The challenge of sustainable development and consumption is to meet current wants without impoverishing future generations and the planet in the long term. Therefore, new patterns of sustainable practices are increasingly promoted. The purpose of the present study is to realize a systematic review aimed to analyze the contents and features of articles dealing with new trends in consumers’ sustainable consumption. One hundred and four papers published in the last five years were retrieved and analyzed through a lexicographical analysis using the software T-LAB. The results show that, even if most of the current studies focus almost exclusively on the environmental impact of sustainability, the social perspective is also recently taking hold. Evidence suggests prevailing attention towards consumers’ appeal and consumption of eco-friendly food products, together with a growing interest in the last years in consumers’ practices in other key sectors, such as tourism, commerce, and clothing. Future research should spotlight the less explored frameworks, looking at the economic and social sides of sustainability in a variety of contextual settings. At the same time, consumer-focused research should not forget to look at consumers’ sustainable behavior as a whole and its impacts from the perspective of planet, people, and profit.

Given the inherently hidden nature of tax evasion, research on tax compliance can be challenging. By drawing on the ‘slippery slope’ framework, which suggests that the tax climate in a society can vary on a continuum between antagonistic and synergistic, we test a new tool in tax compliance research by comparing two areas that differ in terms of tax compliance but share the same language: Italy and the Canton of Ticino (Switzerland). After retrieving 3554 tax-related articles published between 2010 and 2016 from national newspapers with the highest circulation in the two considered countries, we performed a lexicographical analysis using the software T-LAB. The results show that the Italian and Swiss national presses depict their respective tax systems and tax authorities in very different ways. An antagonistic tax climate (coercive power of authorities and distrust in the tax system) appears to prevail in Italy, while a synergistic tax climate (legitimate power of authorities and trust in the tax system) prevails in the Canton of Ticino. The tool appears to be effective not only in detecting the tax climate of a country but also in monitoring changes over time, thus allowing policymakers to fine-tune their fiscal policies accordingly. The results also offer insights into the effects of the vicious cycle between the tax climate of a country and the way the press depicts it in terms of tax behaviour.

Purpose: The paper aims to examine whether financial advisors can understand the symbols and meaning that investors associate with money and whether such ability plays any role in enhancing the advisor-investor relationship in terms of satisfaction, level of trust, referral propensity and loyalty. Design/methodology/approach: The authors used a dyadic research design. A total of 186 dyads of financial advisors and their clients took part in the study and completed two parallel self-administered questionnaires. Findings: The authors found that financial advisors often can detect the emotional associations that their clients attribute to money. Such ability can enhance their relationship with investors. Research limitations/implications: The main limitation of this study is its exploratory nature and the convenience sampling technique that was adopted. Therefore, researchers are encouraged to test the main findings further. Practical implications: The results have implications for the development of ad-hoc psychological training to enhance the relationship between financial advisors and investors. Understanding the symbolic meanings and the emotions that clients associate with money may be a prerequisite for a financial services company to succeed and be competitive in the sector. Originality/value: Despite acknowledging that money is not a neutral object but is layered with symbolic meanings and emotional associations, the behavioral finance literature has so far neglected to study these implications from either a theoretical or a practical point of view. This paper aims to fill this gap by investigating the symbolic value of money in the financial services industry.

In neoclassical economics the decision to evade tax is analysed in the same way as the decision to commit benefit fraud. Both decisions depend on the net expected utility that a 'representative individual' will derive from the gamble. If the financial loss a community experiences when there is tax evasion is equal to the financial loss experienced when there is benefit fraud, there is no reason to expect any difference in individuals' attitudes towards these crimes. However, in practice, individuals are far more condemnatory of benefit fraud than of tax evasion. Prospect theory is applied to explain this difference of attitude as well as why individuals are more likely to commit tax evasion than benefit fraud. Moreover, when comparing attitudes and behaviour towards public finance crimes in different countries, the salience of the public finances in individuals' lives, together with the perceived prevalence of illegal behaviours, is important. A comparison of attitudes in Italy and in the UK indicates that Italians are more likely to more heavily punish these crimes and to commit these crimes. The present study sheds insight when explaining why 'gamekeepers' who call for the harshest punishments are the individuals who are more likely to act as 'poachers' themselves. There is a distinction between what individuals wish for themselves in a 'private-person' role and what they wish for others in a 'public-citizen' role - would-be poachers are harsh gamekeepers

The present study seeks to analyse the predictive capacity of the Index of Consumer Sentiment (ICS) (a leading index in international market research) in Italy, before and after the global financial crisis. The analysis focuses on the period 2005–2013 and investigates the predictive power of the ICS with regard to two different outcomes: (1) the actual level of household consumption (considering both its absolute value as total spending and its quarterly variations) and (2) consumers' strategies (i.e. reducing their consumption, focusing on discounts and promotions, focusing on quality), both in general and in specific sectors (e.g. food, leisure, health). The study is based on a second-level analysis of data collected by the Italian Statistical Institute (ISTAT) and a tracking survey on Italian consumers' perceptions and strategic intentions (four waves per year, each consisting of 1,000 telephone interviews based on a structured questionnaire). The findings show that the ICS is predictive of quarterly variations in household consumption, and not of its absolute values; that the index is more predictive in the following trimester, while less predictive synchronously (i.e. in the same quarter); and that its predictive power was stronger between 2009 and 2013 compared to previous years. Furthermore, after 2008, the ICS was also predictive of consumer strategies, particularly those aimed at reducing expenses and focusing on quality (while no relation seems to exist between consumer sentiment and consumers' strategies aimed at discounts and promotions). Implications for marketing and market research are discussed.

Given the intrinsic complexity of cognitive and affective processes affecting how people reason about taxes and their decisions to be compliant with such social duty, we aimed at exploring those latent processes by combining the analysis of their central and peripheral physiological correlates. We asked participants to make realistic economic decisions concerning tax-payment and manipulated the social vs. individual decisional frame. In addition, we took into account the potential role of tax-compliance trait. Thirty self-employed professionals took part in the study and completed a public good game while their autonomic (skin conductance – SC – and heart rate – HR) and neural brain (electroencephalography – EEG) activities were recorded. The analysis of physiological responses during the feedback phase – where participants could be presented or not with a fiscal audit – highlighted: (i) increased tonic SC levels and theta activity in the social condition than in the individual one; (ii) increased HR values when a fiscal audit did not take place, especially in participants who presented an enforced tax-compliance trait. Present findings support the idea that classic economic theories of tax behaviour developed under the assumption that taxpayers act as rational and individualist agents do not provide a comprehensive account for the decision-making process. They add to available evidence highlighting the contribution of psychological and social-affective variables to individuals’ decision-making processes to pay or evade taxes and to their appraisal of the consequences of such choice, as suggested by the ‘slippery slope’ framework.