Dynamic mental representations of habitual behaviours: Food choice on a web-based environment

Aim: Rather than being rigid, habitual behaviours may be determined by dynamic mental representations that can adapt to context changes. This adaptive potential may result from particular conditions dependent on the interaction between two sources of mental constructs activation: perceived context applicability and cognitive accessibility . Method: T wo web-shopping simulations of fering the choice between habitually chosen and non-habitually chosen food products were presented to participants. This considered two choice contexts dif fering in the habitual behaviour perceived applicability (low vs. high) and a measure of habitual behaviour chronicity . Results: Study 1 demonstrated a perceived applicability ef fect, with more habitual (non-organic) than non-habitual (organic) food products chosen in a high perceived applicability (familiar) than in a low perceived applicability (new) context. The adaptive potential of habitual behaviour was evident in the habitual products choice consistency across three successive choices, despite the decrease in perceived applicability . Study 2 evidenced the adaptive potential in strong habitual behaviour participants – high chronic accessibility – who chose a habitual product (milk) more than a non-habitual product (orange juice), even when perceived applicability was reduced (new context). Conclusion: Results portray consumers as adaptive decision makers that can flexibly cope with changes in their (inner and outer) choice contexts.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT

Why do people fail to act? Situational barriers and constraints on ecological behavior

The lack of success in dealing with the inconsistency between positive attitudes and ecological behaviors, and in explaining why people fail to act pro-environmentally is still widespread in practice and research. In our view, this has to do with three main reasons: 1) A positivity fallacy - the belief shared by many researchers and practitioners that as long as people have the right (or positive) attitudes, intentions, skills, information, etc., the right pro-ecological action should follow; thus, they disregard the importance of negative determinants in explaining the attitude-behavior inconsistency. 2) Lack of a psychological level of explanation; even when negative determinants are considered, the psychological explanation is often disregarded or incompletely identified, with most of the factors identified being socio-economical, or urban planning and architectural, etc. However, factors explaining why people fail to act can also be viewed within a psychological level of explanation, with behavior considered to be the result of an interaction between contextual variables and psychological processes. 3) Underestimation of the unconscious processes influence; contextual effects on behavior can be mediated not only by conscious perception but also by cognitive processes of which people are not aware of. Given these reasons, a model of psychological barriers and constraints is proposed (DN-Work model; “Didn’t work”) trying to integrate negative determinants within a psychological explanatory model of pro-ecological behavior. This model aims to represent a process view regarding how a conflict between pro-ecological and anti-ecological behavioral goals can be produced, given the presence of two types of barriers and constraints: a) perceived barriers and constraints, and b) unconscious barriers and constraints. We briefly present two studies based on this model. These studies address habit accessibility as an unconscious behavioral barrier on ecological decisions to buy organic products, mediated by the effect of behavioral-goals activation from the situation

Effect size, confidence intervals and statistical power in psychological research

Quantitative psychological research is focused on detecting the occurrence of certain population phenomena by analyzing data from a sample, and statistics is a particularly helpful mathematical tool that is used by researchers to evaluate hypotheses and make decisions to accept or reject such hypotheses. In this paper, the various statistical tools in psychological research are reviewed. The limitations of null hypothesis significance testing (NHST) and the advantages of using effect size and its respective confidence intervals are explained, as the latter two measurements can provide important information about the results of a study. These measurements also can facilitate data interpretation and easily detect trivial effects, enabling researchers to make decisions in a more clinically relevant fashion. Moreover, it is recommended to establish an appropriate sample size by calculating the optimum statistical power at the moment that the research is designed. Psychological journal editors are encouraged to follow APA recommendations strictly and ask authors of original research studies to report the effect size, its confidence intervals, statistical power and, when required, any measure of clinical significance. Additionally, we must account for the teaching of statistics at the graduate level. At that level, students do not receive sufficient information concerning the importance of using different types of effect sizes and their confidence intervals according to the different types of research designs; instead, most of the information is focused on the various tools of NHST

PSYCHOLOGICAL MEANINGS OF “POSITIVE SPIRITUAL ENVIRONMENT” AND “PLACES TO COMMUNICATE WITH GOD”

The spaces that surround and sustain daily life significantly influence people’s way of thinking, feeling and behaving. They also reflect personal and meaningful aspects of their lives. This study was aimed at investigating conceptions regarding spiritual environments and characteristics of places wherein individuals communicate with God or a “higher power”, seeking to find empirical support to the idea of positive spiritual environments (spiritual contexts that, simultaneously, promote human wellbeing and environmental conservation). Ninety-one undergraduate students participated in the study. The network of spiritual environment generated a network size of 137 words with a core of 28 words. The highest semantic weights were produced by peace, God, tranquility, love, faith, church, pray, harmony, beliefs, wellbeing, happiness, and relaxation. Characteristics of the place wherein people communicate with God produced a network size of 104 words and a core of 27 words. The most important of those words were: church, home, calm, room, quiet, school, sacred, natural, alone, street, prayer, and clean. Few words communicating concern for environmentally conservation behaviors were found within the network

PSYCHOLOGICAL MEANINGS OF “POSITIVE SPIRITUAL ENVIRONMENT” AND “PLACES TO COMMUNICATE WITH GOD”

The spaces that surround and sustain daily life significantly influence people’s way of thinking, feeling and behaving. They also reflect personal and meaningful aspects of their lives. This study was aimed at investigating conceptions regarding spiritual environments and characteristics of places wherein individuals communicate with God or a “higher power”, seeking to find empirical support to the idea of positive spiritual environments (spiritual contexts that, simultaneously, promote human wellbeing and environmental conservation). Ninety-one undergraduate students participated in the study. The network of spiritual environment generated a network size of 137 words with a core of 28 words. The highest semantic weights were produced by peace, God, tranquility, love, faith, church, pray, harmony, beliefs, wellbeing, happiness, and relaxation. Characteristics of the place wherein people communicate with God produced a network size of 104 words and a core of 27 words. The most important of those words were: church, home, calm, room, quiet, school, sacred, natural, alone, street, prayer, and clean. Few words communicating concern for environmentally conservation behaviors were found within the network

A global look at time: a 24-country study of the equivalence of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory

In this article, we assess the structural equivalence of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (ZTPI) across 26 samples from 24 countries (N = 12,200). The ZTPI is proven to be a valid and reliable index of individual differences in time perspective across five temporal categories: Past Negative, Past Positive, Present Fatalistic, Present Hedonistic, and Future. We obtained evidence for invariance of 36 items (out of 56) and also the five-factor structure of ZTPI across 23 countries. The short ZTPI scales are reliable for country-level analysis, whereas we recommend the use of the full scales for individual-level analysis. The short version of ZTPI will further promote integration of research in the time perspective domain in relation to many different psycho-social processes

On the relation between social dominance orientation and environmentalism: A 25-nation study

International audienc

A model of proenvironmental behavior predicted by dispositional, situational and demographic variables: The case of Mexico.

The purpose of this study was to test a model of conservation behavior in a Mexican community. Reuse and recycling patterns of one-hundred families in a middle-sized city of Northwestern Mexico were analyzed using direct observations of reused and recycled items. Predictors of the studied behaviors were assessed by an inventory administered to housewives, which included self-reports, observations and event-test activities of dispositional variables (motives, competencies, beliefs, knowledge), demographic factors (age, income, education) and situational variables (storage facilities, presence of collectors of recyclables, use of radio, TV, newspapers and books). A comparison of responses to self-reports and observations of reused/recycled items showed a significant lack of correspondence between these measures. Therefore, observation was selected as the method best indicating reuse and recycling. These observations revealed that reuse is a more generalized conservation practice, while recycling is limited to selected items. Multiple regressions of dispositional, demographic and situational variables on both conservation behaviors showed that motives to reuse was the only significant direct predictor of reusing, while motives to recycling predicted recycling in a positive way, and facilities for storage had a significant but negative effect on recycling. However, the use of a structural equations models revealed the presence of significant indirect predictors of most of these variables on reuse and recycling. Motives and competencies to reuse/recycle positively affected conservation behaviors, but conservation beliefs did not; Competencies had a positive influence on motives to reuse and recycle, and the use of TV/radio negatively affected the motivation to reuse. Knowledge of reusables/recyclables had a positive effect on competencies, while reading books and newspapers had a significant influence on knowledge about reusables. The indirect effect of education on these conservation behaviors was manifested through its significant positive influence on reading books/newspapers and a significant negative effect on the use of radio and television. The presence of people collecting recyclables did not affect housewive's recycling while the possession of storage facilities negatively affected such a recycling practice

Percepción de riesgos, conducta proambiental y variables demográficas en una comunidad de Sonora, México

Responses of 200 northern Mexicans to a questionnaire investigating the perceived risk from 84 situations we re studied. These included potential natural hazards , use of technologies, criminal behaviors and personal risky actions. Participants determined how much danger every situation represented for the physical environment (environmentalrisk), for their society(socialrisk) , and for themselves (personalrisk) . In addition, pro-environmental behaviors were selfre ported by each participant , and their demographic information was recorded. Results from three multiple regression models revealed that perception of environmental risk seemed to result in environmentally protective behaviors, but perceptions of social and personal risks did not. In the three cases, older people and individuals of lower income perceived a higher environmental, social and personal risks. These results are discussed in terms of possible preventive and remedial strategies for coping with these types of risk