Divergent roads: A cross-national intercohort analysis of affluence and environmental concern

VanHeuvelen, Tom; Summers, Nik

doi:10.1016/j.ssresearch.2019.04.001

Cited by 20 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 63 publications

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“…Individuals who earned $80 K and more, perceived recycling as more difficult than individuals who earned below $80 K ( p s < .05). These results are consistent with previous research indicating that developed nations show declining concern for the environment (Uyeki & Holland, 2000; VanHeuvelen & Summers, 2019).…”

Section: Methodssupporting

confidence: 93%

“…Previous research shows divergent findings regarding the effect of income on people's pro‐environmental concerns. While some research show income does not account for individuals' environmental concerns (Brechin, 1999), other research show that high‐income countries have less environmental concern than middle‐income countries (Uyeki & Holland, 2000; VanHeuvelen & Summers, 2019). When the required time and money is of concern, it is more reasonable than wealthier people tend to be more engaged in environmentally friendly behaviors than lower‐income people.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Environmental knowledge gap: The discrepancy between perceptual and actual impact of pro‐environmental behaviors among university students

Tofighi

Jackson

2020

Journal of Public Affairs

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This empirical research investigates the discrepancy between the environmental attitudes and actual impact of pro‐environmental behaviors. Survey results of 280 undergraduate students, from a large public university in the United States, show that there is a knowledge gap between the perceived environmental impact and actual impact on high‐impact and low‐impact pro‐environmental behaviors. However, this discrepancy between the perceived and actual impact tends to be smaller in other resource‐related perceptions (i.e., perceived difficulty, effort, and time and money). Some demographic and socioeconomic factors (i.e., gender, income, household size, and ethnicity) show significant effects on the individuals' attitudes toward environmental actions.

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Section: Methodssupporting

confidence: 93%

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Environmental knowledge gap: The discrepancy between perceptual and actual impact of pro‐environmental behaviors among university students

Tofighi

Jackson

2020

Journal of Public Affairs

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“…Although the international picture is very complex (Benegal & Scruggs, 2016;Mayer & Smith, 2017;Pampel, 2014;VanHeuvelen & Summers, 2019), a wide body of evidence indicates that in advanced industrial nations, higher individual socio-economic status (SES) tends to be associated with more concern for the environment (Pampel, 2014). (This broad statement is not intended to diminish the important environmental work done by some disadvantaged communities in these countries, e.g.…”

Section: Socioeconomic Status and Environmental Concernmentioning

confidence: 99%

Even conservative voters want the environment to be at the heart of post-COVID-19 economic reconstruction in the UK

Kenward

Brick

2021

J. Soc. Polit. Psych.

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In 2019, the environment began to rival the economy among priority issues for the UK public. The COVID-19 pandemic has the potential to shift this balance in either direction, because the crisis is not only causing serious economic damage but is also highlighting the usefulness of expert warnings. The current work examines the balance between public prioritisation of environment and economy in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic. A nationally representative YouGov sample of 1654 UK adults were presented with two political speeches, either linking COVID-19 to climate and prioritising environment as part of planned economic recovery, or separating the issues and stating that environmental prioritisation is now unaffordable. Most participants (62%) were positive towards the environmental prioritisation speech, and it was more popular than the other speech (which 36% were positive towards). The same proportion of Conservative voters (62%) were positive towards the environmental prioritisation speech (with 50% positive towards the other speech). Higher support for the environmental prioritisation speech was associated with more education but not with socioeconomic status. Voting history and socioeconomic status were therefore less predictive of differences in support for the speeches than expected based on previous research. Consistent with these results is the suggestion that environmental concern in the UK is becoming less tied to social identity and more tied to concern for personal well-being. These findings suggest that foregrounding environmental concerns is politically realistic in post-COVID-19 economic policy, consistent with suggestions from economists and environmental scientists that an environmental focus is feasible and necessary.

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“…Although some research shows, with weak to moderate effect sizes, that younger people have stronger environmental concerns than older people (e.g., Buttel and Flinn, 1978 , r = −0.30; Howell and Laska, 1992 ; Jones and Dunlap, 1992 ; Li and Chen, 2018 , b = −0.03; Nord et al, 1998 , β = −0.42; Vaske et al, 2011 ), other researchers either found no significant relationship between age and environmental concern (e.g., Gray et al, 2019 ), or instead found that age was positively, although weakly, related to environmental concern (e.g., Echavarren, 2017 , β = 0.01; Hirsh, 2010 , β = 0.13; Huddart-Kennedy et al, 2015 , β= −0.03 to 0.12; Lewis et al, 2019 ; β= −0.40 to 0.50). There is also evidence from a large-scale, multi-country analysis, that the relationship between age and environmental concern may be weakening compared to earlier decades, at least in affluent countries ( VanHeuvelen and Summers, 2019 ), perhaps due to increased exposure to environmental issues in the media ( Howell and Laska, 1992 ), a finding that aligns with research of Americans from 1966 to 2009 showing that young people are becoming more concerned with money and status, and less concerned about the environment than previous generations were ( Twenge et al, 2012 , with moderate to large effect sizes). Therefore, the evidence in relation to the age hypothesis seems to be weak and mixed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Relationship Between Sociodemographics and Environmental Values Across Seven European Countries

2020

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Given the importance of environmental values (altruistic, biospheric, and egoistic) to pro-environmental behavior, it would be useful to segment the population – an approach known as market segmentation – to tailor pro-environmental messages more effectively. Sociodemographic variables are popular targets for segmentation, as such variables are often knowable in the absence of more nuanced information about individuals. However, evidence for the relationship between sociodemographics and environmental values is sparse, and contradictory. We examined the extent to which popular sociodemographic variables (gender, age, income, education, urbanization level, and political orientation) were predictive of environmental values for 11,820 participants across seven European countries. Overall, sociodemographics were hardly related to environmental values. Only gender and political orientation were weakly but significantly related to environmental values, whereby men and right-wingers showed weaker altruistic and biospheric, and stronger egoistic, values than women and left-wingers. We conclude that sociodemographic variables cannot be considered a suitable proxy for environmental values, and thus that behavior-change campaigns might be more impactful when focused on alternative segmentation strategies in relation to environmental aims.

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Divergent roads: A cross-national intercohort analysis of affluence and environmental concern

Cited by 20 publications

References 63 publications

Environmental knowledge gap: The discrepancy between perceptual and actual impact of pro‐environmental behaviors among university students

Environmental knowledge gap: The discrepancy between perceptual and actual impact of pro‐environmental behaviors among university students

Even conservative voters want the environment to be at the heart of post-COVID-19 economic reconstruction in the UK

The Relationship Between Sociodemographics and Environmental Values Across Seven European Countries

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