Validating a Comprehensive Model of Environmental Concern Cross‐Nationally: A U.S.‐Canadian Comparison*

Objective. The dimensionality of “environmental concern” remains ambiguous despite decades of research on environmental attitudes and beliefs. We attempt to provide insight into this issue by using the belief systems perspective and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to test a comprehensive conceptualization of environmental concern. Methods. The study employs a comparative design by using national probability samples of citizens from Canada and the United States, and a comprehensive conceptualization model to maximize content validity. We utilize CFA and structural equation modeling techniques to avoid well‐known measurement error problems in survey research. Results. Eight key facets of environmental concern have moderate to high factor loadings on one underlying construct, and all but perception of community problems and national problems have high loadings. Further analyses provide construct validation for our measurement model. Conclusion. Our results suggest that even among the general public, attitudes toward environmental issues are relatively well organized into a broad and coherent sense of “concern for the environment.” The similarity in the U.S. and Canadian results increases our faith in the validity of our comprehensive conceptualization of environmental concern, as well as the utility of the belief systems perspective and CFA modeling for future studies of environmental attitudes and beliefs.     

Climate Change Communication: Examining the Social and Cognitive Barriers to Productive Environmental Communication

Objectives. This study explores the efficacy of visual appeals that may be used to communicate environmental risk.Methods. To better understand the social and cognitive barriers present in environmental risk communication associated with climate change, we conducted a series of six focus groups. Groups were asked to view images of environmental issues and select the best representation of their feelings out of a range of preselected emotions. While further research is required, preliminary investigation based on the focus groups suggests several themes. Results. First, an individual's familiarity with both an area and an event will decrease the individual's perception of urgency; conversely, the participants expressed greater concern for events that were local and new—in other words, familiarity diminishes urgency, while emergent problems create alacrity. Second, participants expressed a sentiment of tacit blame, in which the participant's own contribution to the issue received less emphasis when ascribing fault. Last, the participants reacted positively toward messages that emphasized a hopeful and solution-based narrative and were seemingly less motivated by images that relied on fear-based messaging. Conclusions. Preliminary findings suggest that hopeful, solution-based messaging may be more effective in facilitating pro-environmental behavior than either fear- or guilt-based appeals.     

The Role of Media System Development in the Emergence of Postmaterialist Values and Environmental Concern: A Cross‐National Analysis*

Important theories related to the social development of environmental concern and attitudes ascribe different roles to the media. Inglehart's materialist–postmaterialist value shift thesis sees the development of a more advance media system as promoting pro‐environmental values. Gerbner's cultivation theory, on the other hand, sees the media as promoting consumerist tendencies, which run counter to environmental concern. This study examines the effect of media system development on postmaterialist values and environmental concern at the national and individual levels. Controlling for other factors known to impact the emergence of environmental concern, the overall effect of media system development is largely negative. However, this result should be considered in light of interactions within and among other key variables. Hierarchical linear modeling is employed to examine the impact of media system development on environmental concern considering individual‐ and country‐level predictors. Results indicate media system development uniquely explains a small but significant amount of variation in individual‐level environmental concern. Findings are discussed in the theoretical context of country‐level predictors of environmental concern.     

Religious Values and Environmental Concern: Harmony and Detachment*

Objective. The thought that environmental concern is rooted in religious beliefs and values has been raised by many writers. Different claims have been made about whether the nature of this relationship is positive or negative, and empirical evidence is mixed. In line with research on attitudes and values, this study examines the hypothesis that unless religious values are mentally accessible, they will not affect judgments of environmental issues. Method. Two environmental issues, genetically modified crops and more traditional environmental issues, for example, air pollution from traffic, are chosen to represent accessibility and nonaccessibility, respectively. A two‐wave data set from a national survey is analyzed. Results. The findings support the suggestion that religious values will affect the judgment of environmental threats of the first, but not the second, issue. Conclusion. These findings suggest that situational cues partly determine which values embodied in religion will influence environmental attitudes.     

Public Perception of Environmental Issues in a Developing Setting: Environmental Concern in Coastal Ghana

OBJECTIVE: Balancing environmental quality with economic growth in less developed settings is clearly a challenge. Still surprisingly little empirical evidence has been brought to bear on the relative priority given environmental and socioeconomic issues among the residents themselves of such settings. This research explores such perceptions. METHODS: We undertake survey research with 2500 residents of coastal Ghana on policy issues, focusing on environmental topics. RESULTS: Our analyses reveal a significant amount of environmental awareness, with education and political engagement consistently predicting higher levels of concern. In addition, environmental issues are deemed important even when considered relative to other socioeconomic issues. CONCLUSION: In the end, we argue that our work sheds light on global environmentalism and the ways in which local populations in less developed settings prioritize social and environmental concerns. This work also has important policy implications since insight on local perceptions may help buttress policy responses designed to cope with global change.     

Environmental shifts for social work: A principles approach

Miller SE, Hayward RA, Shaw TV. Environmental shifts for social work: A principles approach The social work profession is rooted in a history of addressing the needs of vulnerable populations. Generally, however, this history has not extended to issues relating to the natural environment. Building on a framework of environmental justice, this article proposes a shift from the artificial separation of the social and natural environments in its person‐in‐environment focus to an expanded holistic understanding of the dynamic interplay between human society and the natural environment. It examines issues surrounding environmental and ecological justice, and proposes a principles approach to move the profession towards a paradigm of environmental justice using as its template the 17 Principles of Environmental Justice adopted by the First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit in the USA in 1991. It discusses the value of these principles in enhancing social work's capacity to address issues of environmental concern. It proposes that, with greater awareness of the effects of environmental issues on high‐needs populations, the profession would be better able to balance environmental and human concerns.     

Are There Similar Sources of Environmental Concern? Comparing Industrialized Countries*

Objectives. Despite the emergence of environmental concern worldwide, the social forces underlying its expression are not well understood. This research extends previous cross‐national studies by employing multi‐item indicators of environmental concern in order to more accurately portray concern for the environment as a multifaceted concept and to determine whether the sources of environmental concern are similar among industrialized countries. Methods. Survey data from the ISSP 2000 Environment data set are analyzed for 19 countries. Results. The findings are threefold. First, there are some remarkably consistent influences on both measures of concern for the environment. Second, some differences remain, which are linked with measuring environmental concern. Third, these results suggest that models explaining environmental concerns appear to operate similarly in this sample of industrialized countries. Conclusions. This investigation provides a baseline for future research to introduce additional cases and correlates to empirically test explanations regarding environmental concern's global reach.     

建构环境关心的测量模型:基于2003中国综合社会调查数据

环境关心的维度一直是个有争议的问题。本文从环境关心的理论定义出发，利用2003年中国综合社会调查（CGSS）数据对环境关心的测量进行验证性因子分析（CFA）。分析结果显示，与二阶模型相比，包括了四个潜在变量（因子）的一阶测量模型更能拟合所收集的数据和环境关心的定义。同时，本文还考察了社会、人口、经济变量对模型中各个因子的影响，结果显示，各个因子之间的相关强度和方向揭示了环境关心并不是具有一个内在一致性的态度体系，从侧面说明了环境关心构成的复杂性，且这种复杂性也体现在其社会、人口、经济变量等方面。     

Explaining Public Support for the Environmental Movement: A Civic Voluntarism Model*

Objective. The literature on environmentalism includes many more studies of environmental concern than of the public's practical support for the environmental movement. This article develops several categories of predictors of such support from the civic voluntarism model of Verba and associates. Methods. These predictors are tested with data from the 2000 General Social Survey, which included a special module of items on environmental attitudes and activities. Results. Findings generally suggest the utility of the civic voluntarism model for explaining public support for the environmental movement. Additional analysis attempts to untangle reasons for gender and racial differences in the level of this support. Conclusion. This study elucidates several predictors of practical support by the U.S. public for the environmental movement that merit further attention. Such research should pay attention to the proper operationalization of the kind of movement participation studied here.     

Environmental Psychology and Sustainable Development: Expansion, Maturation, and Challenges

In this summary article, some advances of, the potential for, and challenges faced by environmental psychology as a contributor to sustainability science are outlined. In its first 40 years, it has evolved from a discipline primarily—but never solely—concerned with proximate architecture to one that adds concern with larger-scale issues, particularly sustainability. This growth of interest has in turn led to increased interest within it in public policy, technology, cooperation with other disciplines, multilevel analyses of problems, the ingestion of new ideas, and concern with the health of the biotic and ecological world. Some challenges are that the central proponents of "sustainability science" itself have not acknowledged environmental psychology as a potential contributor, the field is comparatively young, that it needs to explore biotic and ecological issues more, needs to help discriminate facts from nonfacts about environmental problems, and needs to warn sustainability science about the daunting task of overcoming environmental numbness and self-interest in individuals. Nevertheless, there is hope: sustainability scientists, including environmental psychologists, may be Adam Smith's "invisible hand."     

The reverse environmental gender gap in China: evidence from "The China Survey"

Objectives This article explores gender differences in attitudes about the seriousness of the environment as a problem in China using the “2008 China Survey.” Methods We use generalized ordered logit models to analyze survey respondents’ environmental attitudes. Results Our results indicate that there is indeed a “gender gap” in environmental attitudes in China, but the pattern is reversed from what has been generally found in previous work conducted in the United States and Europe. Chinese men, not women, show a greater concern about environmental problems and the seriousness of the environmental degradation in China. Further, we find that this gender gap is based largely in the substantial economic and educational differences between men and women in contemporary China. Conclusions This study emphasizes the mediating influence of socioeconomic variables in explaining gender attitudes toward the environment in China. Our findings suggest that in different contexts, women may be faced with difficult decisions between immediate economic necessities and long-term environmental concerns. The observed environmental gender gap in China will likely persist unless further economic development results in improved access to education and economic conditions for Chinese women.     

Environmental Aid: Driven by Recipient Need or Donor Interests?*

Objective. This study investigates the trends in the distribution of environmental aid from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), U.S. foundations, and a multilateral donor, the Global Environmental Fund (GEF), to determine whether aid is driven by donor interests or recipient need. Methods. Data from USAID, the Foundation Center, GEF, and other secondary sources are analyzed using logistic and OLS regressions. Results. Traditional donor interests (politics, economics, and security) and donors' environmental interests (those favoring "global" environmental concerns over local ones) explain which nations receive environmental aid and which do not and how much nations receive. In general, the allocation of environmental aid differs from that of official development assistance. The United States does not demonstrate a middle–income bias; multilateral aid is not more "humanitarian" than bilateral aid. Foundations' allocation patterns favor traditional donors interests. Conclusions. Environmental aid does not target the nations that are most in need of abating local pollution. Instead, environmental aid donors favor nations with whom they have had prior relations (economic and security), nations that are democratic, and nations with unexploited natural resources. In short, donor interests outweigh recipient need.     

Cost Perceptions and Voter Demand for Environmental Risk Regulation: The Double Effect of Hidden Costs

This paper reports the first detailed empirical examination of the effects of voter cost perceptions on demand for environmental risk regulations. Using a statewide random sample of Washington's electorate, I examine voting behavior for a proposed regulation of gasoline stations under varying cost and distributional assumptions. Results suggest normative concerns are as important in explaining support as are expected risk reduction benefits. These norms include making polluters pay, imposing larger burdens on polluters with higher ability to pay, and enforcing public property rights. In contrast, potential price increases as a result of regulation have negligible effects on voter support.     

Environmental Vulnerability in Public Perceptions and Attitudes: The Case of Israel's Urban Centers

Objective. This article investigates how urban environmental vulnerability to hazards reflects in the perceptions and attitudes of the public in three major cities in Israel: Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Haifa. Our central argument is that the differences between the residents' perceptions and attitudes toward environmental issues are related mostly to the actual hazard levels of their communities, whereas individual differences in socioeconomic characteristics are of lesser importance in this regard. Methods. The research was based on survey data of representative samples of the adult residents in the three cities. The differences in attitudes and perceptions among the three samples were statistically assessed by means of analysis of variance. Results. We found relatively strong and consistent relationships between actual environmental vulnerability to hazards in the three cities and their residents' attitudes toward environmental issues. The relationships with socioeconomic characteristics, such as education and income, were considerably weaker and less consistent. Conclusions. The results of this research indicate that environmental concern is not exclusive to groups and individuals characterized by postmaterialist values. Rather, the urban public in general is responsive to the environmental vulnerability of its community. This conclusion supports the argument that attitudes toward the environment are mainly affected by instrumental considerations of objective environmental problems rather than by subjective values.     

Environmental ethics for social work: Social work's responsibility to the non‐human world

Gray M, Coates J. Environmental ethics for social work: Social work's responsibility to the non‐human world This lead article in this Special Issue begins discussion on an environmental ethics for social work and raises arguments as to whether and, if so, why social workers have duties, obligations, responsibilities and commitments to the non‐human world. It provides an overview of the field of environmental ethics in searching for a moral stance to affirm an environmental social work. To what extent should social workers engage in fundamental geopolitical issues concerned with climate change, global warming, environmental degradation, pollution, chemical contamination, sustainable agriculture, disaster management, pet therapy, wilderness protection and so on and, if so, why and how? Are these issues incidental and peripheral and only of concern when they impact upon humans or do social workers have a responsibility beyond human interests? What is the significance of the ‘non‐human’ for social work? The article explores the terrain of the burgeoning field of environmental ethics to determine whether convincing ethical grounds for environmental social work might be found beyond hortatory claims of what the profession ought to be doing to address environmental concerns.     

Environmental Attitudes in International Comparison: An Analysis of the ISSP Surveys 1993 and 2000*

Objective. The goal of this article is to compare the concern for the natural environment between the citizens of 26 countries that participated in the 2000 International Social Survey Program (ISSP) and to explain the differences. Prior studies (e.g., Dunlap, Gallup, and Gallup, 1993; Brechin, 1999 ) suggest that the increase of environmental concern is a global phenomenon. However, Inglehart (1995) , as well as Diekmann and Franzen (1999) , argue that the level of environmental concern and knowledge is highly correlated with GNP per capita. Method. The article analyzes new evidence obtained from the ISSP 2000 and compares it to the prior findings based on the ISSP 1993. Results. It is shown that citizens in wealthier nations express greater concern for the global condition of the environment than those in poorer countries. Conclusion. The new analysis of the ISSP 2000 confirms our original notion that support for global environmental protection is strongly correlated with wealth. However, the increase in real GDP between 1993 and 2000 did not lead to a further increase in environmental concern.     

Income and Power Inequality as Determinants of Environmental and Health Outcomes: Some Findings*

Objective. The article corrects for two main shortcomings in conventional economic analyses of environmental change. First is the overemphasis placed on income growth, and general disregard for other socioeconomic factors. Second is economists' often oversimplified view of the environment, where distinctions between environmental necessities such as potable water and so‐called environmental luxuries are ignored. I test for the effectiveness of power inequality in explaining access to sanitation and safe water as well as their health consequences. Methods. I develop a two‐stage model seeking first to explain changes in the environmental variables and then population health. I employ ordinary least squares regressions on international cross‐sectional data. Results. Some dimensions of power inequality outperform per‐capita income as possible determinants of population health. Neither power inequality nor income is clearly superior at explaining environmental quality. Conclusion. The study casts further doubt on the importance of per‐capita income in explaining environmental and health outcomes.     

Bridging Environmental Science with Environmental Policy: Plasticity of Population, Affluence, and Technology

Objective . Sound environmental policy is fully dependent upon sound science. However, we have little scientific knowledge of the driving forces behind environmental change. We use the well-known I = PAT formulation (environmental i mpacts are the multiplicative product of p opulation, a ffluence, and t echnology) as a framework to assess the relative impacts of driving forces. Methods . We introduce the concept of plasticity —the potential for each factor to vary, particularly because of purposive human action (e.g., policy)—to fine tune our understanding of how each factor can influence different impacts. We illustrate plasticity by assessing each driving force for a variety of environmental impacts. Results . We demonstrate that population, affluence, and technology have different potentials for mitigating different types of impacts and that no one factor is of greater importance than the others. Conclusions . We conclude that plasticity measures can guide policymakers toward identifying and prioritizing those environmental problems most responsive to policy solution.     

Do We Trust the Data? On the Validity and Reliability of Cross‐National Environmental Surveys

Objective. This article provides evidence on the validity and reliability of cross-national environmental surveys, an aspect that has not found much attention so far. Methods. Validity can be checked in examining whether cross-national differences in environmental attitudes are in accordance with theoretical hypotheses. For example, a study can claim some validity if concern about inadequate sanitation is strongly negatively correlated with the actual extent of access to sanitation in a country. Results. Several validity checks were undertaken for the Gallup, Gallup, and Dunlap (1993) survey, all of which tend to support its validity. Next, the reliability of cross-national environmental surveys was checked. Both Pearson and Spearman rank correlations were run for similar questions from differing studies. Most correlations were low and statistically insignificant, however, thus putting some doubt on the reliability of cross-national environmental surveys, at least with respect to the questions examined. Conclusions. The findings support the validity of cross-national environmental surveys, but not their reliability. Future surveys should be designed such that validity and reliability checks become easier to undertake.     

Cross‐National Gender Variation in Environmental Behaviors*

Objective. This article presents a cross‐national examination of gender variations in environmental behaviors. Research on environmental concern reveals modest distinctions between men and women, with women typically displaying higher levels of environmental concern and behavioral adjustments relative to men. Additionally, some prior research suggests that women appear more engaged in household‐oriented (private) pro‐environment behaviors (e.g., recycling), and men in community/society‐oriented (public) pro‐environment behaviors (e.g., protests). The analysis provided here offers an important extension to existing research through its cross‐cultural, comparative perspective. Method. We make use of the 1993 International Social Survey to explore gender differences in “private” and “public” environmentally‐oriented behaviors across 22 nations. Results. It is shown that women tend to engage in more environmental behaviors than men in many nations, particularly private behaviors. In addition, both women and men tend to engage in relatively more private environmental behaviors as opposed to public ones. Conclusion. The cross‐national analysis provides support for gender distinctions with regard to some environmental behaviors within most of the incorporated 22 national contexts. Gender differences in level of private environmental behaviors tend to be more consistent within nations at the upper end of the wealth distribution.