The Perils of Explaining Climate Inaction in Terms of Psychological Barriers

Abstract

As awareness of climate change and its consequences increases, many have asked, “Why aren't people taking action?” Some psychologists have provided an answer that we describe as a “psychological barriers explanation” (PBE). The PBE suggests that human nature is limited in ways that create psychological barriers to taking action on climate change. Taking a critical social psychology approach (e.g., Adams, 2014), we offer a critique of the PBE, arguing that locating the causes of inaction at the psychological level promotes a misrepresentation of human nature as static and disconnected from context. Barriers to environmental action certainly exist, and most if not all involve psychological processes. However, locating the barrier itself at the psychological level ignores the complex interplay between psychological tendencies, social relations, and social structures. We consider the ways in which psychological responses to climate change are contingent upon social‐structural context, with particular attention to the ways unequal distributions of power have allowed elites to block climate action, in part by using their power to influence societal beliefs and norms. In conclusion, we suggest that psychologists interested in climate (in)action expand their scope beyond individual consumer behaviors to include psychological questions that challenge existing power relations and raise the possibility of transformative social change.

A Motivated Defense of Meat: Biased Perceptions of Meat's Environmental Impact

“…The other papers in this special issue point to limitations and important future directions in this line of research. Dietary change, like many other changes for sustainable consumption, could largely be the product of the context a person is in or could be hindered by a person's belief in other barriers to change (Schmitt, Neufeld, Mackay, & Dys‐Steenbergen, ). Further work might examine other beliefs around this specific behavioral change such as belief of self‐ or collective‐efficacy that personal dietary changes matter, as shifting those beliefs may also change behavior (Hamann & Reese, ).…”

Towards a Psychology of the Food‐Energy‐Water Nexus: Costs and Opportunities

“…This framing includes attending to patterns and predictors of human behavior, institutions, public policy, and other social practices that have created the FEWxH issues that we are trying to solve. Furthermore, sustainability requires expertise about personal drivers such as attitudes and beliefs, group membership, and self‐efficacy as well as organizational systems that shape consumption behavior (Abrash Walton, In press; Harmann & Reese, ; Kurz, Prosser, Rabinovich, & O'Neill, ; Schmitt et al., ; Tugwell, Robinson, Grimshaw, & Santesso, ). The field of psychology is ideally focused to add input and guide policies aimed at introducing behavioral sustainability solutions within the FEWxH nexus.…”

“…Indeed, widening one's thinking and levels of analysis as a psychologist to a broader, FEWx H nexus level has the potential to open up new and novel types of research questions and agendas, and represents a gain for our discipline. For example, psychologists typically examine people's willingness to reduce consumption of specific food, energy, and water resources voluntarily, or their levels of support for policies to enforce such outcomes (Schmitt, Neufeld, Mackay, & Dys‐Steenbergen, ). However, it is rare in such work for trade‐offs between support of behavioral/policy changes in different parts of the nexus to be examined.…”

Scaling Up and Out: Psychological Science in the Service of Promoting Sustainable Consumption

“…As noted in this volume (Schmitt, Neufeld, Mackay, & Dys-Steenbergen, 2020), framing research as problem-solving can have powerful implications for the utility of research. How to decrease food waste at home?…”

“…This lens from social psychology, anthropology, and sociology can be a powerful tool to identify aspects of our social systems and structures that need to be adjusted so the behavior of larger segments of the population becomes less harmful to our social and physical contexts. The need to think about structures is also present in Schmitt et al's (2020) thoughtful critique of the longstanding focus on cognitive barriers within psychological research on sustainability. Schmitt et al include a call to action, to consider how social structures (physical, social, and perceived) shape individual behaviors.…”