The case for impact-focused environmental psychology

Biodiversity conservation as a promising frontier for behavioural science

“…1), both enforcing forest protection laws and providing herd management support that is conditional on ranchers stopping clearance might be considered to have greater technical potential than slowing population growth in beef-consuming countries (which may have only limited effect if per capita demand continues to rise). Prioritising behaviours for research and intervention on the basis of their technical potential-considered an omission in behavioural science contributions to climate change mitigation 57,[88][89][90] -ensures that resources and efforts are allocated toward the behaviours with the greatest potential to effectively mitigate biodiversity threats.…”

“…As with climate change interventions, there is a clear need for a more systematic understanding of the technical potential of different behaviour changes: which ones, if delivered, would be most likely to reduce a threat and thereby enhance the status of the conservation target, taking into account other threats it faces 80,91 ? Given the focus of many recent environmental interventions on appealing, tractable but relatively low-impact behaviour changes (for example, eating more locally grown food or avoiding plastic drinking straws), such prioritization is badly needed 88,90 . One challenge in identifying priorities may be the complexity of conservation outcomes: estimating probable impacts of behaviour changes on highly interconnected ecosystems may be more difficult than impacts on greenhouse gas levels 80 , but we suggest that this is a surmountable problem.…”

Theory enhances impact. Reply to: ‘The case for impact-focused environmental psychology’

“…Theory enhances impact. Reply to: 'The case for impact-focused environmental psychology' Nielsen et al (2021) make the case for 'impact-focused' environmental psychology, arguing that environmental psychology can be more impactful 'if [researchers] focus primarily on environmental impact and secondarily on psychological theory' (p. 1). We agree it is important to consider environmental impact to increase the practical relevance of environmental psychology, and that more research could focus on high-impact behaviours.…”

Editorial: The Role of the Individual in the Great Transformation Toward Sustainability

“…In the following, we discuss three overarching implications of a shift toward a multi-level perspective that the contributions to this special section propose as future research avenues for psychological and education sustainability research. First, psychological and educational researchers are challenged to broaden their traditional focus on individual, often low-impact consumption behavior toward more sustainably-relevant high impact actions in a first instance (Bilharz and Schmitt, 2011; see also current debate Nielsen et al, 2021, andvan Valkengoed et al, 2021). Focusing on high-impact behaviors alone should be surpassed by opening up for peoples' role as active members of communities, citizens, and activists trying to bring about social change through their engagement in public protest and social movements.…”