Culture-common Predictors of Sustainable Behavior

Aghop Der-Karabetian (Professor of Psychology), Yingxia Cao (Professor of Business Administration), and Michelle Alfaro (Former PsyD student and Clinical Psychologist) recently published an article in the journal of Ecopsychology, identifying predictors of sustainable behavior in the US, China and Taiwan.

The editor’s acceptance comment said, “ You offer a positive vision toward solving some major world-wide environmental problems.” Using very large samples of college students, several common and unique predictors were identified across the three countries.

Perceived personal risk and a sense of global belonging and citizenship were significant predictors of sustainable behavior in all three countries. World-minded value orientation and stronger sense of national identity were additional predictors in the US and China samples.

In all three samples a stronger sense of global belonging and citizenship was related to stronger perception of the positive impact of globalization (in terms of economics, technology and culture) globally and locally. Moreover, in all three cultures, those who reported a more integrated higher sense of global and national identity were also more inclined to engage in more sustainable behaviors. These predictors point to culture common and potentially universal factors in promoting sustainable behavior that may be incorporated into educational and community engagement efforts.

Their research continues to collect comparable data to further evaluate the impact of these predictors of environmentally sustainable behavior in different countries.

The link to the article is: http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/eco.2014.0035