The Importance of Context in the Interpretation of Cross-Cultural Environmental Attitudes

Ten years ago a series of international studies were undertaken (DU) to assess the public’s concern about a number of environmental problems at the local, national and global level (Uzzell, 2000). This paper reports on an exploratory study with a sample of 94 UK students (University of Surrey) and 39 Swedish students (University of Umeĺ) which sought to assess whether there has been any change in environmental attitudes within the last decade. Respondents were asked to indicate in how good or poor a state the environment is at the local, country and global levels, whether the environment would be in a better or poorer state in 20 years time, their attitudes towards consumerism and their attributions of responsibility for bringing about change. Furthermore, a series of open ended questions sought to elicit their ‘unstructured’ views about their environmental concerns, the perceived causes and their suggestions for solutions. Not only did the qualitative responses indicate different priorities, but they demonstrated the need for contextual/local knowledge to make sense of cross-cultural comparisons. International and cross-cultural studies not only require the collaboration of data-collectors, but also data-interpreters