Managerial attitude towards the natural environment and environmental sustainability expenditure
Introduction
Many scholars and practitioners have explored avenues to better accelerate the shift towards a “green economy” and halting environmental degradation (Bergius et al., 2020). Policymakers and stakeholder groups continue to impose pressure on businesses to pay attention to social and environmental practices (Amankwah-Amoah, 2020; Boso et al., 2017; Leonidou et al., 2016). For example, consumer demand for more transparency, and strict regulations have influenced businesses to consider sustainability as a competitive priority. These pressures have prompted many businesses to balance their economic goals strategically with their societal and environmental goals. Accordingly, businesses are increasingly using sustainability matrices to demonstrate their concern for the environment (Brown et al., 2006).
Apart from these pressures, chief executive officers (CEOs) also tend to have greater influence on firm strategy, resource deployment and behaviours which can have direct and indirect impact on sustainability. Thus, the success of a firm's sustainability strategy and initiative is impacted by the support of executive leadership in those firms (Huang, 2013; Lewis et al., 2014). For example, executives tend to see environmental issues as opportunities or threats when the firm's strategic leaders legitimize environmentally significant behaviours by institutionalizing them within the firm's identity (Afshar, Jahanshahi, Brem & Bhattacharjee, 2017; Sharma, 2000). Executives are often guarded by their traditional beliefs and values which drive the organization's behaviour (Tsang, 2004b) such that new research may provide information to supplement theory on drivers or barriers to sustainability in the literature.
However, despite the significant impact CEOs bestow on sustainability practices of firms, we still do not know enough about whether managers' superstitious beliefs could influence the firm's sustainability activities. Although superstition is rooted in cultural traditions and has often been the central pillar of environmental sustainability (Mawere and Awuah-Nyamekye, 2015), there remains limited understanding of how superstition influences environmental sustainability expenditure. Moreover, whilst it is widely recognised that superstition endures in society (Tsang, 2004a; Wang et al., 2012; Ya'akov et al., 2018) and that superstition predicts attitudes (Chen, 2018 Tsang, 2004b), to date we know little about how these constructs work in concert with one another to influence sustainability expenditure of firms. This issue is particularly important given that superstition is inextricably interwoven with environmental protection (Mawere & Awuah-Nyamekye), and superstition and attitudes are pivotal features of many societies in developing countries (see Tsang, 2004). Thus, the purpose of this paper is to examine the mediating mechanism of the relationship between superstition and sustainability expenditure and proposes gender as a moderating variable on this relationship.
The present study contributes to a more nuanced understanding of how superstition influences a firm's sustainability expenditure. First, building on superstition literature (Gallup and Newport, 1991; Hernandez et al., 2008; Mowen and Carlson, 2003), we examine the direct impact of CEOs' superstition on their attitudes towards the natural environment. In addition, we examine the indirect influence of CEOs' superstition on environmental sustainability expenditure. This enquiry is critical because despite the growing research into environmental sustainability (Adedoyin et al., 2020; Adomako et al., 2019; Asongu et al., 2020; Helfaya and Whittington, 2019), scholarly effort to investigate how executives' superstition influence a firm's sustainability expenditure lacks theoretical precision. We argue that when CEOs' enduring cultural beliefs (religion, morals and superstition) are greater, they are more likely to develop a positive attitude towards the natural environment. The attitudes towards the natural environment, in turn, are more likely to translate into greater sustainability expenditure.
Second, several scholars have called for additional research efforts to be dedicated to understanding the ways in which superstition of CEOs impact their firms' sustainability expenditure (Appiah-Opoku, 2007; Mawere and Awuah-Nyamekye, 2015). For example, given the limited progress in transitioning to efficient sources of energy, minimizing waste, reducing global degradation activities, and protecting the natural environment, there have been increasing calls to turn to local traditions and norms to motivate and incentivize organizational leaders, communities and businesses to embrace and spearhead contemporary sustainability efforts (see Appiah-Opoku, 2007; Mawere and Awuah-Nyamekye, 2015). Previous research has not examined the underlying mechanisms through which CEOs’ superstition influences sustainability expenditure of firms. The current study sought to obtain evidence on this question from a developing nation to investigate the potential mediating role of attitudes towards the natural environment in this nexus.
Third, beyond examining the theoretical relationship between CEOs' superstition and firms' sustainability expenditure, we examine the boundary conditions under which this relationship is more effective or optimal by introducing gender as a moderating variable. This is an important enquiry because extant research shows that women are more superstitious than men (Gallup and Newport, 1991; Mowen and Carlson, 2003). For example, superstition, which is often considered as irrational, requires moderation to cope with uncertainty and ambiguity (Hernandez et al., 2008). Thus, we derive insights from the social role theory (e.g., Eagly, 1987; Eagly et al., 2000) to examine how gender can help explain variations in the effect of CEOs’ superstition on their attitudes towards the natural environment. Our contention is that individuals behave in ways that conform to the societal norms of the gender role, as such the positive effect of superstition on managerial attitudes towards the natural environment will be more positive for female-led firms.
The paper proceeds in the following manner. In the next section, the theoretical models and hypotheses are examined accompanied by the analysis of the research methods and data collection procedures. Following this, we outline the findings, limitations and directions for future research.
Section snippets
Related literature
In the last two decades, a substantial amount of research attention has been devoted to environmental sustainability issues. Particularly, the renewed attention reflects the importance of superstition (Peng et al., 2017) and national institutions (Roxas and Coetzer, 2012). Arguably, extant research indicates that strategically pursuing an environmental sustainability agenda in resource-constrained settings such as those found in emerging markets yields positive outcomes for firms (Adedoyin et
Study setting
From the mid-twentieth century, when Ghana, like most African nations, gained independence, there has been policy alignment towards development which in many instances hampered environmental efforts. When Ghana gained independence, it started to enact policies to modernize industries and embrace new technology, all underpinned by government participation. Ghana, like many nations in Africa, is well endowed with natural resources such as gold, copper, and timber (Mensah, 2018).
Ghana is a member
Estimation and results
Table 2 presents the descriptive statistics and correlations of the variables used in this study. The variables involved in the interactions were standardized before their inclusion in the main regression to prevent multicollinearity (Aiken and West, 1991). The largest variance inflation factor (VIF) value was 3.56, which is way below the suggested cut-off value of 10 (Neter et al., 1996). Thus, we concluded that multicollinearity is not a major concern in our data. In addition, potential
Discussion and conclusion
Despite substantial interest in environmental sustainability from both researchers and policymakers, insights relating to how executives' superstition drive a firm's sustainability expenditure are far from complete in the sustainability literature. To advance the current frontiers of scholarly knowledge, we build on the literature related to cultural orientation and sustainability to explore how executives' superstition influences sustainability expenditure through the mediating mechanism of
Limitations and directions for future research
Despite the theoretical and practical implications outlined in this study, the current study has some limitations. First, the use of Ghana as a study setting limits the generalizability of findings. Given that Ghana has multiple cultural traditions and superstitions, the interpretation of the findings doesn't necessarily reflect all the numerous ethnic groups and cultural traditions in Ghana. Future research should have a more robust within-country and cross-country design to address the issue.
Data availability statement
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author, [author initials], upon reasonable request.
CRediT authorship contribution statement
Samuel Adomako: Methodology, Data curation, Writing – original draft, preparation. Joseph Amankwah-Amoah: Conceptualization, Methodology, Data curation, Writing – original draft, preparation, and all section.
Declaration of competing interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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