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Vested interest theory (VIT), first investigated on environmental risk, suggests that the hedonic relevance of an attitude object moderates relations between attitudes, intentions, and responses to danger. Emphasizing vested interest may maximize impacts of risk communications. Study 1 (N = 215) assessed differences between inhabitants of two flood-risk areas in Italy on past experience, risk perceptions, concerns, attitudes, and behavioral intentions.Objectively, higher risk areas' residents reported more experience, and greater perceived risk and concern, while no preparedness differences were found (both at "between cities" and "within city" levels). Study 2 (N = 444) looked at the moderating role of VIT-based risk communication messages on the relationship between vested interest and behavioral intentions. Components of vested interest moderate attitude-intention consistency, suggesting a new method of developing effective risk announcements. Vested interest and attitude-behavior consistencyThat attitudes are functionally related to attitude-relevant behavior is an essential tenet of the field (Crano & Prislin, 2006;McGuire, 1985). A long history of research on attitudebehavior consistency has established the strong link between attitudes and consequent behavior (Crano & Prislin, 2006). This relation is widely recognized in social psychology, as is the possibility that other sources of variation (social, contextual, and intrapsychic) affect the strength of the relationship. Over the years, research has identified a number of factors that affect attitude strength and, consequently, attitudebehavior consistency (many variables implicated in attitude-behavior consistency is self-interest, which has been shown to moderate the attitude-action bond across a host of behaviors (Krosnick, bs_bs_banner

This study examined the relationship between flow experience and place identity, based on eudaimonistic identity theory (EIT) which prioritizes self-defining activities as important for an individual’s identification of his/her goals, values, beliefs, and interests corresponding to one’s own identity development or enhancement. This study focuses on place identity, the identity’s features relating to a person’s relation with her/his place. The study is also based on flow theory, according to which some salient features of an activity experience are important for happiness and well-being. Questionnaire surveys on Italian and Greek residents focused on their perceived flow and place identity in relation to their own specific local place experiences. The overall findings revealed that flow experience occurring in one’s own preferred place is widely reported as resulting from a range of self-defining activities, irrespective of gender or age, and it is positively and significantly associated with one’s own place identity. Such findings provide the first quantitative evidence about the link between flow experienced during meaningfully located self-defining activities and identity experienced at the place level, similarly to the corresponding personal and social levels that had been previously already empirically tested. Results are also discussed in terms of their implications for EIT’s understanding and enrichment, especially by its generalization from the traditional, personal identity level up to that of place identity. More generally, this study has implications for maintaining or enhancing one’s own place identity, and therefore people–place relations, by means of facilitating a person’s flow experience within psychologically meaningful places.

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