Stakeholders increasingly put pressure on firms to ensure their suppliers' adherence to corporate social responsibility principles and standards. A firm's supplier monitoring activities (SMA) are, thus, central to achieving supply chain transparency. In an effort to help build a business case for SMA, this research explores the effect of SMA disclosures on consumers' attitude toward the firm and purchase intention. In so doing, we also examine how consumer attitude and purchase intention vary as a function of SMA disclosure characteristics. The results of three behavioral studies reveal more positive consumer attitude and higher purchase intention when a firm discloses that its supplier monitoring extends to lower‐tier suppliers (SMA depth) and the firm monitors its lower‐tier suppliers directly rather than relying on its first‐tier suppliers or third parties to do so (lower‐tier supplier monitoring mechanism). Greater SMA breadth—monitoring both suppliers' social and environmental activities—in turn, is not associated with more positive consumer attitude and higher purchase intention. Further, attitude toward the firm mediates the relationship between SMA disclosure characteristics and purchase intention. Collectively, these findings underline that consumers value firms' SMA and point toward an economic rationale for a firm's transparency regarding its supplier monitoring efforts.

中文翻译：

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消费者关怀和公司也应该：公开供应商监督活动的好处

利益相关者越来越向公司施加压力，以确保其供应商遵守公司的社会责任原则和标准。因此，公司的供应商监控活动（SMA）对于实现供应链透明至关重要。为了帮助建立SMA的业务案例，本研究探讨了SMA披露对消费者对公司的态度和购买意愿的影响。在此过程中，我们还研究了消费者态度和购买意愿如何随SMA披露特征的变化而变化。当一家公司披露其供应商监控范围扩展到较低级别的供应商（SMA深度），并且该公司直接监控其较低级别的供应商而不是依赖其第一级别的供应商时，这三项行为研究的结果表明，他们具有更积极的消费者态度和更高的购买意愿。二级供应商或第三方这样做（低级供应商监控机制）。反过来，更大的SMA宽度（监视供应商的社会和环境活动）与更积极的消费者态度和更高的购买意愿无关。此外，对公司的态度介导了SMA披露特征与购买意愿之间的关系。总的来说，这些发现强调了消费者重视企业的SMA，并指出企业的SMA的经济原理。