Health Consciousness and Brand Equity in the Carbonated Soft Drink Industry in Sri Lanka

The purpose of this study is to assess the degree of health consciousness and customer based brand equity, and this study aims to consider further the impact of health consciousness on customer based brand equity by using the health belief model theory and brand value concept in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka. A total of 338 usable data were collected from undergraduate students at universities in Sri Lanka. In analyzing the empirical data one sample t-test and simple linear regression analysis were used. The results show that the degree of health consciousness and customer based brand equity are in low level and moderate level, respectively, whilst health consciousness has significant positive impact on customer based brand equity. The findings of this study regarding the levels of health consciousness and customer based brand equity and the impact of health consciousness on customer based brand equity have important implications for marketing managers in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.


Introduction
Food and beverage industry is one of the vital industries and largest contributors to the world and Sri Lankan economy (Gehlhar & Rrgmi, 2005;Peiris, 2014).Soft drinks sector is one of the fastest growing, most innovative and rapidly changing areas in the food and beverage industry (Central Bank of Sri Lanka, 2011;Leatherhead Food Research, 2014), while carbonated soft drink sector represents the largest segment of the global as well as Sri Lankan soft drink sector (Bloomberg, 2011;Bruce, 2011;Pamnani, Pellerano, Sivajee & Tambiah, 2004).In fact, per capita consumption of carbonated soft drinks in Sri Lanka is 21 bottles compared to India's 5 bottles and Pakistan's 17 bottles (NIIR Project Consultancy Services, 2012), with 62 million liters of carbonated soft drink consumed by Sri Lankans per year (Bruce, 2011), thus, carbonated soft drink industry is one of the growing industries in Sri Lanka, especially among the educated youth generation.Even though the carbonated soft drink industry is the important sector in the soft drink industry, there are, however, few published studies in the Sri Lankan context related to carbonated soft drink industry, especially among the educated youth generation, and this is the main intention for conducting this empirical study mainly in this sector.Further, carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka is dominated by three key players namely, Elephant House, Coca Cola and Pepsi Cola (Mendis, 2012;The Sunday Leader, 2010).brand equity.Though, brand equity is focused on three perspectives, namely financial (Haigh, 1999), company (Keller, 2003) and customer (Aaker, 1991), this study considers brand equity in the customer's perspective.This customer based brand equity (CBBE) performs a vital role in the carbonated soft drink industry (Waris, 2013), but what is the degree of youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation on brand equity in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka?Extant published research does not answer this question.
The rest of this study is organized as follows: the next section literature review and conceptual framework, followed by methodology, data analysis and results, and discussion.The final section offers the limitations and further research directions.

Health Consciousness
HC of the consumers is becoming a vital factor over the last few decades.Bhangale (2011) argues that health is the condition of a person's body (e.g., a person living without illness) and consciousness is the knowledge or understanding about existence of something or importance of something, therefore HC refers to a comprehensive orientation of individual towards health, rather than the issues related to specific orientations such as smoking and weight control.Gould (1990) defines HC as inner status of a person regarding the health.
It is important to note that there is a growing segment of health conscious consumers across the world (Kemp & Bui, 2011).In fact, consumer's HC towards the consumption of soft drinks (especially carbonated soft drinks) is increased (Lőrinczi et al., 2009), since carbonated soft drinks consumption has a harmful dietary effect to the human body and it will lead to the risk of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and fatty liver disease (e.g., Assy et al., 2008;Davis et al., 2005;Palmer, Boggs, Krishnan, Hu, Singer & Rosenberg, 2008).In addition, Sri Lankan consumers have now rapidly become more health conscious towards consumption of food and beverage (e.g., Cader, 2014;Perera, 2012).However, there has been no recent systematic data available that is related to the level of HC of consumers in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka, especially among the educated youth generation.In addition, generally, the HC is high degree in the carbonated soft drink industry across the world, and Sri Lankan consumer's, especially among the educated youth generation HC is also high degree towards the consumption of food and beverage, and thus, the researcher assumed that the HC is high degree in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka, especially among the educated youth generation.According to the above argument the first hypothesis has been formulated.H1: The degree of youth educated consumers' HC is at a high level in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.
Consumers purchase branded products since they desire to live a healthier life (Shavitt, Torelli & Wong, 2009).Therefore, Kemp and Bui (2011) argue that, due to the HC, individuals purchase branded products and therefore, it leads to brand equity.

Customer Based Brand Equity
Aaker (1991) defines brand equity is 'a set of brand assets and liabilities linked to a brand, its name and symbol that add to or subtract from the value provided by a product or service to a firm and/or that firm's customers'.
Although brand equity focuses on three perspectives, namely financial, company and customer based, this study considers the brand equity in the customer's perspective, whilst many previous studies consider CBBE (e.g., Aaker, 1991;Pradhan & Misra, 2014).Pappu, Quester and Cooksey (2006) defines CBBE as 'the value consumers associate with a brand, as reflected in the dimensions of brand awareness, brand associations, perceived quality and brand loyalty'.
The CBBE performs a vital role in the beverage industry (Atilgan, Aksoy & Akinci, 2005), and Waris (2013) and Huang and Liu (2014) imply that CBBE is particularly important to the carbonated soft drink industry.Though there has been no recent statistics available to show the level of CBBE in the Sri Lankan carbonated soft drink industry, and Coca Cola, Elephant House and Pepsi Cola have more brand value within the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka in 2014 (Brand Finance Lanka, 2014), since Kamakura and Russell (1993) affirm that high brand value is vital for and creates high degree of CBBE.Therefore, the researcher assumed that the CBBE is at a high degree in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka, especially among the educated youth generation due to the higher brand value for Coca Cola, Elephant House and Pepsi Cola.According to the above argument the second hypothesis is advanced.H2: The degree of youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation on brand equity is at a higher level in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.

Health Consciousness-Customer Based Brand Equity: Theoretical Foundation
The relationship between HC and CBBE is explained by using the health belief model theory and brand value concept (e.g., Becker, Drachman & Kirscht, 1974;Dawar, 1998;Dawar & Pillutla, 2000;Kamakura & Russell, 1993;Narayana, 2009).In fact, the health belief model theory is rooted from a well established body of psychological and behavioral theory (Janz & Becker, 1984) and it is designed by Hochbaum et al. in the 1950s (Glanz & Rimer, 1995;Janz & Becker, 1984;Rosenstock, 1974).This model contributes to the health behavior concept and it is used to develop HC scale (e.g., Narayana, 2009).Hence, the health belief model theory supports the concept of HC of consumers (e.g., Narayana, 2009;Rosenstock, Strecher & Becker, 1988).
According to the health belief model theory people expect health actions to prevent illness, since they do not want to get sick and these health actions for prevent sick creates better choices, especially brand choice (e.g., Becker et al., 1974;Janz & Becker, 1984;Narayana, 2009).In other words, the health belief model theory supports the HC and brand choice and therefore, this study makes link between the HC and CBBE by using this model.
Importantly, there is a growing segment of health conscious consumers across the world (Kemp & Bui, 2011).Even though consumers are more concerned of their health, Zsolt (2012) implies that the choices of branded products are healthier than unbranded products.Therefore, it is notable that these health conscious consumers have the motivation to purchase the products, which have strong brand name in order to improve the quality of life and this is particularly true in the food and beverage industry (Kemp & Bui, 2011).Indeed, consumers go for the branded products due to the HC and reduce the perceive risk of health (e.g., Kemp & Bui, 2011;Orth, 2006;Tikász, Szûcs & Stündl, 2009), it is perhaps according to the health belief model theory (Janz & Becker, 1984).
Nevertheless, Coca Cola and Pepsi Cola have more global brand value and they are ranked first and second respectively, within the global carbonated beverage industry in 2014 (Forbes, 2014).Notably, Coca Cola, Elephant House and Pepsi Cola had more brand value within the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka in 2014 (Brand Finance Lanka, 2014).According to Kamakura and Russell (1993) higher level of brand value is vital for the creation of CBBE at a higher degree.Though, consumers have more HC towards the consumption of carbonated soft drinks (Lőrinczi et al., 2009), the brands like Coca Cola, Elephant House and Pepsi Cola assist to preserve the HC unambiguously and reduce the health risk of the consumers, since these brands have high brand value.This unambiguous support of its brands for the HC (e.g., Narayana, 2009) will lead to an increase in CBBE (e.g., Dawar, 1998;Dawar & Pillutla, 2000) and this link is further supported by health belief model (e.g., Becker et al., 1974;Janz & Becker, 1984;Narayana, 2009).
Therefore, based on the preceding discussion on health belief model theory and brand value concept the researcher assumes that HC may positively impact on CBBE, especially in the carbonated soft drink industry among the educated youth generation in Sri Lanka.
H3: The degree of youth educated consumers' HC has a significant positive impact on the degree of their perceived evaluation of brand equity in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.

Conceptual Framework
The conceptual framework is depicted in the Figure 1 that is based on the Gould (1988Gould ( , 1990) HC model, Aaker (1991) CBBE model, and health belief model theory and brand value concept.Indeed, the health belief model theory from psychological and behavioral theory and value concept are used to explain the relationship between HC and CBBE Figure 1.Conceptual Framework

Measures and Measurement
The HC and CBBE were measured by means of the scales developed in the literature.In fact, to measure the HC a nine item scale were used, consisting of four sub-dimensions namely, health alertness, health self-consciousness, health involvement and health self-monitoring, which was developed by Gould (1988Gould ( , 1990)).Further, CBBE was treated as a four dimensional construct encompasses of brand awareness, brand association, perceived quality and brand loyalty (Aaker, 1991).Brand awareness was measured using a 3-item scale adapted from the branding literature (Yoo & Donthu, 2001).Brand association-a 4-item scale was adapted from brand equity literature (Aaker, 1991).Perceived quality was measured using a 4-item scale adapted from the branding literatures (Aaker, 1991;Yoo & Donthu, 2001 both as cite in Spry, Pappu & Cornwell, 2011).Finally, brand loyalty was measured using a 3-item scale from the work of Yoo and Donthu (2001).
The measurement scales for the HC and CBBE constructs (23 items) were used to develop a questionnaire in English.All the items were measured on a five-point Likert scale with anchors of strongly disagree (1) and strongly agree (5).The final section of the questionnaire consisted questions related to the respondents' demographic characteristics including, gender, age and parental income.

Pre-test
A pre-test of the questionnaire with 23 items was conducted prior to the actual study by six marketing academics and six marketing managers.Based on these twelve experts' comments, the wording and layout of the questions were rearranged.Then, the main study followed with 23 items.

Sample Section and Data Collection
Previous carbonated soft drink related studies considered educated youth generation as target population, especially university undergraduate students (Atilgan et al., 2005;Netemeyer et al., 2004).As consistent with previous studies, this study also considered educated youth generation studying in Sri Lankan universities (undergraduate students) who has consumed carbonated soft drinks as target population, using a judgmental sampling method.Accordingly, a total of 381 copies of questionnaires were distributed, and after deleting data with missing values, 338 responses were found usable, yielding an 89 per cent response rate.

Statistical Treatment of Data
This study used one sample t-test at the 0.05 significance level to test the hypotheses H1 and H2, and simple linear regression analysis was used to test the hypothesis H3 with SPSS version 22.0.In addition, the mean scores of the 5-point Likert scale measurement (mean scores for low level, moderate level and high level are between 1 and 2.49, 2.5 and 3.49 and 3.5 and 5, respectively) were adopted from Hair, Black, Babin, Anderson and Tatham (2006) to determine the degree of HC and CBBE (e.g., Thusyanthy & Senthilnathan, 2013;Thusyanthy & Tharanikaran, 2015;Thusyanthy, 2016) in the one sample t-test statistical analysis.

Sample Profile
The details of 338 respondents are represented in

Unidimensionality, Reliability and Validity Assessment
Unidimensionality of HC and CBBE was assessed using principal component factor analysis with Varimax rotation.In fact, as preliminary to conduct factor analysis the data from the study were subject to two tests.Accordingly, the SPSS version 22.0 output for Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) test (0.814) and Bartlett's test of Sphericity (χ 2 = 2603.56,p < 0.000, df = 253) were ensured the sampling adequacy and the appropriateness of the factor analysis, respectively.After determining sampling adequacy and the appropriateness of the factor analysis, 338 samples in this study were also subject to factor analysis (through principle component analysis with Varimax rotation procedure) in order to explore the unidimensionality of each scale by applying SPSS version 22.0 (see Table 2).All the items for both HC and CBBE were factor loaded, ranging from 0.657 to 0.895, exceeding the critical level of 0.4 (Bagozzi & Baumgartner, 1994) and thus, no necessity for eliminating any items and ensured the acceptable level of unidimensionality.
Sekaran and Bougie (2010) classify the validity into two major categories namely, content validity and construct validity.According to Rossiter (2002) content validity is a priori evidence that the items are a good way representation of the construct.To ensure the content validity, scale development procedure for HC, and CBBE that were guided by the existing scaling literature (Aaker, 1991;Gould, 1988Gould, , 1990;;Yoo & Donthu, 2001).Further, Westen and Rosenthal (2003) define construct validity as 'the extent to which a measure adequately assesses the construct it purports to assess'.In addition, construct validity is assessed through convergent and discriminant validities.As consistent with past studies, this study also used Construct Reliability (CR) and Average Variance Extracted (AVE) to assess the convergent validity (Zdravkovic, Magnusson & Stanle, 2010).
Accordingly, CR and AVE for all dimensions were well above the recommended levels of 0.7 (  Discriminant validity can be established if the AVE value for a construct/dimension should be substantially higher than the squared correlation of two constructs/dimensions (Fornell & Larcker, 1981).As can be seen in Table 3, according to Fornell and Larcker (1981) the discriminant validity was established, since the AVE values associated with all dimensions (0.53 < AVE value < 0.69) were greater than the squared correlation between dimensions.Moreover, Table 3 also reported the means and standard deviations for all dimensions and constructs.
The means for the dimensions range from 2.35 to 2.72 (out of 5) and corresponding standard deviation range from 0.45 to 0.75.

Test of Hypotheses
H1 and H2 were tested using one sample t-test (see Table 4).The decision criteria for low level (between 1 and 2.49), moderate level (2.5 and 3.49) and high level (3.5 and 5) were adopted to determine the degree of youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation on HC and brand equity in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.As indicated in the Table 4, significance values of 0.000 for both lower and upper boundaries (i.e., p < 0.05) in HC and CBBE shows that there are significance differences between assumed means and observed means.Clearly, the observed mean 2.40 for HC has fallen the low level range of 1 -2.5, while observed mean 2.62 for CBBE has fallen the moderate level range of 2.5 -3.5.Hence, the degree of youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation on HC and brand equity are in low level and moderate level, respectively in the carbonated industry in Sri Lanka (Thusyanthy, 2016).Notably, the one sample-t-test failed to offer support for H1 and H2.
To test H3 simple linear regression analysis was performed (see Table 5).As can be seen in Table 5, approximately only 4 per cent of the observed variability of CBBE (adjusted R 2 = 0.038) was explained by HC.However, this simple linear regression equation was found significant (F = 14.350, p < 0.05).Further, the youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation of HC has significantly positive impact on their brand equity by 15.3 per cent (β = 2.251; p < 0.05).Thus, it supports the H3.

Theoretical Implications
H1 predicted the degree of youth educated consumers' HC is at a high level in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.H1 was not supported.There is a possible explanation for this result.This study considered educated youth generation as target population in Sri Lanka, since this youth generation like to drink more carbonated soft drink beverages (Cuomo, Sarnelli, Savarese & Buyckx, 2009), and thus, they might less concern their health.However, the HC might have been at a high level, if the target population is selected from the whole Sri Lankan consumers.Nevertheless, this study offers the empirical support to close the first gap.Consequently, the answer gets for the first research question is that the HC at a low level in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka, especially among the educated youth generation.
H2 predicted that the degree of youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation on brand equity is at a higher level in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka; however there was no support for H2.Even though the results suggested that the degree of youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation on brand equity is at a moderate level in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka, the literature offers strong support for CBBE high level in the carbonated soft drink industry in various countries (Atilgan et al., 2005;Huang & Liu, 2014;Waris, 2013).There is possible reason for this explanation for this result.This study considered educated youth generation as target population, since they might have consider the brand equity moderate level.The CBBE might have had high level, if the target population was the whole Sri Lankan consumers.Nevertheless, this empirical study offers the support to close the gap two, and the answer gets for the second research question is that the CBBE is at a moderate level in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka, especially among the educated youth generation.
A result confirming the degree of youth educated consumers' HC has a significant positive impact on the degree of their perceived evaluation of brand equity in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka, hypothesized in H3.In other words, this study offers empirical support for previously theorized relationship between HC and CBBE in accordance with the health belief model theory and brand value concept.In fact, health belief model theory is used to make a link between HC and CBBE (Narayana, 2009), since the people take action to prevent illness via choices, especially brand choices (e.g., Becker et al., 1974;Narayana, 2009).Nevertheless, consumers go for the branded products due to the HC and reduce the perceive risk of health (e.g., Kemp & Bui, 2011;Orth, 2006), and thus consumers purchase the products which has high brand value.Kamakura and Russell (1993) argues that higher level of brand value is vital for the creation of CBBE at a higher degree.Therefore, the both health belief model and brand value concept were used to make the link between HC and CBBE.Notably, the hypothesis testing results for the H3 revealed that it is consistent with the theory of health belief model and brand value concept.Therefore, this study offers the empirical support to close the third gap and assists to get the answer for the third research question.

Managerial Implications
The findings of this study have important implications for the marketing managers in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.The present study indicates that the degree of youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation of heath consciousness and brand equity are in the low level and moderate level, respectively in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka.However, the consumption of carbonated soft drinks harmful impact to the human body (Assy et al., 2008;Palmer et al., 2008), the educated youth generation in Sri Lanka less concern their health, since HC is high, related to the consumption of carbonated soft drinks in the various countries (Lőrinczi et al., 2009).It is the positive sign to the marketing managers who are in the carbonated soft drink industry to target this educated youth generation.In addition, CBBE also very crucial in the carbonated soft drink industry in Sri Lanka (Huang & Liu, 2014;Waris, 2013), however youth educated consumers' perceived evaluation of brand equity in moderate level.Therefore, the marketing managers in this industry should concentrate these findings try to build CBBE at a high level to get the sustainable competitive advantage among the educated youth generation in Sri Lanka.
Even though, the degree of youth educated consumers' HC at low level in the carbonated soft drinks industry among the educated youth generation in Sri Lanka, the youth educated consumers' HC significantly impact on their perceived evaluation of brand equity.Hence, the marketing managers should consider the health of the educated youth generation, since this generation also may highly concern their health in future and thus, it might negatively impact the CBBE in long-term.As a result, this study suggests that marketing managers should develop effective marketing strategies to concern the long-term impact of health for the educated youth generation as well as the other consumers and potential consumers of the carbonated soft drinks.

Limitations and Future Research Directions
The current study examined only the educated youth generation in Sri Lankan universities.Therefore, the main limitation was related to the generalization of the findings due to the usage of student sample, since this sample has unique characteristics and non-representativeness of the population and thus, threatens the external validity (Zdravkovic et al., 2010).As consistent with the previous studies this study also used the students sample as replication to the existing literature (Fives, Hammana & Olivarez, 2007).However, future research can be conducted to cover the consumers in different part in Sri Lanka, including rural and urban areas.Second, this study only identifies the impact of HC on CBBE.Thus, the further research can be incorporated other variables, along with the HC and CBBE.

Table 1 .
Table 1.A large proportion of respondents (40.72 per cent) fell between the 20 and 23 age group and about 57 per cent were male.Most of the respondents' parents (43.79 per cent) had monthly income 100000 -169000; 13.61 per cent, less than 30000; 23.96 per cent, 30000 -99000; and 18.64 per cent, above 170000.Demographic profile of respondent

Table 3 .
Descriptive statistics and correlation metricsNote.D, dimension; M, mean score; SD, standard deviation; HC, health consciousness; BE, CBBE; HA, health alertness; HS, health self-consciousness; HI, health involvement; HSM, health-self monitoring; BA, brand awareness; BAS, brand association; PQ, perceived quality; BL, brand loyalty; n.s., not significant; values on the diagonal in bold indicate the average variance extracted for the dimensions; the scores in the lower diagonal are Pearson correlations and **p < 0.01, *p < 0.05 (two-tailed).

Table 4 .
One sample T-test results

Table 5 .
Simple linear regression analysis results