Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Human Identity: A Missing Link in Environmental Campaigning

2010; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 52; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00139157.2010.493114

1939-9154

Tom Crompton, Tim Kasser,

Social Acceptance of Renewable Energy

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes 1. For example, a recent UK public opinion survey found that only 13 percent of respondents thought that it was reasonable to expect people to "make significant and radical changes to their lifestyle in terms of the products they buy, how much they pay for things and how much they drive and fly" in order to tackle climate change. See IPSOS-MORI, Public Attitudes to Climate Change, 2008: Concerned but Still Unconvinced (London, UK: IPSOS-MORI, 2008), http://www.ipsos-mori.com/Assets/Docs/Publications/sri-environment-public-attitudes-to-climate-change-2008-concerned-but-still-unconvinced.pdf (accessed 20 November 2009). 2. Attention was drawn to the problems facing governments by the former UK Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Ed Miliband, who was quoted as saying: "There will be some people saying 'we can't go ahead with an agreement on climate change, it's not the biggest priority.' And, therefore, what you need is countervailing forces. Some of those countervailing forces come from popular mobilisation." Quoted in: D. Adam and J. Jowit, "People Power Vital to Climate Deal—Minister," The Guardian, 8 December 2008. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/dec/08/ed-miliband-climate-politics-environment (accessed 21 May 2010). Similarly, Jules Peck, formerly Director of the UK Conservative Party's Quality of Life Policy Group (which played a key role in proposing environmental policy for the UK Conservative Party) writes: "Time and again I have seen policy proposals watered-down in order to stand some chance of being tolerated by an electorate who are expected to resist any interventions that entail personal economic costs" (Jules Peck, Director, Quality of Life Policy Group, in correspondence with the authors, 19 August 2009). Nonetheless, it seems clear that far bolder government leadership is both urgent and possible: By highlighting the problem of a lack of electoral pressure, we are not seeking to detract attention from the urgent need for political leadership. 3. Energy Savings Trust, "Getting Started: Ten Ways to Save Energy, Money, and Help Prevent Climate Change," http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/Easy-ways-to-stop-wasting-energy/Stop-wasting-energy-and-cut-your-bills/Getting-started (accessed 8 February 2010). 4. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, "Climate Change: What You Can Do," http://www.epa.gov/climatechange/wycd/home.html (accessed 8 February 2010). 5. D. J. C. McKay, Sustainable Energy—Without the Hot Air (Cambridge, UK: UIT, 2008), 114 6. For a full discussion of the evidence for "spillover" from one form of pro-environmental behavior to another, see J. B. Th⊘gersen and T. Crompton "Simple and Painless? The Limitations of Spillover in Environmental Campaigning," Journal of Consumer Policy 32 (2009): 141–163. 7. T. Crompton and T. Kasser, Meeting Environmental Challenges: The Role of Human Identity (Godalming, UK: WWF-UK, 2009), http:www.wwf.org.uk/change (accessed 20 November 2009). 8. M. Buijzen and P. M. Valkenburg, "The Effects of Television Advertising on Materialism, Parent-Child Conflict, and Unhappiness: A Review of Research," Applied Developmental Psychology 24 (2003): 437–456. 9. See, for example, J. E. Brand and B. S. Greenberg, "Commercials in the Classroom: The Impact of Channel One Advertising," Journal of Advertising 34 (1994): 18–21. 10. J. H. Pryor, B. Hurtado, V. B. Saenz, J. L. Santos, and W. S. Korn, The American Freshman: Forty-Year Trends, 1966–2006 (Los Angeles, CA: Higher Education Research Institute, 2007), http://www.heri.ucla.edu/PDFs/pubs/briefs/40yrTrendsResearchBrief.pdf (accessed 18 February 2010). 11. B. E. Whitley Jr. and M. E. Kite, The Psychology of Prejudice and Discrimination (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2006); M. Biernat, T. K. Vescio, S. A. Theno, and C. S. Crandall, "Values and Prejudice: Understanding the Impact of American Values on Outgroup Attitudes," in C. Seligman, J. M. Olson, and M. P. Zanna, eds., The Psychology of Values (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 1996), 153–189. 12. P. W. Schultz "Empathizing with Nature: The Effects of Perspective Taking on Concern for Environmental Issues," Journal of Social Issues 56 (2000): 391–406. 13. G. W. Allport, The Nature of Prejudice (New York: Perseus, 1954); T. F. Pettigrew, "Intergroup Contact Theory," Annual Review of Psychology 49 (1998), 65–85. 14. Whitley and Kite, note 11 above. 15. A. Leiserowitz, E. Maibach, & C. Roser-Renouf, (2010) Climate Change in the American Mind: Americans' Global Warming Beliefs and Attitudes in January 2010: Yale University and George Mason University (New Haven, CT: Yale Project on Climate Change, http://environment.yale.edu/uploads/AmericansGlobalWarmingBeliefs2010.pdf (accessed 8 February 2010). 16. "Climate Scepticism 'on the Rise', BBC poll shows.," BBC-online, 7 February 2010, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8500443.stm (accessed 8 February 2010). 17. R. F. Baumeister, K. Dale, and K. L. Sommer "Freudian Defense Mechanisms and Empirical Findings in Modern Social Psychology: Reaction Formation, Projection, Displacement, Undoing, Isolation, Sublimation, and Denial," Journal of Personality 66 (1998): 1081–1124. 18. A. Homburg, A. Stolberg, and W. Wagner, "Coping with Global Environmental Problems: Development and First Validation of Scales," Environment and Behaviour 39 (2007): 754–778. 19. See J. Macy and M. Y. Brown, Coming Back to Life: Practices to Reconnect Our Lives, Our World (British Colombia: New Society Publishers, 1998); R. Hopkins, The Transition Handbook: From Oil Dependency to Local Resilience (Totnes, UK: Green Books, 2008); M. Gomes, "Altars of Extinction: Honoring the Broken Circle of Life," in L. Buzzell and C. Chalquist, eds., Ecotherapy: Healing with Nature in Mind (San Francisco, CA: Sierra Club Books, 2009), 219–223. 20. Th⊘gersen and Crompton, note 6 above. 21. See, for example: Futerra, The Rules of the Game: Principles of Climate Change Communications (London, UK: Futerra, 2005); J. Collins, G. Thomas, R. Willis, and J. Wilsdon, Carrots, Sticks and Sermons: Influencing Public Behaviour for Environmental Goals, Version 4.0 (London, UK: Demos and Green Alliance, 2003); S. Retallack, T. Lawrence, and M. Lockwood Positive Energy: Harnessing People Power to Prevent Climate Change (London, UK: IPPR, 2007); S. Hounsham, Painting the Town Green: How to Persuade People to Be Environmentally Friendly (London, UK: Green Engage, 2006); C. Rose, A Tool For Motivation Based Communication Strategy (Campaign Strategy, 2004), http://www.campaignstrategy.org/maslow_campaign.pdf (accessed 8 February, 2010). 22. There is a large body of research in social psychology that establishes the importance of appeal to intrinsic values in motivating people to engage in particular behaviours. This work derives from self-determination theory (SDT). See, for example, M. Vansteenkiste, J. Simons, W. Lens, K. M. Sheldon, and E. L. Deci, "Motivating Learning, Performance, and Persistence. The Synergistic Effects of Intrinsic Goal Contents and Autonomy-Supportive Contexts," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 87 (2004): 246–260. 23. Alliance Against Urban 4×4s, "Top 10 Reasons Not to Drive an Urban 4×4," http://www.stopurban4×4s.org.uk/reasons.htm (accessed 19 November 09). 24. Alliance Against Urban 4×4s, "What You Can Do," http://www.stopurban4×4s.org.uk/help.htm (accessed 19 November 09). 25. The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB), Welcome to the TEEB website, http://www.teebweb.org/AboutTEEB/Background/tabid/1038/language/en-US/Default.aspx (accessed 16 November 2009). 26. D. J. McCauley, "Selling out on Nature," Nature 443 (2006): 27–28 (Quote from page 28). 27. E. Marris, "Putting a Price on Biodiversity," Nature 462 (2009): 270–271. (Quote from page 271). 28. Ibid., page 271. 29. See, for example, T. Kasser, S. Cohn, A. D. Kanner, and R.M. Ryan, "Some Costs of American Corporate Capitalism: A Psychological Exploration of Value and Goal Conflicts," Psychological Inquiry 18 (2007): 1–22; Whitley and Kite, note 16 above; W. G. Stephan and C. W. Stephan, "An Integrated Threat Theory of Prejudice," in S. Oskamp, ed., Reducing Prejudice and Discrimination (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 2000): 23–45; and J. Greenberg, S. Koole, and T. Pyszczynski, eds., Handbook of Experimental Existential Psychology (New York: Guilford Press, 2004). 30. See, for example, S. H. Schwartz, "Universals in the Content and Structure of Values: Theory and Empirical Tests in 20 Countries," in M. P. Zanna, ed., Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, Vol. 25 (New York: Academic Press, 1992), 1–65; S. H. Schwartz "Basic Human Values: Theory, Measurement, and Applications," Revue Française de Sociologie 47, no. 4 (2006): 249–288. 31. See, for example, B. Gatersleben, J. Meadows, W. Abrahamse, and T. Jackson "Materialistic and Environmental Values of Young People," unpublished manuscript, University of Surrey, UK; T. Kasser, "Frugality, Generosity, and Materialism in Children and Adolescents," in K. A. Moore and L. H. Lippman, eds., What Do Children Need to Flourish? Conceptualizing and Measuring Indicators of Positive Development (New York: Springer Science, 2005), 357–373; K. M. Sheldon and H. McGregor, "Extrinsic Value Orientation and the Tragedy of the Commons," Journal of Personality 68 (2000): 383–411; T. Kasser, "Cultural Values and the Wellbeing of Future Generations: A Cross-National Study," Journal of Crosscultural Psychology (in press). For a more comprehensive overview of relevant literature, see Crompton and Kasser, note 7 above. 32. See, for example, S. Plous, "Is There Such a Thing as Prejudice Towards Animals?" in S. Plous, ed., Understanding Prejudice and Discrimination (New York: McGraw Hill, 2002), 509–528; G. Saucier, "Factor Structure of English-Language Personality Type-Nouns," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 85 (2003): 695–708; and J.-P. Leyens, A. Rodriguez-Perez, R. Rodriguez-Torres, R. Gaunt, M.-P. Paladino, J. Vaes, and S. Demoulin, "Psychological Essentialism and the Differential Attribution of Uniquely Human Emotions to Ingroups and Outgroups," European Journal of Social Psychology 31 (2001): 395–411. For a more comprehensive overview of relevant literature, see Crompton and Kasser, note 7, above. 33. A. Homburg, A. Stolberg, and W. Wagner "Coping with Global Environmental Problems: Development and First Validation of Scales," Environment and Behaviour 39 (2007): 754–778; K. M. Norgaard, "'People Want to Protect Themselves a Little Bit': Emotions, Denial, and Social Movement Non-Participation," Sociological Inquiry 76 (2006): 372–396; S. Stoll-Kleemann, T. O'Riordan, and C. C. Jaeger, "The Psychology of Denial Concerning Climate Mitigation Measures: Evidence from Swiss Focus Groups," Global Environmental Change 11 (2001): 107–117. 34. F. M. E. Grouzet, T. Kasser, A. Ahuvia, J.M. Fernandez-Dols, Y. Kim, S. Lau, R.M. Ryan, S. Saunders, P. Schmuck, and K.M. Sheldon, "The Structure of Goal Contents Across 15 Cultures," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 89 (2005): 800–816; Schwartz 1992, note 30, above; Schwartz 2006, note 30, above. 35. Biernat et al., note 11, above; M. Rokeach, The Nature of Human Values (New York: Free press, 1973); L. S. Son Hing, W. Li, and M. P. Zanna, "Inducing Hypocrisy to Reduce Prejudicial Responses Among Aversive Racists," Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 38 (2002): 71–78; P. W. Schultz "Empathizing with Nature: The Effects of Perspective Taking on Concern for Environmental Issues," Journal of Social Issues 56 (2000): 391–406; Whitley and Kite, note 11, above. 36. Homburg et al., note 18, above. 37. As an example, we draw attention to the work of Rosemary Randall at Cambridge Carbon Footprint. Randall applies her background as a psychotherapist to the facilitation of "Carbon Conversations." Led by trained volunteer facilitators, groups of six to eight members meet in homes, community centers, workplaces, or other venues. Over the course of several meetings, participants are engaged both emotionally and practically, helping them overcome the barriers often associated with making large carbon reductions. See: http://cambridgecarbonfootprint.org/action/carbon-conversations (accessed 8 February 2010). 38. K. W. Brown and T. Kasser, "Are Psychological and Ecological Well-Being Compatible? The Role of Values, Mindfulness, and Lifestyle," Social Indicators Research 74 (2005): 349–368; Brown, K. W., Kasser, T., Ryan, R. M., Linley, P. A., & Orzech, K. (2009). When what one has is enough: Mindfulness, financial desire discrepancy, and subjective well-being. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 727–736; C. K. Gerner, R. D. Siegel, and P. R. Fulton, eds., Mindfulness and Psychotherapy (New York: Guilford Press, 2005).