Connectedness to Nature and Environmental Identity Scales Reveal Environmental Awareness in Greek Teachers

Core Ideas: The present study measures Greek teachers' environmental identity, feeling of connectedness to nature, and environmental knowledge. Primary and secondary teachers are environmentally conscious, but they lack knowledge of fundamental concepts of environmental literacy. Effective environmental education in schools requires environmental literacy in teachers. Teachers are responsible to provide their students with knowledge, values, attitudes, and skills needed to preserve the environment in order to produce environmentally literate citizens. The latter is possible if teachers themselves have high levels of environmental knowledge, strong environmental awareness, and manifest environmental behavior. In response, this study aimed to assess Greek in-service teachers' environmental knowledge, eco-friendly behavior, and their connectedness to nature and environmental identity as aspects of their environmental consciousness. A self-administered questionnaire was used to assess teachers' demographic profile, environmental knowledge, and self-reported environmental behavior. Two well-established measures of general environmental attitudes—connectedness to nature and environmental identity scales—were also used. The method lies on principal component analysis and evaluation of Cronbach's alpha to confirm the reliability and validity of the scales. The results showed that teachers' scores on both scales were high, revealing their positive attitudes in terms of the environment. Responders possess a moderate level of environmental knowledge and they possess pro-environmental behavior. Results from this study can be useful to policy makers in order to design and promote the implementation of teachers' training programs in Greece and other countries of the European Union that focus on the enhancement of their environmental literacy. Copyright © 2018 by the American Society of Agronom

Assessing values, attitudes and threats towards marine biodiversity in a Greek coastal port city and their interrelationships

The global marine environment degradation is strongly related to the unsustainable use of the marine living resources and the ineffective conservation policies. Assessing individual's general perceptions of marine biodiversity may contribute to the implementation of successful conservation policies within the existing social-cultural context. The present work investigates citizens' assigned values for ecosystem services, perceived threats, and attitudes toward marine biodiversity in a Greek coastal port city, Thessaloniki. We used the Social Values Indicators for ecosystem services list of items to measure values, a revised form of the Ocean Attitudes Questionnaire to assess attitudes toward the marine environment, and adopted items from past research to explore the perceived threats to the marine environment. Exploratory Factor Analysis revealed the structure of the constructs. Τhe results showed positive attitudes towards marine biodiversity while participants recognized the contribution of marine biodiversity to both ecological balance and economic development. Pollution from industry and farming were identified as the most important threats to the marine environment. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) were used to confirm the structure of the constructs and assess the relationships between attitudes, threats, and values. The results indicated that use values are strongly but negatively related to ecological attitudes and perceived threats, while non-use values are significantly and positively related to attitudes and threats. The utility of these results for designing effective policy implementations that incorporate public perceptions is discussed. © 2018 Elsevier Lt

Public perceptions of the marine environment and behavioral intentions to preserve it: The case of three coastal cities in Greece

This study explored public perceptions of the marine environment in three coastal communities in Greece and further investigated intentions to adopt behaviors that contribute to marine conservation. We used the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) to study the psychological determinants of behavioral intentions. The findings indicated that respondents have positive attitudes, moderate knowledge of marine issues, and they value the marine environment for the multiple ecosystem services that it provides. Litter and pollution from industry were considered as the most important marine threats, followed by fishing and farming. Participants suggested that informing the public and giving prominence to environmental education can contribute to marine conservation efforts. They felt that research centers and scientific community were more competent than governmental authorities and the private sector concerning the management and protection of the marine environment. Intention to adopt environmental behaviors was influenced by normative considerations, attitudes toward marine biodiversity and perceived behavioral control beliefs. The results may: 1) help inform policymakers to improve marine resource management towards a more sustainable relationship between people and the sea; 2) support the development of marine strategies that fit the social preferences, needs, and priorities to increase the likelihood of public support; and 3) support marine spatial planning efforts to uncover the intrinsic complexity of societal interactions with the marine environment. The findings further support policymakers that wish to promote behavior change through communication strategies that deliver environmental messages that focus on enhancing normative considerations, behavioral control beliefs, and corresponding attitudes. © 2019 Elsevier Lt

Environmental behavior in a private-sphere context: Integrating theories of planned behavior and value belief norm, self-identity and habit

This study explores the determinants of environmental behavior in a private-sphere context and proposes an integrative model that includes the constructs from two theoretical frameworks, the theory of planned behavior (TPB) and the value belief norm theory (VBN), along with two additional variables, habits and self-identity. A questionnaire survey method was used to collect the survey data and statistical analysis relied on application of structural equation modeling (SEM). The results show that intention is the best predictor of environmental behavior followed by habits and subjective norm is the main attendant of intention. Awareness of consequences has a positive impact on personal and subjective norms, attitudes and perceived behavioral control, while these constructs have in turn a significant influence on behavioral intention. Self-identity moderates the relationships between biospheric values and personal norm, attitudes, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control. The proposed model exhibit superior predictive ability compared to the original TPB and VBN models verifying its utility and effectiveness in explaining environmental behavior. The results of this work can be used by governments and policymakers to design and implement conservation programs to promote a more sustainable lifestyle. Recommendations for future research are discussed in the last section of this paper. © 2019 Elsevier B.V

Development and validation of a scale for measuring Multiple Motives toward Environmental Protection (MEPS)

The current study aimed to establish and validate the Multi-motives toward Environmental Protection Scale (MEPS) to assess the various reasons that motivate individuals to engage in environmental behaviors. The scale development process included four steps: extensive literature review on environmental incentives, generation of an item pool, evaluation of the initial item pool by a panel of experts, and administration of the final item pool to a population sample to test the psychometric properties of the scale. We collected five distinct samples to: (1) explore the factorial structure of the MEPS using Exploratory Factor Analysis (Study 1); (2) confirm the proposed structure using Confirmatory Factor Analysis and assess reliability and validity (Studies 2 and 3); (3) examine test-retest reliability (Study 4); and (4) evaluate the MEPS in a representative sample (Study 5). The overall findings supported a seven-factor structure for the 28-item MEPS, revealed good scale reliability and provided evidence of construct validity in terms of discriminant and convergent validity. The scale exhibited criterion-related validity as suggested by the correlations observed between each MEPS subscale and other outcome variables. Results showed that configural, measurement and latent mean invariance were established across gender groups. The MEPS comprises a comprehensive instrument that makes a significant contribution to the motivation literature within the environmental conservation context. The proposed measure gives rise to future research in the environmental psychology field and may inform behavior change strategies by policymakers that wish to promote environmental behavior. © 2019 Elsevier Lt

A Multi-dimensional Measure of Environmental Behavior: Exploring the Predictive Power of Connectedness to Nature, Ecological Worldview and Environmental Concern

In this study we examine the multi-dimensional structure of environmental behavior and its potential domains. Factor analysis reveals six behavioral domains: civic actions, policy support, recycling, transportation choices, behaviors in a household setting and consumerism. We use the Connectedness to Nature and Inclusion of Nature in Self scales to measure connection with nature, the New Environmental Paradigm to measure ecological worldviews, and Environmental Motives Scale to assess people’s environmental concern. We further explore the predictive power of connectedness to nature, ecological worldview, and environmental concern for explaining the diverse behavioral domains. Connectedness to nature and ecological worldview were more predictive of civic actions, recycling, household behaviors, and consumerism than were environmental concerns. In the case of policy support and transportation choices, environmental concerns explained more variance than the other constructs. © 2018, Springer Nature B.V

Who cares about the environment?

Environmental behavior substantially differs among individuals depending on their environmental attitudes, connectivity to nature beliefs, and socioeconomic profile. People who adopt an eco-friendly lifestyle and those who are unconcerned about environmental protection represent population segments with diverse characteristics. Consequently, this study aims to identify homogeneous groups based on individuals’ environmental behavior. A total of 400 Greek citizens completed a self-report questionnaire. We used behavioral items adopted from previous studies to measure environmental behavior and background variables to assess the socio-demographic profile of the respondents. Additionally, we used the well-established measures of Connectedness to Nature Scale (CNS) and New Ecological Paradigm Scale (NEP) to measure people's relatedness with nature and their ecological beliefs separately. Multivariate Cluster Analysis results indicated that participants can be grouped into two broad segments, named moderate eco-friends and non-environmentalists. Individual differences between the clusters were detected with respect to gender, education, connectedness to nature and ecological worldview. © 2018, © 2018 Taylor & Francis

Assessing the structure and correlations of connectedness to nature, environmental concerns and environmental behavior in a Greek context

The current study examines connectedness to nature feelings, environmental concerns and environmental behavior in a Greek population. The structure of these constructs and their relations were assessed with the help of Factor Analysis and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). Data were collected from two random Greek citizen samples using questionnaire survey method. We used the Connectedness to Nature Scale (CNS) to measure connectivity to nature feelings and Environmental Motives Scale (EMS) to assess peoples’ environmental concern in both studies. Items from previous research were adopted to measure peoples’ environmental behavior. In study 1, Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) suggested that connectedness to nature is a uni-dimensional measure, while environmental behavior and environmental concerns are multidimensional constructs. In study 2, Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) confirmed the proposed structure of all constructs in the study. The SEM model tested the associations among connectedness to nature, environmental concern, and the behavioral domains and showed an acceptable fit. The results indicated that, after controlling for age, gender and education, connectedness to nature, egoistic and biospheric concerns were significantly related to personal practices, while altruistic concerns had a significant but negative correlation with personal practices. Only egoistic concerns showed a significant and positive relationship with environmental action. The reported findings have implications on policy related to the promotion of pro-environmental behavior and contribute to social science research that aims to understand human responses to a changing environment. © 2018, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature

How do motives and knowledge relate to intention to perform environmental behavior? Assessing the mediating role of constraints

This study explored how motives and knowledge are associated with intention to adopt environmental behavior through the mediating role of constraints. Additionally, it assessed structural models of associations among barriers to environmental behavior, motives, and environmental knowledge. Two broad types of barriers were assessed (psychological and structural barriers) to shed light on the limiting factors of environmental behavior. Drawing on the Goal Framing Theory, we investigated three incentive types that motivate individuals to participate in pro-ecological activities, namely gain, hedonic and normative motives. A questionnaire survey method was used to obtain a representative sample of Greek citizens (n = 1551). We applied Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) to assess the reliability and validity of the study constructs and Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) to test the research hypotheses and reveal the interrelationships among the variables. The main findings indicated that barriers mediate the impact of environmental knowledge and motivation on intention. Normative and hedonic motives had a significant negative impact on all types of barriers, while gain goals significantly but negatively influenced constraints. The possible contribution of the research findings to the literature or the design of policy interventions that consider knowledge, constraints and motives to environmental behavior, and future research directions are discussed. © 2019 Elsevier B.V