Background: A new insight into the importance of professional ethics in the fashion industry has led to a change in consumer choice. The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of professional ethics observance on the purchase behavior of consumer in fashion industry.
Method: The present research is an applied study in terms of its purpose and a descriptive-correlational study in terms of data collection method. The statistical population of the study consisted of clothes buyers in Ardabil city. With regard to the unlimited size of the population, 384 people were selected according to the Cochran formula and selected by nonrandom convenience sampling method. To measure the variables, standard questionnaire was used. The hypotheses were analyzed using structural equation modeling and Lisrel software.
Results: The results show that customer concern about exploitation of workers with a standard coefficient of 0.85, customer awareness about exploitation of workers with a standard coefficient of 0.89; customer beliefs about exploitation of workers with a standard coefficient of 0.6; customer concern about environmental aspects with a standard coefficient of 0.91; customer awareness about environmental aspects with a standard coefficient of 0.97; ultimately, customer beliefs about environmental aspects with a coefficient of 0.86 have a positive and significant relationship with consumer purchasing behavior.
Conclusion: The results show that customers' concern, awareness and beliefs about exploitation of workers as well as their concern, awareness and beliefs about environmental aspects (environmentally friendly fashion) have a significant relationship with customer buying behavior. Commitment of producers of apparel and fashion to social responsibility will help to development of target markets by upgrading professional ethics standards.