The influence of consumers' lawfulness attitude and morality towards willingness to purchase counterfeit fashion products

The seriousness and global magnanimity of counterfeit has been a consistent thief of companies’ intellectual property rights, robbing countries of income and societies of their jobs. Countless efforts have been taken by the World Customs Organization (WCO), Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and locally by the Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs (KPDNHEP) to combat the growth of counterfeiting. However, the growth of this illicit trade is still proudly blossoming despite all the efforts to control it. The focus of this study would be on fashion brands, which proudly sits at the top of counterfeited products ranking worldwide. The purpose of this research was to investigate the significance of the relationship between moral intensity, recognition of moral issue, moral judgment and willingness of consumers to purchase counterfeit fashion products. This research also evaluated the moderating effects of lawfulness attitude as an individual moderator between moral judgment and predicting the outcome variable. This study was underpinned by Jones 1991 Issue-Contingent Model to gauge the influence of lawfulness attitude and morality particularly on Generation-Y consumers. This study involved 266 respondents from Penang. Out of the six hypotheses tested, two were supported while the other four were not supported. The analysis revealed a positive relationship between recognition of moral issue and moral judgment towards respondents' willingness to purchase counterfeit fashion products. On the other hand, lawfulness attitude did not moderate the relationship between moral judgment and willingness to purchase. This study also highlighted implications of the study, limitations as well as recommendations for future research