Role of environmental awareness & self-identification expressiveness in electric-vehicle adoption

Abstract

Global warming is a serious threat to humanity, and greenhouse gases are behind it. CO₂ is one of the main greenhouse gasses that cause global warming. The second most important reason behind CO₂ emission is the transport sector. Electric-powered Vehicles introduced by the automobile sector are regarded as the main alternative to cope with this issue. Despite their advantages, EV adoption rates vary by country, and the expected reductions in energy shortages and pollution are not fully achieved. We took the opportunity to assess the consumer EV adoption intention by using the Value-based technology adoption model. We integrated Environmental awareness (EA) and Self-identification expressiveness (SIE) as new factors in this model to assess the role of EA and SIE in EV adoption intentions. We have collected the response of 704 EV users from China and applied the SEM-ANN dual-stage hybrid model to test proposed hypotheses and rank the variables according to their importance. Study findings revealed that Environmental awareness is a significant predictor of EV adoption but is not the most important factor. Study results also revealed that the perceived benefits of EV adoption and perceived sacrifices for its adoption have a significant impact on the perceived value of EV, and this value leads to the adoption intentions. PV is revealed as a significant mediator in our proposed model. We conclude that people need to educate about environmental issues and the benefits of using EVs to achieve the CO₂ reduction and EV sale target. The study has several theoretical and practical implications for the government and the electric vehicle manufacturing industry.