The COVID-19 pandemic has made significant differences in consumers' sustainable consumption behaviors and their attitudes toward environmental issues. After the global spread of the virus, a growing number of people became more aware of the environmental impact of their consumption habits, and their purchasing decisions shifted to favoring products and brands that place a higher value on environmental issues. Therefore, this chapter aims to introduce what the existing knowledge has presented about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on consumers' sustainable consumption practices and presents an overview of the existing literature. For this purpose, the current study focused on the recent research that addressed the changes in the sustainable consumption behaviors of consumers from different aspects, such as consumer spending habits, adopting a voluntarily simple life, consumption of energy and natural resources, the purchase, consumption, and use of environmentally friendly products and participating in sustainable practices.
TopIntroduction
“We are facing a global health crisis unlike any in the 75-year history of the United Nations — one that is killing people, spreading human suffering, and upending people’s lives. But this is much more than a health crisis. It is a human crisis. The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is attacking societies at their core.” (United Nations, 2020).
According to the UN report, COVID-19 pandemic has had an adverse effect on some sustainable development goals (SDGs). For instance, it has led to the loss of income (i.e., no poverty), disrupted food production and distribution (i.e., zero hunger), devastated health outcomes (i.e., good health and well-being), and increased unemployment and reduced work time (e.g., decent work and economic growth). On the other hand, after the global spread of the virus, a growing number of people became more aware of the environmental impact of their consumption habits, and their purchasing decisions shifted to favoring products and brands that place a higher value on environmental issues (Barbier & Burgess, 2020). Besides, Perkins et al.’s (2021) study focusing on the lessons taken from COVID-19 addressed the potentiality of decreasing fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse emissions. It is suggested that the COVID-19 pandemic is a significant driver of behavioral change in people, with implications for environmental awareness, sustainability, and social responsibility (Ali et al., 2021; Severo et al., 2021). In addition, people have also changed their way of consumption in the COVID-19 era. At the beginning of the pandemic, panic buying at supermarkets for stockpiling was sparked by the widespread fear of COVID-19’s consequences (e.g., death and severe disease) (Naeem, 2020). However, following the pandemic’s initial months, one of the most obvious signs of a shift in consumer behavior was the adoption of cautious approaches to purchasing habits (Mehta et al., 2020). According to Hobbs (2020), for example, people avoided unnecessary purchases of luxury goods, and they also limited their major purchases to necessities (Tuncer, 2020).
It is seen that the COVID-19 pandemic has made significant differences in consumers’ sustainable consumption behaviors and their attitudes toward environmental issues. In this context, this chapter aims to introduce what the existing knowledge has presented about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on consumers’ sustainable consumption practices and perspectives so far. For this purpose, this chapter presents an overview of the current literature addressing the studies that have focused on the changes in the sustainable consumption behaviors of individual consumers in the COVID-19 era. Hence, this study will help understand the current information about the link between COVID-19 and sustainability from a consumer perspective and see the avenues of research for future studies.
In this context, the remainder of the paper has the following organizational structure. The first section introduces the concept of sustainable consumption. Then, the second section gives a review of the relevant literature on the relationship between sustainable consumption and the COVID-19 pandemic. After that, the discussion and conclusion part is given. Last, limitations and implications for future research finalize the study.