New article on impact of sustainability information on consumer decision making based on 40,000 online purchase interactions on the website GoodGuide.com. Health ratings in particular showed the strongest effects. Direct users-those who intentionally sought out sustainability information-were most strongly influenced by sustainability information. Sustainability information had, on average, no impact on nondirect users, demonstrating that simply providing more or better information on sustainability issues will likely have limited impact on changing mainstream consumer behavior unless it is designed to connect into existing decision-making processes.
See
O'Rourke, D. and A. Ringer. 2015. The Impact of Sustainability Information on Consumer Decision Making. Journal of Industrial Ecology: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/jiec.12310.