Understanding pro-environmental behavior using the theory of planned behavior

Many studies have highlighted the urgent need for policies that promote environmental sustainability. Steffen et al. (2015) report that we have transgressed four of nine planetary boundaries (climate change, loss of biosphere integrity, land-system changes and altered biogeochemical cycles). These problems are caused by human behavior. When humanity’s demand for biocapacity (humanity’s ecological footprint) is compared with the Earth’s supply of biocapcity, the former surpasses the latter by 50% - i.e. we need 1.5 Earths to meet our current demands on nature (WWF, 2014). Societies are confronted with the difficult task to steer behavior towards more environmentally friendly behavior to reduce environmental impacts and to reduce the ecological footprint (see e.g. Steg & Vlek, 2009). It is often argued that policymakers should take the lead and aim to change behavioral patterns, as relying on technological change may not suffice (Jackson, 2009). However, promoting pro-environmental behavior is easier said than done, as many behaviors are locked-in in terms of technological development or behavioral habits, while access to more environmentally friendly alternatives may be lacking for some groups in society. In order to stimulate pro-environmental behavior, it is important that policymakers better understand the underlying determinants of pro-environmental behavior. Several theories to understand human behavior have been developed over the past few decades. We will make use of one of these theories – the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) put forward by Ajzen (1991) – to focus on the pro-environmental behavior of students. TPB states that behavior is influenced by both intentions and perceived behavioral control. The latter concept depends on the extent to which individuals are able to change their behavior, and the availability and accessibility of options. Intentions, in turn, are shaped by the interrelation between attitudes towards the behavior, subjective norms and values and perceived behavioral control. The TPB model can then be used by policymakers to foster behavioral changes that will benefit the transition towards a more sustainable society. We apply the Theory of Planned Behavior to a sample of students at Ghent University, Belgium. Analyzing student behavior has several advantages. Students are similar from a socio-demographic point of view (e.g. age), but it also allows us to focus on very specific behaviors in the survey, which would not be possible in a survey aimed at a broader sample. Understanding student behavior is also interesting because they are at the start of their life, and behavioral change is easier earlier in life than later in life. They are the citizens of tomorrow, they still have to take many decisions in life, all many of them with an environmental impact (e.g. where to live and work, how to raise their children…). We aim to analyze three specific behaviors with environmental impacts that are well-known to most students: meat consumption, travelling behavior (commuting and long distance travel) and recycling behavior. Next, we will assess to what extent the model can be applied to the overall environmental impact of the sum of behaviors of the students by focusing on their ecological footprints. Our survey contains three types of questions. First, a number of questions are included to measure the ecological footprint (EF) of each student starting. The EF will be calculated using the footprint calculator of Ecolife, a Belgian environmental ngo, that was developed for WWF Belgium. Next, we include questions about attitudes, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control and intentions with respect to each of the three behaviors and pro-environmental behavior in general. A last series of questions focuses the students’ behavior and socio-demographic variables (gender, social background, knowledge about environmental problems, …). The survey will enable us to apply four Theory of Planned Behavior models. It will be distributed in January 2017 to around 600 students following several courses at Ghent University. A prior survey, with a simpler setup focusing only on the carbon footprint and meat consumption, has been filled out by a group of 169 students at Ghent University in May 2016. Here, we found that for both behaviors, intentions depend on attitudes and subjective norms, but not on perceived behavioral control. The main difference between the two models, though, was the relation between intentions and behavior. For meat consumption, intentions strongly determined behavior whereas for the carbon footprint no relation between intentions and behavior was found – i.e. having more sustainable intentions did not result in having a lower ecological footprint. In neither of the two models, perceived behavioral control was found to be a determinant of behavior. Bibliography Ajzen, I. (1991). Theory of planned behaviour. Organizational Behaviour and Human Decision Processes, 50, 179-211. doi:10.1016/0749-5978(91)90020-T. Jackson, T. (2009). Steg, L., & Vlek, C. (2009). Encouraging pro-environmental behavior: An integrative review and research agenda. Journal of Environmental Psychology 29(3), 307 – 317. doi:10.1016/j.jenvp.2008.10.004 Steffen W., Richardson K., Rockström J., Cornell S. E., Fetzer I., Bennett E. M., Biggs R., Carpenter S. R., de Vries W., de Wit C. A., Folke C., Gerten D., Heinke J., Mace G. M., Persson L. M., Ramanathan V., Reyers B., & Sörlin S. (2015). Planetary boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planet. Science 347(6223): 1259855. doi:10.1126/science.1259855 WWF (2014). Living Planet Report 2014: Species and spaces, people and places. Gland, Switzerland: WWF International