IMPACT OF RETAIL PRICE ON PURCHASE DECISION: MEDIATING ROLE OF PHARMACIST

Abstract

The ethical pharmacy practice and price-regulation approaches that focus on affordability and professional guidance for clients would be emphasized, as a policy implication, in emerging markets where patient outcomes should be consistently improved. The paper focuses on the mediating role of pharmacist in the relationship between retail price and purchasing decision in Pakistan's pharmaceutical industry, using the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB) to analyse the effect of expert advice on purchasing decision. By analyzing the primary data obtained via face-to-face surveys among 169 owners of medical stores using a 5-point Likert-scale questionnaire. The research employed structural equation modelling in SmartPLS version 3 to test the suggested hypotheses. The results confirmed that retail price has a significant influence on purchase decision and pharmacist. Furthermore, mediating role of pharmacist is partially mediated by pharmacists. The findings showed that the guidance of pharmacists affects the sensitivity of prices, which proves that the TPB's subjective norms are decisive factors in healthcare decisions. The research contributes to behavioral economics and healthcare marketing by combining both economic and social-cognitive theoretical perspectives, offering a template that can be applied in future studies focusing on expert-mediated consumer decision-making.