Language Cues and Product Benefit Appeals: What Drives Green Purchase Intentions in AI Recommenders?
Published online on July 25, 2026
Abstract
["Journal of Consumer Behaviour, EarlyView. ", "\nABSTRACT\nThis research examines the interaction effect between language cues and product benefit appeals on green purchase intention in AI‐driven conversational recommender systems (AI‐CRSs). Through three experiments across various green products with rigorous manipulation checks, we demonstrate that consumers respond more favorably to other‐benefiting appeals when presented with warm language cues, and to self‐benefiting appeals with competent cues. This symmetric effect is driven by moral judgments: the match between warm cues and other‐benefiting appeals activates deontological reasoning, while competent cues paired with self‐benefiting appeals trigger egoistic reasoning, both enhancing green purchase intention. Product set granularity moderates this core effect, with coarse granularity strengthening the warm‐other and competent‐self congruence. These findings advance literature on AI anthropomorphism and green marketing, while offering actionable insights for AI‐CRSs design.\n"]