efforts of companies to behave in a responsible manner in the face of pressures to seek the lowest price despite the human cost. However, much consumer and activist energy has been expended to improve the practices in manufacturing for the apparel and footwear sector, especially related to the treatment of labor. While the construct of interest is the consumer perception of the transparency of social responsibility efforts, the resulting measure will be referred to as merely Transparency. Item development. The second step was the development of initial items for the measure. Because of the limited availability of established measures for socially responsible brands, some of the items used in the scale development phase were adapted from previous research on brand trust related to warranty fulfillment (Delgado-Ballester et al., 2003). The four items used in their scale were reliable (Cronbach’s a = .83) and included “X brand name would be honest and sincere in addressing my concerns,” “I could rely on X brand name to solve the problem,” “X brand name would make any effort to satisfy me,” and “X brand name would compensate me in some way for the problem with the product.” The last item was not relevant to the issue of social responsibility, because consumers are not typically compensated when brands behave in a socially irresponsible manner, so it was not adapted. The remaining three items were adapted by making the focus of the problem specific to social responsibility or sweatshops. Four additional items were developed for this study based in part on the feedback of apparel and footwear industry professionals working in the area of social responsibility. These items included “If I wanted to, I could easily find out about labor conditions in the factories that the ______ brand uses to make their product,” “I believe the ______ brand doesn’t have anything to hide,” “The ______ brand does a good job of sharing their social responsibility efforts with people like me,” and “The _____ brand is open and honest about their actions.” Scale purification. Next, the initial items were subject to the scale purification process in order to reduce items and assess the scale’s dimensionality and reliability (c.f., Kang & Park-Poaps, 2011). Scale purification was based on an exploratory analysis with the data from a survey with a convenience sample consisting of 120 university students. The students were recruited from large courses in a variety of departments at a large public university in the Southern region of United States. The resulting group of students was more likely to be female (79%) and white (77%) compared to the university as a whole. University students were considered appropriate for this purification stage for the transparency scale because American university students have formed an important part of the effort to improve labor conditions in companies selling university-licensed apparel (Micheletti & Stolle, 2007). Hustvedt and Kang / PERCEPTIONS OF TRANSPARENCY 303 In the exploratory student survey, to reduce the impact of possible brand affiliation, three apparel brands (Nike, American Apparel, and No Sweat) were chosen. The questionnaire repeated the items isolated in the scale development phase (a total of seven items) using a 7-point Likert Scale for each of the brands. The three brands used in the student survey were selected to provide variety in both popularity and level of social responsibility efforts. The brands were selected on the basis of claims being made about social responsibility efforts, either from company marketing or from the social responsibility compliance division. To avoid an order effect, three versions of the instrument were used with the order of the brands changed in each version. The corresponding items for each brand were summed and the total was divided by three to return the summed item to the original scale. Summing the items for all three brands prior to analysis was necessary to produce measures that could be applicable to any apparel or footwear brand, despite the brand specificity required for the individual items. Exploratory factor analysis using the principal components analysis (PCA) method of extraction, with varimax rotation, was conducted with the summed transparency items to confirm that there was a single underlying variables being measured by these items (SPSS, 2011). Six other items related to brand attitudes (i.e., “I trust this brand”) were also summed across the three brands to ensure that the transparency items were not too closely related to other attitudes such as brand trust. Two items “The ______ brand does a good job of sharing their social responsibility efforts with people like me” and “The _____ brand is open and honest about their actions” were cross-loaded onto other factors. A single measure was created with the remaining five items of the original seven that had a factor loading above 0.5 and were not cross-loaded onto another factor (Hair, Black, Babin, Anderson & Tatham, 2005). The mean for the resulting variable, called Transparency, was 4.16 (SD = .84), which indicated that participants were neutral in their overall evaluation of the three brands and in their perceptions of the social responsibility efforts of each brand. Because the three brands were chosen in part to provoke a range of opinions, the resulting neutrality of the measure created from the summed items was not unexpected. See Table 1. Scale Validation Although students were used for the exploratory phase of measure development, it was necessary to use a consumer sample for further validation of the purified scale. In the scale validation phase, an online survey with a general consumer panel sample was used to enhance the external validity. The scale validation involved a threefold procedure: (i) exploratory factor analysis of the broader consumer survey data to initially examine the scale structure, (ii) confirmatory factor analyses to verify the scale structure, and (iii) assessments of reliability and validity of the scale. The consumer panel sample was purchased from a large online survey/data company. An online survey was chosen for these reasons: high accessibility to diverse respondents, fewer coding errors, and more privacy and convenience to respondents (e.g., Reilly & Rudd, 2009). Initially, a total of 7,600 invitations were sent for this survey. A total of 770 (response rate of 10.1%) started the survey, 304 TABLE 1: FAMILY AND CONSUMER SCIENCES RESEARCH JOURNAL Exploratory Factor Analysis of Transparency Items Variable Coding Item (Cronbach’s a = .87, variance explained = 66.76%, eigenvalue = 3.39) T1 If I wanted to, I could easily find out about labor conditions in the factories the _____ brand uses to make their product. The _____ brand would be honest and sincere in addressing the issue of sweatshop labor. I believe the _____ brand doesn’t have anything to hide. I can rely on the _____ brand to solve the problem of sweatshops. The _____ brand would make any effort to improve poor labor conditions in their factories. T2 T3 T4 T5 Factor Loading .75 .86 .86 .84 .77 and a total of 697 (91%) completed it. This provided a standard response rate (usually around 10%) for online sample. Among these completed responses, a total of 303 remained after filtering out the invalid responses. No abnormality associated with nonresponse bias was found. Thus, a total of valid 303 responses were used for the subsequent analyses. Table 2 shows the demographic information of valid responses used for the scale validation phase. Questionnaire and measure. The questionnaire for scale validation included the measure of transparency, other external measures to be used for testing nomological and predictive validity, and demographic questions. Three footwear brands were selected: New Balance (BRAND 1), Nike (BRAND 2), and TOMS (BRAND 3). These three brands were selected to capture a wide range of variance of brand properties such as brand awareness, brand popularity, and brand perception related to corporate social responsible efforts. By testing the transparency scale with various brands that involved a wide range of brand properties, the external validity of the results could be enhanced. Using the randomization function of the online survey system, each respondent was able to answer questions related to each brand in a random order, which prevented an order effect for the brands. RESULTS Exploratory Factor Analysis First, exploratory factor analyses (EFAs) were used to examine the basic structure of the scale. Using a principal axis extraction method, the transparency measures were analyzed using a varimax rotation. The measures were examined based on their communalities, EFA factor loadings, and interitem-total correlations (c.f., Tabachnick & Fidell, 2006). As expected, all EFAs suggested one-factor solution for each of the three brands. The factor analysis solution for BRAND 1 accounted for approximately 67.72% of the total variance. All communalities ranged from .43 to .77, and they were higher than the acceptable threshold (> .40). Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) measure of sampling adequacy was .85. All EFA loadings were higher than the acceptable threshold (> .70) except for one item (BT1), “If I wanted to, I could Hustvedt and Kang / PERCEPTIONS OF TRANSPARENCY TABLE 2: Demographics of the Sample used in the Scale Validation Demographics Frequency Gender Male Female Ethnicity Euro-American/Caucasian African American Hispanic/Latino(a) Asian-American Other Marital status Married Never married Divorced/separated/widowed Employment Full-time Part-time Unemployed/Retired Highest level of education 4-year college or graduate degree High school degree or other Annual household income < $20,000 $20,000–$39,999 $40,000–$59,999 $60,000–$79,999 $80,000-$99,999 $100,000 or up Total valid response NOTE: 305 (%) 153 150 50.5 49.5 241 26 17 11 8 79.5 8.6 5.6 3.6 2.6 168 70 68 55.4 23.1 21.5 144 45 114 47.5 14.9 37.6 140 163 46.2 53.8 39 84 63 43 33 41 303a 12.9 27.7 20.8 14.2 10.9 13.5 100 Median age = 42; ranged from 19 to 75; SD = 14.03. a easily find out about labor conditions in the factories the ________ brand uses to make their product.” The EFA loading for this item was .66, which was slightly below .70. However, the EFA loading of the same item used for the other two brands turned out to be higher than the .70 (i.e., .76 for BRAND 2 and .79 for BRAND 3). For BRAND 2, approximately 76.16% of the total variance was explained by the factor solution. All communalities were between .58 and .84, and all EFA loadings were between .76 and 91, which met all of the satisfactory levels. KMO measure of sampling adequacy was .89. Similarly, the one-factor solution for BRAND 3 accounted for approximately 82.03% of the total variance. Communalities ranged from .62 to 90, while EFA factor loadings ranged from .79 to .95. KMO measure of sampling adequacy was .90. The results of EFAs for all three brands are reported in Table 3. Given the consistently successful levels of EFA solutions for all the three brands, interitem-total correlations were subsequently examined. For BRAND 1, interitem-total correlations among all items, ranged from .60 to .69, were higher than the satisfactory level (> .50) except for one item (BT 1). This item showed a weak correlation with other items (r ranged from .37 to 44) and was considered as a candidate for deletion from the factor. To decide on the deletion of the item, 306 TABLE 3: FAMILY AND CONSUMER SCIENCES RESEARCH JOURNAL Descriptive and Exploratory Factor Analysis Results Item (Coding) Brand 1 T1_BRAND1 T2_BRAND1 T3_BRAND1 T4_BRAND1 T5_BRAND1 Brand 2 T1_BRAND2 T2_BRAND2 T3_BRAND2 T4_BRAND2 T5_BRAND2 Brand 3 T1_BRAND3 T2_BRAND3 T3_BRAND3 T4_BRAND3 T5_BRAND3 M SD Communality EFA Loading 3.13 3.29 3.39 3.10 3.29 .91 .73 .79 .79 .72 .43 .77 .68 .67 .74 .66 .88 .82 .82 .86 3.19 3.19 3.31 3.02 3.18 .95 .87 .93 .95 .89 .58 .84 .79 .81 .80 .76 .91 .89 .90 .89 3.05 3.07 3.06 2.95 3.06 .88 .73 .72 .75 .72 .62 .90 .88 .82 .88 .79 .95 .94 .91 .94 KMO Measure of Sampling Adequacy Eigen Value Total Variance Explained (%) .85** 3.29 67.72 .86 .89** 3.81 76.16 .92 .90** 4.10 82.03 .94 a NOTE: Brand 1: New Balance, Brand 2: Nike, Brand 3: TOMS.All items were measured on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). **p < .001. interitem-total correlations for other two brands were examined. In the results, the same item showed a successful level of correlation with all other items for both brands (r ranged from .55 to .63 for BRAND 2; r ranged from .64 to .66 for BRAND 3). Thus, the item, BT 1, was retained in the scale. Interitem-total correlations for the rest of the items were also strong: r ranged from .73 to .86 for BRAND 2; r ranged from .81 to .90 for BRAND 3. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient (a) was examined in order to initially explore the internal consistency—reliability of the scale. The results showed an excellent reliability of the transparency scale for all three brand cases: .86 for BRAND 1, .92 for BRAND 2, and .94 for BRAND 3. Confirmatory Factor Analysis Given that EFA results showed a successful factor structure of the transparency scale as well as its strong reliability, a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to confirm the factor structure of the scale and further ensure the scale’s reliability and validity. Using AMOS software, a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) with maximum likelihood was conducted on five indicators of one latent variable—transparency (Arbuckle, 2009). The CFA model for BRAND 1 exhibited an acceptable fit: v2ðdf ¼5Þ = 15.86, p = .01; Goodness of Fit Index [GFI] = .98; Adjusted Goodness of Fit Index [AGFI] = .94; Comparative Fit Index [CFI] = .99; Non-Normed Fit Index (NNFI) = .98; Standardized Root Mean Square Residual [SRMR] = .02; Root Mean Square Error of Approximation [RMSEA] = .09. Model fit indices, including the p-value of chi-square > .05, GFI and AGFI > .90, CFI and NNF > .95, SRMR lower than .08, and RMSEA lower Hustvedt and Kang / PERCEPTIONS OF TRANSPARENCY 307 than .10, indicate that the model successfully fits the data (Bagozzi & Yi, 1988; Browne & Cudeck, 1993; Hu & Bentler, 1999). Although the p-value of the chi-square was smaller than .05, which typically results from the relatively large sample size, all of the other indices suggested an acceptable fit of the model to the data. All modification indices (MIs) showed below 8.00, which indicated no critical problems of misfit. The entire item squared multiple correlations (SMCs) ranged from .32 to .72. Another acceptable model fit was shown in CFA results for BRAND 2: v2ðdf ¼5Þ = 13.42, p = .02; GFI = .98; AGFI = .95; CFI = .99; NNFI = .99; SRMR = .01; RMSEA = .08. SMCs ranged from .46 to .80, and no critical misfit problem was found in the examination of MIs. The consistent results were shown in the CFA on BRAND 3. The model fit was acceptable: v2ðdf ¼5Þ = 11.74, p = .04; GFI = .99; AGFI = .95; CFI = .99; NNFI = .99; SRMR = .01; RMSEA = .07. Consistent with the other two brand results, there was no critical level of misfit in the MIs. SMCs ranged from .49 to .91. Given successful CFA model fits of the transparency scale for all three brands, comprehensive examinations of the CFA estimates were followed to test the reliability and validity of the scale: unidimensionality and reliability; convergent validity; nomological validity; and predictive validity. See Table 4. Reliability and Validity of the Scale Unidimensionality and reliability. First, unidimensionality and reliability of the scale were examined. The transparency scale consisting of multiple items should be unidimensional; there should be existence of a single construct (i.e., transparency) underlying a set of the five items, and at the same time be reliable— internally consistent (c.f., Gerbing & Anderson, 1988). The coefficients indicated a satisfactory level of unidimensionality and reliability of the scale for all three brand cases: The composite reliability estimates were .91 (BRAND1), .93 (BRAND 2), and .96 (BRAND3), which exceeded the recommended .70 threshold (c.f., Fornell & Larcker., 1981). Furthermore, all average variance extracted estimates (AVEs)—68(BRAND1), .74(BRAND 2), and .85 (BRAND3)—also exceeded the recommended .50 threshold (c.f., Fornell & Larcker., 1981). Convergent validity. The concept of a scale’s convergent validity requires that the five items must be related to each other because these items are measuring the same, upper level of construct (i.e., transparency). All CFA loadings exceeded .56 for BRAND 1, .68 for BRAND 2, and .70 for BRAND 3, and t-values for each brand were all significant. Furthermore, the scale’s composite reliability estimates for all of three brands (exceeding the recommended .70 threshold) and the scale’s AVEs for all three brand cases (exceeding the recommended .50 threshold) together suggest that convergent validity of the scale has been established (c.f., Fornell & Larcker., 1981). It is thus determined that the five items well represent the latent variable—transparency. Nomological validity. Examining whether the transparency scale correlates statistically with other conceptually, theoretically related measures is a method to test a scale’s nomological validity—”the degree to which a construct behaves as it should within a system of related constructs called a nomological network.” (Bagozzi, 1981, cited in Kang & Park-Poaps, 2011). The correlations matrix was examined between the transparency scale and other measures that were 308 TABLE 4: FAMILY AND CONSUMER SCIENCES RESEARCH JOURNAL Final Properties of the Transparency Scale Item (Coding) Brand 1 T1_BRAND1 T2_BRAND1 T3_BRAND1 T4_BRAND1 T5_BRAND1 Brand 2 T1_BRAND2 T2_BRAND2 T3_BRAND2 T4_BRAND2 T5_BRAND2 Brand 3 T1_BRAND3 T2_BRAND3 T3_BRAND3 T4_BRAND3 T5_BRAND3 CFA Loadinga t-value SE Squared Multiple r2 .56 .85 .78 .76 .83 – 10.04** 9.62** 9.49** 9.93** – .12 .13 .12 .12 .32 .72 .61 .58 .68 .68 .90 .86 .87 .87 – 13.54** 13.54** 13.68** 13.64** – .09 .09 .09 .09 .46 .80 .75 .77 .76 .70 .95 .94 .87 .93 – 15.97** 15.76** 14.63** 15.66** – .07 .07 .07 .07 .49 .91 .88 .75 .87 Composite Reliabilityb Variance Extracted Estimatec .91 .68 .93 .74 .96 .85 NOTE: Brand 1: New Balance, Brand 2: Nike, Brand 3: TOMS. a Standardized estimates. b (∑std. Loadings)2/(∑std. Loadings)2 + ∑measurement error. c ∑std. Loadings2/∑std. Loadings2 + ∑measurement error. **p < .001. hypothesized to be theoretically related: brand trustworthiness and brand social responsibility. All constructs were measured on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). In prior correlation tests, the reliability of each measure of these constructs (i.e., brand trustworthiness and brand social responsibility) was examined. In the results, all measures exhibited excellent reliability, and a ranged from .94 to 97 (see Table 5). Given the satisfactory reliability of the measures, the sum of all items of each measure was used in the correlation tests between transparency and these constructs. Transparency and Brand Trustworthiness Brand trustworthiness refers to an individual’s belief that a brand will continue to deliver what it has promised (Erdem & Swait, 2004). Because the concept of transparency captures trust and belief between an individual and a brand (such as a belief of a brand having nothing to hide), it was expected to be correlated with brand trustworthiness. The brand trustworthiness was measured with five items provided by Erdem and Swait’s study (2004), and these items were paraphrased to be consistent with each brand name. For example, an item, “The ______ brand delivers what it promises,” was shown in the questionnaire as “The New Balance brand delivers what it promises,” for BRAND 1. Consistent with this line of expectation, significant correlations were identified between transparency and brand trustworthiness: BRAND 1 (r = .60; p < .01), BRAND 2 (r = .67; p < .01), and BRAND 3 (r = .51; p < .01). Hustvedt and Kang / PERCEPTIONS OF TRANSPARENCY TABLE 5: 309 Measures Used to Test Nomological Validity and Predictive Validity a Constructs/Items Brand 1 Brand 2 Brand 3 Source Brand trustworthiness The ______ brand delivers what it promises. ______’s product claims are believable. Over time, my experiences with the ______ brand have led me to expect it to keep its promises, no more and no less. The ______ brand has a name you can trust. The ______ brand does not pretend to be something it isn’t. Brand social responsibility ______is committed to using a portion of its profits to help nonprofits. ______gives back to the communities in which it does business. Local nonprofits benefit from ______’s contributions. ______integrates charitable contributions into its business activities. ______is interested in corporate giving. Brand purchasing intention I am likely to ask the salesperson about ______ products the next time I visit a shoe or clothing store. I am likely to consider ______ the next time I think about buying shoes. I am likely to check reviews regarding ______ products. I am likely to suggest ______products to a friend. Brand WOM intention I tend to spread positive word of mouth about the ______brand. I often recommend ______ products to my friends. If my friends were looking to purchase shoes, I often tell them to try the ______ brand. .96 .94 .94 Erdem and Swait (2004) .95 .96 .97 Lichtenstein et al. (2004) .92 .90 .93 Krishnamurthy and Sivaraman (2002) .95 .95 .95 Maxham and Netemeyer (2003) NOTE: All constructs were measured on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree); Brand 1: New Balance, Brand 2: Nike, Brand 3: TOMS. Transparency and Brand Social Responsibility Brand social responsibility is defined as an individual’s perceptions of the brand’s “commitment to giving back to the community by supporting nonprofits” (Lichtenstein, Drumwright & Braig, 2004, pp. 18). Because the nature of transparency involves the belief of a brand being socially responsible, it was expected that transparency would be significantly related to brand social responsibility. Brand social responsibility was measured with five items developed by Lichtenstein et al. (2004). In the same manner as brand trustworthiness, for instance, an original item from brand social responsibility, “______is committed to using a portion of its profits to help nonprofits,” appeared as “Nike is committed to using a portion of its profits to help nonprofits” for BRAND 2 on the questionnaire for this current study. As expected, transparency was significantly correlated with brand social 310 FAMILY AND CONSUMER SCIENCES RESEARCH JOURNAL responsibility for each brand case: BRAND 1 (r = .71; p < .01), BRAND 2 (r = .73; p < .01), and BRAND 3 (r = .81; p < .01). Predictive validity a scale must show predictive validity which is the ability of the scale to estimate external criterion behavior (c.f., Arnold & Reynolds, 2003). Based on the reasoned action theory (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975) which posits that a positive belief leads to a behavioral intention, it would sound to reason that an individual who has a stronger belief on a brand’s transparency is more likely to have a stronger intention to purchase a product from the brand than those who have a lower level of transparency. In the extended line of this reasoning, those who strongly believe that a brand is transparent are more likely to have a stronger intention to recommend other people the brand or the products purchased from the brand. It is assumed that behavioral intention to purchase products from a brand (brand purchasing intention) and (brand word of mouth intention) would serve as appropriate external criterion behaviors to examine predictive validity of the transparency scale. Brand purchasing intention was measured with four items adapted from Krishnamurthy and Sivaraman’s (2002) study. Brand word of mouth (WOM) intention was measured with three items adapted from Maxham and Netemeyer (2003). All constructs were measured on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The reliability of each criterion measure was ensured: a ranged from .90 to 95 (see Table 4). Given the satisfactory reliability of the measures, the sum of all items for each measure was used to test the hypothesized relationships between transparency and these external constructs. The results revealed that the transparency measure was significantly correlated with these two external criterion behaviors for all of three brand cases. See Table 6. IMPLICATIONS AND DISCUSSION The outcome of this research is a reliable and valid measure of consumer perception of transparency of social responsibility efforts that include five items. By identifying and defining transparency, this study contributes to the field of brand management by (i) establishing the concept of Transparency as a consumer concern that is distinct from both brand trustworthiness and brand social responsibility, and (ii) as a belief held by consumers that correlates with their brand purchasing intention and brand WOM intention. The results provide researchers with an empirical definition of what transparency of brand social responsibility means to consumers. The TABLE 6: Correlations of Transparency with External Measures External Measures Transparency (BRAND 1) Transparency (BRAND 2) Transparency (BRAND 3) Brand Brand Brand Brand .60** .71** .49** .51** .67** .73** .57** .72** .51** .81** .42** .37** trustworthiness social responsibility purchasing intention WOM intention NOTE: BRAND 1: New Balance, BRAND 2: Nike, BRAND 3: TOMS. All correlations are significant. **p < .001. Hustvedt and Kang / PERCEPTIONS OF TRANSPARENCY 311 development and testing of this measure has opened the door to future use of the concept of transparency in the examination of brand social responsibility efforts. Future research can include this new component of the consumer–brand relationship along with previously identified components such as competence and credibility as well as brand loyalty. The study has implications for brand managers and social responsibility directors seeking to evaluate the impact that social responsibility efforts can have on consumer attitudes toward their brand. The ability to measure the belief that consumers have in the intention of the brand to deal with social responsibility concerns (e.g., labor conditions in factories) will allow brand managers to consider the role that social responsibility efforts play in shaping consumer attitudes toward their brand. Brand social responsibility directors can directly measure how their efforts are perceived by the consumers of their brand. Future research should explore adaptation of the measure for the specific social responsibility concerns of various industries that do not use factories to produce their products. For example, how do consumers perceive the transparency of the social responsibility efforts of hotel brands relative to their housekeeping staff? Finally, this study has implications for consumers. Some consumers may be seeking greater transparency from the brands they purchase. If brands are prepared to measure consumer reaction to their efforts, the brand managers can attempt to make changes in communication that will meet the needs of consumers. The transparency scale established satisfactory reliability and validity of the measure. However, one potential limitation in applying the findings from this study is related to the brands and products that were used to develop the measure. The brands were chosen for their well-publicized social responsibility successes and failures in order to capture the extremes in attitudes toward the brands. The product category for this study was chosen because the apparel and footwear industry is one of the fields that is often suspected of the exploitation of labor and unfair working conditions in its international supply chain. Future research using this measure should be conducted in other product categories with other brands to examine the stability of the measure across the product categories and brands. The involvement of brands in social responsibility efforts is dynamic and could change over time, as will the methods that brand managers use to communicate their efforts. Thus, transparency might become more dependent on the social networking trend that is capturing increasingly large amounts of brand communication (Trusov, Bucklin & Pauwels, 2009). The relationship of this scale with consumer involvement in social networking–based brand efforts should be explored. Because a scale development procedure involves investigator subjectivity (c.f., Arnold & Reynolds, 2003), there is a possibility of other indicators not captured in this study. This study focused on labor conditions such as sweatshop issues. Future studies need to consider other labor-related issues such as child labor and other social responsibility issues such as impact on the environment and resource usage. By expanding the scope and considering other indicators, the transparency measure could become a multidimensional scale. Further, the transparency scale needs to be tested across cultures and countries where consumer perceptions on labor conditions vary; this would enhance the external validity of scale development. 312 FAMILY AND CONSUMER SCIENCES RESEARCH JOURNAL Finally, future research can utilize the scale to understand the factors that influence transparency as well as the outcomes of transparency. As shown in the nomological validity tests of this study, transparency was statistically correlated with brand trustworthiness and brand social responsibility. Thus, future research should include transparency along with previously identified components of brand trust (e.g., competence and credibility) as well as brand loyalty to enhance the understanding of factors that could influence transparency. The predictive validity tests, in this study, demonstrated that transparency is significantly related to brand purchasing intention and brand word of mouth intention. 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Copyright of Family & Consumer Sciences Research Journal is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. 1 Article Critique Assignment: Week # Student Name Here xxx University 2 Article Critique Assignment: Week # Write the APA formatted reference of this article here. Make sure it is completely APA formatted. Please note that the information in the announcement will not be APA. You need to learn how to put references in APA format. (Make sure you are using the article assigned for the week!!) Introduction Write a one paragraph summary of the article including why the research was done, what they found, and implications for social change (no more than 1 page). Critique of Article/Research Study In paragraph form, write a 2-3 page critique of the article you were assigned to read for the assignment. In this section you should consider the items asked in the directions for the assignment but do not copy and paste the questions into your paper and answer them one after another. A critique is not a summary (retelling) of the article and what the authors did. A critique is a combination of a short summary of what you are critiquing and then a critique of it (Was what they did appropriate? Why or why not? What would you have potentially done differently? Why? Did they follow best research practices? How do you know?). Here are some of the things you should consider when critiquing a research article (do not just copy and paste these questions into the critique—this is just to give you an idea of what types of things to address—you don’t have to address everything but should have 2-3 pages of critique in this section—double spaced): Critique of Literature Review 3 • • • • • • • Was the problem clearly articulated and was ample evidence provided to support the problem being addressed? Was the theoretical or conceptual framework present, was its relationship to the present study described, and was it appropriate to the problem being addressed? Was the literature cited appropriate to the topic? Was the literature primarily from current sources (within 5 years of the article publication date)? Did the author choose citations judiciously, or were did it appear that quantity of citations was emphasized over quality? Does the literature review present a clear and non-biased approach to the topic? Were the research questions and / or hypotheses clearly stated? Do they logically derive from the literature review? Critique of Methods/Research Design • • • • • • • • • • • Were the participants adequately described in terms of population, inclusion and exclusion criteria, and sampling strategy? Is the sample representative of the population? Is there support that the sample size ensures adequate statistical power? Was there a statement indicating that IRB approval was obtained? Were procedures for protecting participant rights included? Were the procedures for executing the design carefully described in a way that you or other scientists could replicate the study? Is the role and activity of the researcher in the data collection setting/sites described? Were reliability and validity measures of questionnaires, scales, or other measurement instruments presented? Do measures exhibit adequate reliability and validity? Were instruments used in populations for which they may not have been normed? Was there effort made to ensure reliability and validity in the study sample? Was the design appropriate to test the hypothesis(es) or address the research questions? Was random assignment used? If not, what are the potential flaws to internal and external validity? Critique of Results Section • Are the important characteristics of the sample described? • Are participation rates (and attrition rates in longitudinal studies) described? For longitudinal studies, was differential attrition determined? • Were key descriptive statistics provided for all variables? • Do the results address the hypotheses under question? 4 • • Are tables and figures used effectively? Were tables not used when they would have been very helpful to the reader? Are effect sizes and p-values reported for all inferential findings? Were they appropriate? Critique of Discussion Section • Are the results discussed in the context of the research presented in the literature review section? • Are methodological limitations adequately addressed? Think in terms of sample representativeness, generalizability of results, and potential threats to internal and external validity. • Are implications for further research described? • Are implications for practitioners described? • Is the contribution/significance to the field in relation to the continuum of inquiry clear? You do not need to cite the article you are critiquing but you do need to cite any materials that you use in critiquing the article from other sources. If you do cite other resources you will need to add an APA formatted reference list on the last page of the paper. Make sure that you are not giving non-human things human characteristics in your paper. This means things like “this study concluded”. A study cannot conclude something but you can say things like “these authors concluded”. In addition, when you talk about research that has been done in the past or published materials you need to talk about them in the past tense. Conclusion In your conclusion write a paragraph about what your overall thoughts about the article were and if you found the article to be useful as well as why or why not. Also include if you think this article would be helpful to another researcher and why/why not. 5 References Include any references you used in your paper other than the article you critiqued in APA format.
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