Narrative or Logical? The Effects of Information Format on Pro-Environmental Behavior

To build a sustainable society, the provision of information is very important. This study examines the different methods by which providing a narrative and logical information on climate change affects pro-environmental behavior. Narrative information is defined as expressions describing the process of someone experiencing an event, and logical information refers to straightforward representations composed of only central facts. According to the dual-process theory, these two formats of information seem to be processed in different ways: the former is processed automatically and intuitively, and the latter is processed deliberatively and logically. This study aims to reveal the potential of narrative information to encourage behavioral intentions and policy acceptance in energy and environmental fields. In an experiment conducted via the internet, participants either read the narrative or logical information on climate change and completed the questionnaires before and after reading. The results indicate that narrative evokes stronger emotions, such as anxiety and fear, and leads to higher behavioral intentions and policy acceptance of climate change than logical information. They further infer that this tendency is more pronounced when the participants tend to be absorbed into narratives or have little interest in climate change. Our results suggest that the narrative approach can be effective for providing information on energy and environmental issues

Socio-psychological impacts of the introduction of energy technologies: Change in environmental behavior of households with photovoltaic systems

After installing a photovoltaic (PV) system in a house or a school, it is said that people seem to increase behavior that shows concern for the environment such as saving electricity. Do characteristics of PV systems have any influence on the change in people's behavior? This study attempts to discover why people's behavior toward energy and the environment change after installing a PV system. Based on questionnaire surveys, this paper describes the results of statistical analysis concerning the changes in households that installed PV systems. The results show that in households where the family members are highly aware of their PV systems they tend to increase environmental behavior after installing the PV system. It is also found that an increase in communication about environmental behavior in a family tends to go hand-in-hand with the increase in environmental behavior. The findings suggest that the installation of residential PV systems affect people's concern and norms related to energy and the environment, and consequently influences people's behavior.Energy conservation Pro-environmental behavior Social capital Solar photovoltaic power generation Technology assessment