Mapping the Intellectual Structure of Green Supply Chain Management and Consumer Behavior Research: A Bibliometric Analysis (1996-2025)

Green Supply Chain Management (GSCM) has emerged as a critical corporate sustainability strategy, yet its relationship with consumer behavior remains fragmented, geographically concentrated, and insufficiently mapped as an integrated research domain. This study employs bibliometric analysis to examine the global intellectual landscape of GSCM–consumer behavior research from 1996 to 2025. A total of 456 peer-reviewed articles retrieved from the Scopus database were analyzed using the R-based Bibliometrix package and Biblioshiny interface, following a systematic screening procedure adapted from the PRISMA 2020 framework. The results reveal a significant annual growth rate of 17.56%, with a dramatic surge in publications from 2019 onwards. China and India emerged as the dominant contributors, while Sustainability (Switzerland) and the Journal of Cleaner Production represent the core publication venues. Zhu et al. (2005) remains the most globally cited foundational work (1,264 citations), and the Theory of Planned Behavior is identified as the dominant theoretical anchor across the dataset. Thematic analysis reveals an evolution from macro-level sustainability framing toward micro-level sustainable consumption research, with four distinct intellectual clusters identified through document coupling. Critical knowledge gaps are highlighted in cross-cultural research, supply-demand integration, and longitudinal methodology. To the best of our knowledge, this represents the first comprehensive bibliometric synthesis of the GSCM–consumer behavior nexus as an integrated domain, offering a structured research agenda for scholars, supply chain managers, and sustainability policymakers.