Monitoring Annoyance and Stress Effects of Wind Turbines on Nearby Residents: A Comparison of U.S. and European Samples

As wind turbines and the number of wind projects scale throughout the world, a growing number of individuals might be affected by these structures. For some people, wind turbine sounds and their effects on the landscape can be annoying and could even prompt stress reactions. This comparative study analyzed a combined sample of survey respondents from the U.S., Germany and Switzerland. It utilized a newly developed assessment scale (ASScale) to reliably characterize these stress-impacted individuals living within populations near turbines. Findings indicate low prevalence of annoyance, stress symptoms and coping strategies. Noise annoyance stress (NASScale) was negatively correlated with the perceptions of a lack of fairness of the wind project\u27s planning and development process, among other subjective variables. Objective indicators, such as the distance from the nearest turbine and sound pressure level modeled for each respondent, were not found to be correlated to noise annoyance. Similar result patterns were found across the European and U.S. samples

School or Work? The Choice May Change Your Personality

According to the social-investment principle, entering new environments is associated with new social roles that influence people's behaviors. In this study, we examined whether young adults' personality development is differentially related to their choice of either an academic or a vocational pathway (i.e., entering an academic-track school or beginning vocational training). The personality constructs of interest were Big Five personality traits and vocational-interest orientations. We used a longitudinal study design and propensity-score matching to create comparable groups before they entered one of the pathways and then tested the differences between these groups 6 years later. We expected the vocational pathway to reinforce more mature behavior and curtail investigative interest. Results indicated that choosing the vocational compared with the academic pathway was associated with higher conscientiousness and less interest in investigative, social, and enterprising activities

Umweltpsychologie

In diesem Buchkapitel wird die anwendungsorientierte Teildisziplin der Umweltpsychologie vorgestellt. Dazu werden Gegenstandsbereich sowie grundlegende Methoden und Ansätze skizziert und ihr umfangreiches Themenspektrum anhand von drei Blickwinkeln systematisiert: (1) naturwissenschaftlich-technisch geprägte Ansätze, die analysieren, inwiefern Umwelten auf den Menschen wirken; (2) sozialwissenschaftliche Perspektiven, die die Relevanz von Handlungsentscheidungen für die Umwelt betonen, und (3) menschliche Interaktionen mit der Umwelt, die häufig mit Interessens- und Nutzungskonflikten verbunden sind. Abschließend werden die interdisziplinäre Ausrichtung der Umweltpsychologie und ihre Relevanz für aktuelle gesellschaftspolitische Herausforderungen erläutert

The moderating role of the attitude-subjective norms conflict on the link between moral norms and intention.

Within a traditional planned-behavior framework, the conditions remain ambiguous under which moral norms add to the overall intention to act. In this paper, we aim to provide insights into the circumstances that foster the impact of moral norms. Based on a minimal effort strategy, we predict that moral information is considered more strongly and, thus, is relatively more significant for people's motivation if a person's attitude is at odds with his or her subjective norms. To test our beliefs-conflict hypothesis, we conducted two surveys, one concerning organ donation (N = 639) and another concerning conservation behavior (N = 328). Structural equation analyses confirm that moral considerations have a stronger effect on a person's behavioral intention in cases of attitude-subjective norms conflicts compared to cases of harmonic attitudes and subjective norms

Reconsidering Barriers to Wind Power Projects: Community Engagement, Developer Transparency and Place

In 2016, we undertook a nationally representative wind power perceptions survey of individuals living within 8?km of over 600 projects in the United States, generating 1705 telephone, web, and mail responses. We sought information on a variety of topics, including procedural fairness and its relationship to project attitude, the foci of the present analysis. We present a series of descriptive statistics and regression results, emphasizing those residents who were aware of their local project prior to construction. Sample weighting is employed to account for stratification and non-response. We find that a developer being open and transparent, a community being able to influence the outcome, and having a say in the planning process are all statistically significant predictors of a process perceived as being ‘fair,’ with an open and transparent developer having the largest effect. We also find developer transparency and ability to influence outcomes to have statistically significant relationships to a more positive attitude, with those findings holding when aesthetics, landscape, and wind turbine sound considerations are controlled for. The results indicate that jurisdictions might consider developing procedures, which ensure citizens are consulted and heard, and benchmarks or best practices for developer interaction with communities and citizens

Persuasion Game : Cross Cultural Comparison

Background. This study aims to examine the effectiveness of the “persuasion game” in changing environmental attitudes and behaviors in different cultural contexts. Personal communication has been identified as a key facilitator of environmental behaviors, but environmental communication in our daily lives is infrequent. Intervention. This study tested the effects of the persuasion game in Germany, Hong Kong, and Japan. The game divides participants into two groups: persuaders and persuadees. The persuaders were given 10 minutes to persuade as many persuadees as they could to adopt energy-saving behaviors. Further, after 10 minutes, these participants were asked to switch their roles. Method. The study employed a quasi-experimental pretest/posttest design to examine changes in attitudes and behavioral intentions of the participants toward energy-saving before and after their participation in the persuasion game. Participants were university students in Germany (N = 116), Hong Kong (N = 65), and Japan (N = 92). Results. In all three countries, playing the game was associated with increased intention to adopt energy-saving behaviors, perceived seriousness of environmental problems, descriptive norm, and subjective norm. The increase in subjective norm was especially high in Japan, where the increase in intention to adopt energy-saving behavior was particularly pronounced among those who had less environmental communication. Discussion. The results indicate that this game can not only facilitate communication on environmental issues in different cultural contexts but also change how people perceive others’ interest in environmental issues. Conclusion. This study showed that persuasion game can be played in countries other than Japan as well. Moreover, it provides an opportunity to communicate with others on environmental issues, which may contribute to promoting future environmental behaviors

Monitoring Annoyance and Stress Effects of Wind Turbines on Nearby Residents: A Comparison of U.S. and European Samples

As wind turbines and the number of wind projects scale throughout the world, a growing number of individuals might be affected by these structures. For some people, wind turbine sounds and their effects on the landscape can be annoying and could even prompt stress reactions. This comparative study analyzed a combined sample of survey respondents from the U.S., Germany and Switzerland. It utilized a newly developed assessment scale (ASScale) to reliably characterize these stress-impacted individuals living within populations near turbines. Findings indicate low prevalence of annoyance, stress symptoms and coping strategies. Noise annoyance stress (NASScale) was negatively correlated with the perceptions of a lack of fairness of the wind project\u27s planning and development process, among other subjective variables. Objective indicators, such as the distance from the nearest turbine and sound pressure level modeled for each respondent, were not found to be correlated to noise annoyance. Similar result patterns were found across the European and U.S. samples

Attitudes of U.S. Wind Turbine Neighbors: Analysis of a Nationwide Survey

Experts predict continuing deployment of wind turbines in the United States, which will create more interactions between turbines and surrounding communities. Policymakers can benefit from analyses of existing wind projects that enable them to better understand likely effects on residents around proposed projects. Our analysis of a randomly drawn, representative national survey of 1705 existing U.S. wind project neighbors provides previously unavailable detail about factors influencing the attitudes of these neighbors toward their local wind projects. Overall, we find positive-leaning attitudes, which improve over time as individuals self-select into communities near existing wind projects. Hearing wind turbines leads to less-positive attitudes, although living very near to turbines does not, nor does seeing wind turbines. In fact, our findings suggest complex relationships among nearby residents’ attitudes, their perceptions about the particular fit of turbines within their landscape and community, and their perceptions of wind project impacts on property values. These findings—along with the positive correlation between perceived planning-process fairness and attitude—suggest areas of focus for wind project development that may influence social outcomes and acceptance of wind energy. The concluding discussion provides a number of policy and future research recommendations based on the research