ORIGINAL RESEARCH
Does Environmental Information
Disclosure Affect Customer Stability?
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1
Department of Economics and Management, North China Electric Power University, No. 689, Huadian Road,
Lianchi District, Baoding 071000, Hebei Province, China
2
College of Economics and Management, China Agricultural University, No.17 Qinghua East Road,
Haidian District, Beijing 100083, China
3
Business school, Nankai University, No.121 Baidi Road, Nankai District, Tianjin 300071, China
Submission date: 2023-12-28
Final revision date: 2024-06-16
Acceptance date: 2024-06-30
Online publication date: 2024-10-29
Corresponding author
Xiaoyan Guan
Department of Economics and Management, North China Electric Power University, No. 689, Huadian Road,
Lianchi District, Baoding 071000, Hebei Province, Chin
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ABSTRACT
As environmental problems are becoming increasingly severe, the environmental protection
behavior of an enterprise directly affects the evaluation of customers towards the enterprise. Taking
A-share manufacturing companies listed in China as the sample, this study investigates the impact
of environmental information disclosure on customer stability. The results show that environmental
information disclosure positively affects customer stability. Moreover, hard environment information has
a stronger effect on enhancing customer stability due to its higher information quality. Mechanism tests
indicate that environmental information disclosure exerts three effects on customer stability, namely
“information effect”, “governance effect” and “reputation effect”. Environmental information disclosure
can increase information transparency and improve corporate governance and firm reputation, thereby
enhancing customer stability. Heterogeneity analysis demonstrates that environmental information
disclosure has a more significant promoting effect on customer stability in enterprises with higher media
attention. This study validates the benefits of environmental information disclosure from the perspective
of customers and offers insights for emerging economies to enhance their environmental information
disclosure systems.