Promoting pro-environmental intentions: The effect of norm conflict and ego depletion

While the majority of Australians profess a concern for the environment, this is not reflected in actual pro - environmental behaviour. Research has shown that when injunctive norms (what society expects) conflict with descriptive norms (what societ y actually does), the injunctive norm is less likely to be followed. Further, when individuals are ego depleted, having an impaired ability to self - regulate, they are more likely to base behaviour on mental heuristics, which can result in greater adherence to descriptive norms. The present study aimed to investigate how norm confl ict and ego depletion interact to influence pro - environmental intentions, and whether this relationship was further moderated by individual differences in pro - environmental attitud es. Participants were 109 young adult university students who completed an online experimental questionnaire. They considered norms that were either conflicting or in agreement , before completing a simple or an ego depleting writing task. Dependent variabl es were intentions to engage in easy and difficult pro - environmental behaviours, general intentions to act pro - environmentally, and the number of green - purchasing decisions made in a consumer task. Against predictions, norms were not found to influence any of the dependent variables, nor did norms interact with ego depletion or pro - environmental attitudes. An unexpected interaction was found between ego depletion and pro - environmental attitudes for easy and difficu lt pro - environmental intentions. Compared t o those high in pro - environmental attitudes, those low in pro - environmental attitudes were less likely to intend to act pro - environmentally, particularly when ego depleted or when the behaviour was difficult. Potential problems in the manipulation of the n orms variable are discussed, along with recommendations for future research to further investigate the effect of ego depletion on pro - environmental behaviours