Descriptive normative beliefs and conservation behavior: The moderating roles of personal involvement and injunctive normative beliefs

Abstract

There is ample evidence of the power of social influence on pro-environmental behaviors. Beliefs about the conservation behavior of others (descriptive normative beliefs) have a strong positive correlation with one's own conservation actions. However, this relationship has not been investigated much further in terms of possible moderators or involved mechanisms of information processing. The present study examines two potential moderators and draws links to underlying processing mechanisms. We hypothesized that personal involvement with conservation issues and beliefs about other's approval of conservation (injunctive normative beliefs) would moderate the relationship between descriptive normative beliefs and conservation behavior. The sample consisted of 1604 California residents that were recruited through random digit telephone dialing. Results showed that both injunctive normative beliefs and personal involvement moderated the relationship between descriptive normative beliefs and conservation behavior. High personal involvement weakened the relationship, whereas high injunctive normative beliefs strengthened it. We conclude from these findings that descriptive normative beliefs influence conservation behavior through a rather nonconscious, peripheral route of information processing, while personal involvement motivates a more elaborate, central route of information processing.

Experiences of pride, not guilt, predict pro-environmental behavior when pro-environmental descriptive norms are more positive

“…Social norms are rules or standards for behavior among members of a group (Sherif, 1965;Turner, 1991) and they can be categorized in two main ways: as injunctive norms (i.e., perceptions of what people ought to do) and descriptive norms (i.e., what people actually do). We focus on descriptive norms in particular in this study, as they have been shown in previous research to predict a variety of pro-environmental behaviors, such as reduced littering (Cialdini, Reno, & Kallgren, 1990), increased recycling (Fornara, Carrus, Passafaro, & Bonnes, 2011;Nigbur, Lyons, & Uzzell, 2010;Schultz, 1999), use of public transport or bicycles rather than personal cars (Kormos, Gifford, & Brown, 2015), and energy conservation (Göckeritz et al, 2010;Nolan, Schultz, Cialdini, Goldstein, & Griskevicius, 2008).…”

Determinants of Organic Cotton Apparel Purchase: A Comparison of Young Consumers in the U.S.A. and South Korea

“…When studying proenvironmental or green behaviors, the independent influence of injunctive and descriptive norms has been continuously supported including the examination of littering [19], energy conservation [22,23], purchase of organic and fair-trade apparel [24], participation in a hotel's environmental conservation program [25], and recycling behaviors [26].…”

A Review of Approaches for Sensing, Understanding, and Improving Occupancy-Related Energy-Use Behaviors in Commercial Buildings

“…The ABM model developed by Azar and Menassa [12,87] is based on an RA concept. Additionally, Verplanken and Wood [104] and Göckeritz et al [105] employed RA concepts to simulate pre-environmental behaviors of occupants in order to understand occupants' responses to the new energy characteristics of their built environment. Their results shows that an occupant's energy-conserving behavior is highly connected to his/her belief regarding other occupants' energy-conserving behaviors.…”

“…Verplanken and Wood [104] and Göckeritz et al [105] discussed how improving occupants' energy behaviors first requires changing individuals' beliefs and intentions regarding energy use. In this context, periodically holding energy meetings and workshops for occupants in individual commercial buildings has shown to be effective in improving energy-saving knowledge of built environments.…”

“…Peer pressure capitalizes on the fact that occupants influenced by interventions interact with other occupants to influence them to improve their energy-use behaviors [105,[128][129][130][131]. In one case, an occupant could observe and adjust his or her own behavior to follow other occupants' energy-saving behaviors.…”