Intention to choose Halal products: the role of religiosity

Abstract

Purpose – Muslims living in multi-religious societies are considered more conscious about the permissibility (Halal) of products and thus the majority of Halal research in the non-financial sector was conducted in multi-ethnic societies. Nonetheless, the global trade is changing the way we perceive the origin of products and brands and their permissibility under Islamic Sharia laws. This apparently has serious implications for international companies operating in food, cosmetics and pharmaceutical products. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of Muslim attitude towards Halal products, their subjective norms and religiosity in predicting intention to choose Halal products. Design/methodology/approach – A structured question was designed to elicit consumer attitude, subjective norms, intention to choose Halal products and degree of inter and intra personal religiosity. Data were collected from 180 adult respondents using a convenience sampling method. Only 150 responses were deemed suitable for further analysis, yielding a response rate of 83 per cent. Stepwise regression analysis was used to test the proposed model. Findings – The results indicated that theory of reasoned action (TRA) is a valid model in predicting intention to choose Halal products. The results further indicate that subjective norms (β=0.455, p, 0.001), attitude towards the Halal products (β=0.265, p, 0.001) and intra personal religiosity (β=0.167, p, 0.001) positively influence attitude towards the Halal products. Interestingly, subjective norm appears to be the strongest of all the predictors for choosing Halal products.Research limitations/implications – The data collected for the current study investigate global attitude towards Halal products. It would be interesting if future researchers examine consumers' attitude towards specific Halal products for specific product categories. Practical implications – It is argued in this research that the presence of strong attitude towards Halal products in Muslim consumers might play an important role in exclusion or inclusion of brands, based on their conformance to Halal requirements. Originality/value – The paper extends the applicability of the theory of reasoned action model by investigating the role of inter-personal and intra-personal religiosity in intention to choose Halal products.