Chapter 3 - Environmental Attitudes, Appraisals, and Assessments

Question 1

What is the theory of planned behavior?

Answer 1

If a person is to act in an environmentally friendly manner, several factors must precede it. The person first must have had the intention to act in that way.

Question 2

What 3 conditions must precede the intention to act in an environmentally friendly manner?

Answer 2

1. Positive attitude toward the act
2. Belief that this is the normal or usual way to act
3. Belief that one has sufficient control over the situation to be able to engage in the pro-environmental action

Question 3

What is a descriptive norm?

Answer 3

What people think is the “usual thing to do”

Question 4

What is the values-belief norm (VBN) model?

Answer 4

The chain leading to pro-environmental behavior begins with a person’s values. The more biospheric, the more altruistic, and the less egoistic are one’s general values, the more the person will likely behave in an environmentally friendly manner

Question 5

What is the New Ecological Paradigm?

Answer 5

A world view that the planet is a delicate, threatened, and interconnected system. Certain acts harm the planet and have adverse consequences. People will not behave in an environmentally responsible way if they do not believe that doing so will have any impact

Question 6

What are the 4 kinds of actions a person can take with respect to their Values-Belief Model?

Answer 6

1. Environmental activism
2. Public non-activist behavior (writing letters, attending meetings)
3. Private behaviours (recycling, taking the bus)
4. Action within an organization (starting a recycling program at the office)

Question 7

What is a Generalized Environmental Ethic?

Answer 7

People who hold pro-environment attitudes in more than one domain

Question 8

Are people equally concerned with environmental issues over time?

Answer 8

If something goes wrong (oil spill), then concern for that particular issue increases but after time, interest sinks back to pre-disaster levels

Question 9

What elements determine who is going to be most interested in environmental issues?

Answer 9

1. Gender
2. Age and Childhood Experiences
3. Politics, Religion, and Social Class
4. Cultural and Ethnic Variations
5. Urban-Rural Differences
6. Values, Moral Development, Felt Responsibility, and Worldviews
7. Activities and Education
8. Proximity to, and Threat from, Problem Sites

Question 10

What contributes to age-related perceptions of the environment?

Answer 10

1. Age effect - as people get older, they care less
2. Cohort effect - events that have a greater effect on one set of people over another (those who went through the Great Depression)
3. Era effect - The times are changing, that the overall political-social climate is growing more conservative so that everyone is less concerned about the environment than they used to be

Question 11

What effect does gender have on one’s environmental concerns?

Answer 11

Women tend to express more concern than men, but appear to do less about it

Question 12

What effect does age and childhood experiences have on one’s environmental concerns?

Answer 12

Younger people are more concerned than older people

Question 13

What effect do politics, religion, and social class have on one’s environmental concerns?

Answer 13

• Less environmental concern has been expressed by those with conservative political views, and fundamental Christians.
• Richer countries are more environmentally conscious than poor countries.
• People in poor countries tend to be more concerned with local environmental issues (polluted wells) than they are concerned with global environmental issues

Question 14

What effect does cultural and ethnic variations have on environmental issues?

Answer 14

• Recent research indicates that black Americans are more concerned about the environment than Euro-Americans

Question 15

What effect does rural and urban differences have on one’s environmental concerns?

Answer 15

• Rural and urban dwellers regard the environment differently
• Rural dwellers want to protect the environment mainly so that it can fulfill human needs
• Urban dwellers may be more interested in putting nature’s interest ahead of humanity’s interest

Question 16

What effect do values, moral development, felt responsibility, and world views have on one’s environmental concerns?

Answer 16

• People with altruistic and biospheric values report being more environmentally concerned
• Committed environmentalists have more secular and post-materialist values

Question 17

What are post-materialist values?

Answer 17

Views generally held by more affluent citizens who no longer have to worry about the basic materials of life and can be concerned with “higher-level” goals and actions

Question 18

How is one’s view of the nature of nature related to environmental concerns?

Answer 18

We have 4 myths regarding the nature of nature. Nature can be:

1. Capricious - Capable of anything and unpredictable
2. Benign - Capable of adapting, nature can find its equilibrium, even when she is disturbed
3. Ephemeral - Delicate and fragile … even small changes can have drastic consequences
4. Tolerant/perverse - Able to absorb some disturbance, but beyond a certain point, will collapse

Question 19

Distinguish environmental concern from ecocentrism

Answer 19

Ecocentrism - the belief that nature deserve protection without regard for human costs and/or benefits

Question 20

What effect does activities and education have on one’s environmental concerns?

Answer 20

• People who participate in activities such as hiking and photography are more environmentally conscious than people who participate in activities such as ATV riding and hunting
• The more people are educated on environmental issues, the more concern they have regarding the environment

Question 21

What effect does proximity to, threat from, and problem sites have on one’s environmental concerns?

Answer 21

• The further people live away from a problem site, such as a landfill or waste disposal site, they less concerned they are
• Residents are in favour of reducing greenhouse gas emissions if they believe that this will not threaten their own jobs or freedoms

Question 22

What are ways in which we can increase environmental concern?

Answer 22

1. Environmental education
2. Simulations
3. Environmental stories
4. Powerful images
5. Organized public events
6. A person to champion the issue

Question 23

How does concern translate to action?

Answer 23

• Do people follow-up their attitudes with action?
• Some evidence says that the link between attitudes and action can be quite weak
• There is a problem in measuring the strength of someone’s attitudes and what they consider as their level of action

Question 24

What is a Low-Cost Hypothesis?

Answer 24

• However predictable individuals’ concern may be, that their level of concern is much more developed than their actual pro-environmental behavior
• Environmental attitudes predict whether people will engage in simpler, easier pro-environment actions (recycling at home) versus high-cost behaviours such as giving up their car to take public transit
• How do we justify the gap between what we say and what we do?

Question 25

What are key predictors of pro-environmental behavior?

Answer 25

1. Knowledge of environmental issues
2. Knowledge of action strategies
3. Internal locus of control
4. Verbal commitment
5. Environmental concern
6. A sense of personal responsibility

Question 26

What is a moderator?

Answer 26

A variable that represents a group or condition for which a relationship is stronger or weaker.

Question 27

What is a mediator?

Answer 27

A variable that, in a causal sequence, fits between the attitude and the behavior. The attitude changes a certain variable (the mediator), which in turn changes the actual behaviour

Question 28

What is the DO-RITE?

Answer 28

An acronym that outlines how to change environmental behavior. It stands for:

1. Define the target behaviour to be changed
2. Observe the target behaviour
3. Record the rate of occurrence of the behaviour
4. Intervene with a program that changes the consequences of engaging in that behaviour.
5. Test the impact of the program by comparing the frequency of the behaviour before and after the program
6. Evaluate the program. Was it cost-effective? Were the consequences appropriate and strong enough?

Question 29

What is an Environmental Appraisal?

Answer 29

• Refers to 6 kinds of personal impressions in addition to environmental concern:

1. Descriptions
2. Evaluations
3. Judgments of beauty
4. Emotional reactions
5. Meanings
6. Risk

Question 30

What is Kenneth Craik’s framework for understanding environmental appraisals and assessments?

Answer 30

Find a copy of the chart on page 76 and add it in here

Question 31

What qualities do we use to describe cities?

Answer 31

1. Economic potential
2. Diversity of land use
3. Historic significance
4. Fond memories
5. Appearance of the built environment
6. Natural features
7. Movement and location
8. Importance as an activity centre

Question 32

What are Berlyne’s Collative Properties?

Answer 32

• A set of abstract qualities based on physical features. They are:

1. Congruity -
2. Contrast -
3. Complexity - the number of details and design elements
4. Coherence - the degree to which a scene appears ordered or “hangs together”
5. Novelty - the unusualness of a place’s appearance

Question 33

What is Nasar’s approach to specifying abstract qualities?

Answer 33

There are 3 kinds of relevant qualities:

1. Formal qualities - includes the design’s complexity and order
2. Symbolic qualities - style … colonial or postmodern?
3. Schemas - the typicality of the design - usual or unusual?

Question 34

Define typicality

Answer 34

The typicality of a scene refers to the degree to which it resembles our mental image of a place like that

Question 35

What is Prospect-Refuge Theory?

Answer 35

• Another environment-based approach to scene preference
• People prefer environments at the edges between open areas (fields, savannah) and closed areas (forest, jungle)
• Open areas provide prospect, the opportunity to see game or danger at some distance
• Closed areas provide refuge and the opportunity to hide
• The most preferred scenes are when the viewer is close to clearly defined refuge, but has easy access to open, grassy meadow

Question 36

What is “consensus” with respect to environment preference?

Answer 36

Consensus is when virtually all observers agree on the value of a feature

Question 37

What is “contrast” with respect to environment preference?

Answer 37

When some kinds of observers prefer a feature, but others do not

Question 38

What is a fractal?

Answer 38

• Elements that, although not of perfect geometric form, are repeated in similar shapes but in different sizes in a scene.
• In the built and natural environment, elements that often have fractal characteristics include clouds, mountain ranges, and city skylines

Question 39

Explain the Kaplans’ cognitive affordances

Answer 39

• These are the functional qualities of environments that help us meet important goals
• Humans have a strong desire to make sense of the environment and to be involved with it
• The Kaplans believed that people prefer landscapes and interior settings that “offer promise of being involving and making sense”

Question 40

Explain the Kaplans’ Preference Framework

Answer 40

Take a picture of this and drop it in here … page 83

Question 41

With respect to the Kaplans’ preference framework, what is coherence?

Answer 41

Coherence refers to making sense immediately

Question 42

With respect to the Kaplans’ preference framework, what is complexity?

Answer 42

Complexity refers to being involved immediately

Question 43

With respect to the Kaplans’ preference framework, what is legibility?

Answer 43

Legibility refers to the promise of making sense in the future

Question 44

With respect to the Kaplans’ preference framework, what is mystery?

Answer 44

Mystery refers to the promise of future involvement

Question 45

What are the components of the Kaplans’ preference framework that aid in understanding an environment?

Answer 45

• Coherence and legibility
• Coherence increases preference by the way that elements hang together, resulting in better understanding of the immediate scene
• Legibility increases preference by the perceived potential for finding one’s way around the scene in a future timeframe

Question 46

A web article on the Kaplans’ work

Answer 46

http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-03072002-181243/unrestricted/07Chapter6DiscussionandImplication.pdf

Question 47

What role does emotion play in one’s reactions to an environment?

Answer 47

• Pleasantness is only one emotion we experience; other emotions may not neatly correspond to evaluation or beauty judgments
• Emotion - or the term many psychologists prefer (affect) is conceptually distinct from evaluation and beauty

Question 48

What is the model of emotional response to settings?

Answer 48

Two major dimensions of emotion and their hybrids form a circumplex, or circular ordering.
- Research identified 3 primary emotional responses:

1. Pleasure
2. Arousal
3. Dominance

Question 49

What is a circumplex?

Answer 49

• A circular pattern of emotions which forms an infinite number of combinations pleasure and arousal based on its 2 main dimension
• Any of these emotions may be elicited by a setting
• In this framework, both environmental variables (e.g. light, temperature, or the incoming speed of information)

Question 50

What is Mehrabian and Russell’s Pleasure-Arousal Hypotheses?

Answer 50

• Individuals will want to approach physical settings which are, apart from their other characteristics, moderately arousing and maximally pleasurable
• The maximum desire to approach it is predicted to occur at higher levels of arousal