A Review of Determinants of and Interventions for Proenvironmental Behaviors in Organizations

Abstract

A review of empirical studies on proenvironmental behaviors in organizational contexts is presented. Twenty‐one studies met the inclusion criteria. Quantitative effect sizes were compared where statistics were available and research designs were comparable. Characteristics of the dependent variable and the targeted organizational (sub)populations were systematically examined. With respect to individual‐specific determinants, the results show relatively consistent effects for attitudinal determinants and past behavior. For organization‐specific influences, management and physical facilitation were frequently significant. Findings related to other factors are less conclusive. Given the available evidence and feasibility considerations, it is recommended that interventions focus on physical facilitation, tailored persuasive communication, and active engagement of middle management. It is further recommended that future research integrates the analysis of individual and organizational determinants.

Heritage tourism, CSR and the role of employee environmental behaviour

“…Lo et al, 2012). Motivation continued to be the only independent variable significantly associated with perceived satisfaction with current environmental behaviour and was positively related to satisfaction for the post-survey.…”

“…They note this behavioural change took place with hardly any changes in attitudes or intentions. When group feedback is coupled with social comparison, it appears to have a larger effect when comparisons are made with other organisational subgroups rather than general others (Lo et al, 2012). Feedback has also been linked with peer education to encourage employees to reduce energy use (Carrico & Riemer, 2011).…”

“…Feedback can also be used to overcome a lack of organisational communication (Lo et al, 2012). This is notable given the importance of internal awareness raising campaigns and active championing by green champions/teams as well as top management in encouraging environmental behaviour in the workplace (Andersson et al, 2005;Zibarras & Ballinger, 2011).…”

“…In the employee environmental behaviour literature, few studies have looked at employees' awareness of or involvement with environmental campaigns/interventions largely because few papers have studied the effect of an intervention in the workplace (Lo et al, 2012) or used a time series analysis. The few studies that have included a study of an intervention are: an intervention of recycling behaviour (Ludwig, Gray, & Rowell, 1998), a feedback intervention (Carrico & Riemer, 2011) and an intervention with office paper recycling (Brothers, Krantz, & McClannahan, 1994 McClannahan's (1994) intervention increased paper recycling to 85%.…”

“…Lo, Peters and Kok (2012) suggest that self-efficacy is related to whether one perceives that they have the necessary resources, knowledge or skills to perform the desired behaviour. They suggest that lack of knowledge about what to recycle and perceived time constraints showed a weak negative correlation with waste management behaviour and that forgetfulness was a reason for failing to conserve energy.…”