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Environmental problems have their origins in human behavior, and as a result, any solution to environmental issues will require changes in behavior. While many disciplines in the social and behavioral sciences offer important perspectives on the behaviors linked with environmental problems, the study of the individual brings a focus on cognitive, social, and motivational processes that provides insights into effective ways to promote change. Psychological research on proenvironmental behavior dates back nearly 40 years, and within this rich body of empirical research are a number of well-established findings. Strategies such as prompts, commitments, feedback, social norms, incentives, and convenience have all been shown to effectively promote proenvironmental behavior – at least in some contexts, for some behaviors, and for some individuals. This article begins with a brief overview of these research findings, and then proceeds to examine the less-explored question about when various strategies work. The article concludes with recommendations for selecting an appropriate strategy for promoting behavior change, along with fruitful areas for future research.

Notable advances resulting from new research findings, measurement approaches, widespread uses of the Internet, and increasingly sophisticated approaches to sampling and polling, have stimulated a new generation of attitude scholars. This extensively revised edition captures this excitement, while remaining grounded in scholarly research.Attitudes and Opinions, 3/e maintains one of the main goals of the original edition--breadth of coverage. The book thoroughly reviews both implicit and explicit measures of attitudes, the structure and function of attitudes, the nature of public opinion and po

Achieving a sustainable future will require that people do things differently. Community-based social marketing (CBSM) provides a framework for fostering sustainable behavior, and the approach is being increasingly utilized across a range of domains including energy conservation, recycling, reducing water consumption, promoting sustainable seafood consumption, and many others. This article provides guidance to practitioners about the optimal use of specific behavior change tools. The article summarizes commitment strategies, social diffusion, goal setting, social norms, prompts, incentives, feedback, and convenience as effective tools for encouraging changes in behavior. For each, we summarize the basic approach and provide recommendations regarding when each tool is most appropriate, depending on the existing levels of barriers and benefits associated with the target behavior. The article concludes with three examples of CBSM to illustrate this selection process.

Recent studies have suggested that crime‐prevention strategies tend to interact with characteristics of the community in such a way that what works in one community might not work in another. In this article, we extend this finding to fear of crime and residents' perceptions of crime using a Focus Theory of Normative Conduct framework. Data are reported from three experiments that examine the impact of publicly posted Neighborhood Watch signs on perceived crime rates and worry about victimization. The studies used a virtual community tour to assess the causal impact of Neighborhood Watch sign presence and content. Across the experiments, we consistently find the potential for publicly posted Neighborhood Watch signs to produce unintended consequences such as increased fear of crime and worry about victimization. Moreover, the outcomes associated with posting the signs are influenced not only by the information printed on the sign but also by an interaction between the signs themselves and the environmental context in which they are posted.

Two studies of authoritarianism and environmental attitudes were under-taken. The first, a field study, found the opponents of a proposed riverside power plant to be less authoritarian and more environmentally concerned than supporters of the plants establishment. Overall, right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) correlated -.51 with environmental concern. The second study replicated this finding within a college sample, using a validated measure of environmental concern, the New Environmental Paradigm (NEP) scale. NEP correlated -.54 with RWA. It is concluded that the relationship between authoritarianism and environmental concern is presently strong. Prospective explanations for this relationship revolve around the theoretical nature of authoritarianism.

Many psychological processes unfold over time, necessitating longitudinal research designs. Longitudinal research poses a host of methodological challenges, foremost of which is participant attrition. Building on Dillman's work, we provide a review of how social influence and relationship research informs retention strategies in longitudinal studies. Objective: We introduce the tailored panel management (TPM) approach, which is designed to establish communal norms that increase commitment to a longitudinal study, and this commitment, in turn, increases response rates and buffers against attrition. Specifically, we discuss practices regarding compensation, communication, consistency, and credibility that increase longer term commitment to panel participation. Research design: Throughout the article, we describe how TPM is being used in a national longitudinal study of undergraduate minority science students. TheScienceStudy is a continuing panel, which has 12 waves of data collected across 6 academic years, with response rates ranging from 70% to 92%. Although more than 90% of participants have either left or graduated from their undergraduate degree program, this highly mobile group of people remains engaged in the study. TheScienceStudy has usable longitudinal data from 96% of the original panel. Conclusion: This article combines social psychological theory, current best practice, and a detailed case study to illustrate the TPM approach to longitudinal data collection. The approach provides guidance for other longitudinal researchers, and advocates for empirical research into longitudinal research methodologies.

It is widely agreed that humans must reduce their environmental impact. We propose that an improved understanding of our evolved human nature can help to improve programs and policies to address environmental problems. Combining evolutionary and social psychological approaches, we argue that environmental problems are often caused or exacerbated by five evolutionarily adaptive psychological biases: Humans (1) value personal over collective outcomes (self‐interest), (2) prefer immediate over delayed rewards (shortsightedness), (3) value relative over absolute status (status), (4) copy the behaviors of others (social imitation), and (5) ignore problems that we cannot see or feel (sensing). By considering how and why these five "Stone Age" biases continue to influence modern environmental practices, although acknowledging the role of individual and cultural differences, we present novel ways that human nature can be harnessed to develop intervention strategies to lessen resource depletion, restrain wasteful consumption, curb overpopulation, and foster green choices.

This article examines the impact of visual images and perspective taking on concern for environmental problems. Participants in the experiment were 193 university students. Results replicated earlier results showing that perspective taking, combined with images of animals harmed by nature, caused an increase in biospheric environmental concerns. In addition, results showed that the empathic dimension of personal distress moderated the relationship between kind of image and kind of perspective on both biospheric and egoistic environmental concerns. Results about the lack of other moderating effects are discussed.

Drawing on a recent multinational survey of environmental attitudes and behaviors, we examined the relation between religious beliefs and environmental concern. Measures included the revised New Environmental Paradigm (NEP), Thompson and Barton's ecocentrism and anthropocentrism scales, a 12-item proenvironmental behavior scale, a measure of biblical literalism, and a measure of religious importance. Data are reported from 2,160 university students from Argentina, Canada, Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Spain, the United States, and Venezuela. The data revealed a consistent pattern across countries. Respondents who expressed more literal beliefs in the Bible scored significantly lower on the NEP, lower on ecocentric environmental concerns, and higher on anthropocentric environmental concerns. No significant relation was found between biblical literalism and self-reported proenvironmental behavior.

Persuasive communication campaigns are often used to promote proenvironmental actions, even though their effectiveness has been mixed. Previous research has tested cognitive-based models in explaining proenvironmental choice, but few studies have examined the potential impact of emotional dimensions. This experimental study tests the persuasive effect of argument quality, source expertise, and emotions on the implicit attitudes toward sustainable travel choices. This was a 2 × 2 × 2 between-subjects research design with an additional measured variable of involvement with the topic of sustainable transport. A video including the experimental manipulations was presented, followed by the Implicit Association Test (IAT). Consistent with the Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM), in the case of high involvement, implicit attitudes were more positive in the condition of high-quality arguments, while in case of low involvement, implicit attitudes were more positive in the condition of high source expertise. In addition, the main effect of anticipated negative emotions was significant.

The current article explores the impact of mindfulness on belief in climate change and the mediating effect of connectedness with nature in this relationship. Belief in climate change was assessed both explicitly (using a self-report questionnaire) and implicitly (using an Implicit Association Test [IAT]). A total of 103 university students were recruited for a between-subjects experiment. Participants were randomly assigned to a mindfulness or mindlessness intervention and then completed IAT and several questionnaires. The results showed that mindfulness significantly increased belief in climate change, both explicitly and implicitly. Our findings also showed that the relationship between mindfulness and climate change beliefs was mediated by an increase in connectedness with nature. These results indicate that mindfulness is an effective way to promote belief in climate change and that connectedness with nature plays an important role in this process.