Comportement écologique

Ecological Attitude- Behavior Gap:

A Theoretical Analysis

Dalal TARFAOUI1, Salah ZKIM2

LRMC Department, Hassan1er University

Km 3, route de Casa BP 658, Settat, Maroc

1Tarfaoui_dalal@hotmail.fr

2salah.zkim@gmail.com

Abstract — Many studies have been undertaken to examine whether environmental attitudes predict ecological behaviors. The assumption is: someone with an environmental attitude behaves in ways consistent with that attitude. Some studies have highlighted the important role of environmental attitude in explaining the ecological behavior and have found a positive relationship (Arbuthnot & Lingg, 1975). However, some other researchers have reported completely different outcomes. A weak to inexistent relationship has been found between environmental attitude and ecological behavior (Wicker, 1969; Oskamp et al., 1991). The key question in the present article is: why do we get different results and so many discrepancies in attitude-behavior relationship, mainly in the ecological field? The article represents a theoretical analysis and a review of research analyzing the gap between the environmental attitude and ecological behavior.

Keywords—Attitude-Behavior gap, Ecological Attitude, Environmental Behavior, Ecological Behavior, Gap.

1. INTRODUCTION

Environmental psychology has spread to too many branches to study the complex interactions between people and the environment. General environment issues (e.g. excessive exploitation of natural resources, the damage of the ozone layer, starving polar bears  in the arctic region due the ice melting caused by climate change, upper respiratory diseases because of air pollution, etc.), all point towards changes in ecosystem and threatens the existence of the future generations of the human race. Many scientists, scholars, psychologists and researchers in fields related to the environment have come up with many models with the purpose of understanding the variants of a pro-environmental behavior. They have pointed to the individual’s ecological behavior, and they defined it as actions and activities that contribute towards environmental protection and conservation (Axelrod & Lehman, 1993). They have endeavored to explain what can determine people’s ecological behavior and how behavior can be steered towards a more ecological direction.  The concept of attitude seems to be the most promising and close antecedent to behavior (Newhouse, 1990). Not surprisingly, two-thirds of all environmental psychological  publications consider ecological attitude in one way or another (Kaise, Wolfing, & Fuhrer, 1999).  Studies have been undertaken to examine whether environmental attitudes predict ecological behavior. The guess is that people with an ecological attitude are supposed to behave ecologically; attitude is a powerful concept that pushes people to behave in a certain way in accordance with that attitude. However, the attitude-behavior relationship is far from being straightforward. Some studies have highlighted the important role of environmental attitude in explaining the pro-environmental behavior and have found a positive relationship (Arbuthnot & Lingg, 1975). They have demonstrated that people with an ecological attitude are predisposed to behave ecologically. However, some other researchers have reported completely different outcomes. A weak to nonexistent relationship has been found between environmental attitude and ecological behavior ( Wicker, 1969; Oskamp et al., 1991). There are so many contradictions within these debates; the key question is: why do we get different results and too many discrepancies in Environmental Attitude-Behavior relationship?

1. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND

1. Attitude-Behavior gap

In psychology, the bridge between statements and actions is termed as Attitude-Behavior gap or Attitude-Behavior inconsistency (Byrka, 2009).  The gap between attitude and behavior is confusing to many people, because intuitively, attitude is closely related to behavior. People have claimed for many years the great ability of attitude to predict behavior, for example, a health conscious person would refrain from a health damaging behavior or an environmentalist would perform a responsible behavior regarding the environment. However, studies on attitudes have discovered the attitude’s poor ability to predict behavior, especially when we consider a general attitude towards a specific behavior. Therefore, the researchers moved from a direct and straightforward relation between attitude and behavior, to discovering new determinants of behaviors, and came up with social-cognitive models that would represent the entire process behind the performance of behaviors (Strack & Deutsch, 2004). Similar description of the inconsistency between actions and declarations has been identified over forty years ago by Campbell (1963).  He has stated that declarations were easier to do than overt acts. He has given an example saying that giving a lecture about the effects of carbon dioxide, is actually much easier than walking or cycling.  Many studies have reported the lag between environmental attitudes and behavior (Campbell, 1963).

In one research, 80% claiming to be environmentalist and 70% recommend less packaging by manufacturers: however, only 46% have reported buying an environmental product (Gutfeld, 1991). In other studies, between 30% to 50% of people express their intention to buy green products, however the market share of sustainable products is almost less than 5% of sales (Young, Hwang, McDonald, & Oates, 2010). According the Greendex (2012), the percentage of people who declare that they are “green” is much higher that the real “green” purchasers, as shown in Fig. 1. The Greendex, which is a quantitative study of 17 countries, asked about environmental behavior, like the use of green products, transportation choices, attitudes towards sustainability and the environment. An algorithm has been developed to generate an index score that reflects the environmental impact of the consumers (Society, n.d.) .

Fig. 1: Respondents with green attitude versus average actual green consumer behaviour in %  (Greenindex, 2012)

[pic 1]

Attitude has been described by Allport (1935) in the first Handbook of Social Psychology as “the most distinctive and indispensable concept in social psychology. Theorists generally agree about the importance of the concept of attitude, however they have differed greatly over decades about an adequate definition of it (Dawes & Smith, 1985), all the definitions given are generally broad.  Among the known definitions, attitude has been described as “ a mental and neural state of readiness, organized through experience, exerting a directive or dynamic influence upon individual’s response to all objects and situations with which it is related” (Allport, 1935).  Other researchers have relied on the definition of Katz (1960), who suggested that “an attitude is the predisposition of the individual to evaluate a particular object in a favorable or unfavorable manner” (Katz, 1960). An Attitude has also been defined as “ an enduring set of beliefs about an object that predispose people to behave in particular ways toward the object” (Weigel, 1983). In the current article, the concept of attitude is important as it can define and direct the action and dictate the behavior. To do so, scientists focused more on a specific attitude toward a specific behavior, which is called “compatibility”. Ajzen & Fishbein (1977) have suggested the principle of compatibility, which can be described in terms of specificity or generality of the measure.  That means, to predict a specific behavior, we need a specific attitude about this behavior. As per Campbell (1963) in the following example, “if we are interested in predicting screening for cancer in Saint Joseph Hospital next Friday, we should also measure an attitude toward screening for cancer in the same place at the same time”.  At a very high level of specificity of the two concepts the attitude and behavior, there is more chance that attitude predicts the behavior, and the relation between them is stronger.  The difficulty of behavior is another variable accountable for the attitude behavior inconsistency. It has been proven that behavior is not as easy as attitude to perform; some variables can hinder or facilitate the performance of the behavior. Like situational constraints may stop the behavior from taking place regardless of individual perception. Infrastructure, climate and topography are situational factors that affect people’s behavior. The example given by Kaiser, Midden, and Cervinka (2008), a well-designed bicycle paths facilitate using a bike in the Netherlands more than in Germany. Attitude-behavior inconsistency has attracted too many debates and researches. The poor relationship and the weak correlation between these two concepts (attitude & behavior) found in some studies, cast doubt on the utility of the attitude concept, and question its ability to predict the performance of a behavior.  Recent researchers have proposed the moderate degree of the attitude-behavior relationship and have focused on the conditions in which the relationship is weaker or stronger (Wallace, Paulson, Lord, & Bond Jr, 2005).  Some plausible solutions have been proposed to explain this inconsistency, some suggested that attitude needs to be compatible with behavior to have a better relationship (Ajzen & Fishbein, 1977). Some other researchers have used intention as a predictor to behavior. They have suggested that the intention of doing something pushes us more to do that thing.  An intention describes the people’s willingness to undertake certain actions (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1977), a behavioral intention is considered as an attitudinal indicator, the closest to an overt behavior. The stronger is the intention to undertake an action, the larger is the probability that this action/behavior will be performed.

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