Evaluating determinants of employees’ pro-environmental behavioral intentions

Purpose – The aim of this study was to identify and quantitatively assess the importance of psychosocial and organizational factors that influence employees’ intentions to engage in pro-environmental behaviors at the workplace. Design/methodology/approach – A questionnaire based on the theory of planned behavior was completed by 318 employees. To validate three suggested hypotheses, a series of path analysis models were constructed using AMOS software. Findings – The theory of planned behavior explained 79 percent and 37.7 percent of variance in predicting intentions of employees to travel to work using alternative transportation and to make eco-suggestions directed toward the workplace, respectively. While organizational barriers did not play a significant role in predicting intentions to use alternative transportation, some organizational obstacles (opinion of colleagues, required paperwork) influenced workers’ intention to make eco-suggestions. Originality/value – This is one of the first articles in the field of pro-environmental workplace behaviors in which the theory of planned behavior is implemented in a systematic manner (qualitative exploration of beliefs followed by their quantitative evaluation). This article contributes to the existing literature by shedding light on the disproportionate influence of organizational and psychosocial factors on pro-environmental workplace behavior