Normative influences of Corporate Environmental Responsibility on pro-environmental behaviours: insights from Italy, China, and Taiwan.

Introduction: Corporate Environmental Responsibility (CER) encompasses voluntary initiatives organizations undertake to minimize their environmental impact and communicate these efforts internally and externally. This study employs the Focus Theory of Normative Conduct (Cialdini et al., 1991) to define CER norms as the organization’s beliefs about approved actions (injunctive norms) and its actual practices (descriptive norms). Objectives: The aim is to examine how descriptive and injunctive CER norms enhance collective efficacy toward environmental issues. This, in turn, is expected to positively influence attitudes and intentions toward simple and complex pro-environmental behaviors, such as recycling and adopting new energy technologies, at work and at home. The study also explores norm tightness/looseness moderating role in the relationship between CER norms and behavioral outcomes. Materials and Methods: This correlational research involves samples of employees from publicand private organizations in Italy and China (mainland China and Taiwan). A multi-group regression model analyzes the relationships between variables and compares different samples. Results: The findings highlight the critical role of CER norms in fostering pro-environmental behaviors in organizational contexts and private life. The moderating role of norm tightness/looseness in the relationship between CER norms and behavioral outcomes was revealed. Conclusions: The importance of cross-cultural studies on this topic is growing, although more than a simple East-West comparison is needed for generalization (Krys et al., 2024). Exploring how the impact of these normative behaviors may differ in countries like China, where adherence to norms is generally stricter than in Western countries (Gelfand et al., 2011), remains particularly compelling.