Truffula

Values and Behaviour Change

sustainability

The human mind really is complex, isn't it? There are so many factors, emotional and rational, competing in our internal decision-making processes, adjusting our priorities moment by moment in the subtlest of ways, and ultimately culminating in our behaviour— and sometimes in unexpected and counter-intuitive ways.

So it seems that encouraging environmental behaviour for selfish purposes in addition to transcending purposes can undermine the message. The range of effective messages is so complex— there are problems with frightening people, guilting people, telling people what to do, ridiculing people, forcing different behaviour, expecting voluntary changes in behaviour, and appealing to people's concern for themselves, others, or the environment itself... but in some instances, all of them might be appropriate to some people, in some context. In this skeptical world, there is no one-size-fits-all.

Amidst all this imperical and theoretical research, if I can find any common thread, it's that people want to be heard and respected, and they want to be positive contributors to the world. I love the kind of vision for the future (and for now) that embraces the changes we need as positive changes, appealing to people's innate values of community, sharing, involvement— avoiding the simple self-interested notions as "saving money" in favour of "being prudent"; substuting the negative "reducing your impact" for "treading lightly" (because we are still moving after all); focusing on "life balance and contentment" over the consumption-implying "quality of life"; and even replacing "for the sake of your children" with "for the current and future generations". As was highlighted by the Seattle Neighbourhood Greenways organisation, the choice of language is critical when appealing to people's values, not only because of the direct impact on their behaviour, but also because it can shape the way any debate is carried out, and smooth over the agression that can be raised through negative and polarising words.

This article is a response to:

L. Evans et al, 'Self-Interest and Pro-environmental behaviour', Nature Climate Change, 3 (2013), pp. 122-125.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, 'If we are so rich, why aren't we happy?', American Psychologist, 54 (10) (1999), pp.821-827.

Anja Kollmuss and Julian Agyeman, 'Mind the Gap: why do people act environmentally and what are the barriers to pro-environmental behaviour?', Environmental Education Research, 8 (3), (2002), pp. 239-260.