Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark?
Responding to serious environmental problems, requires urgent and fundamental shifts in our day-to-day lifestyles. This paper employs a qualitative, cross-cultural approach to explore people’s subjective self-reflections on their experiences of pro-environmental behavioral spillover in three countri...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2019-06-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Psychology |
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| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00788/full |
| _version_ | 1818847682348711936 |
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| author | Nick Nash Lorraine Whitmarsh Stuart Capstick John Thøgersen Valdiney Gouveia Rafaella de Carvalho Rodrigues Araújo Marie K. Harder Xiao Wang Yuebai Liu |
| author_facet | Nick Nash Lorraine Whitmarsh Stuart Capstick John Thøgersen Valdiney Gouveia Rafaella de Carvalho Rodrigues Araújo Marie K. Harder Xiao Wang Yuebai Liu |
| author_sort | Nick Nash |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Responding to serious environmental problems, requires urgent and fundamental shifts in our day-to-day lifestyles. This paper employs a qualitative, cross-cultural approach to explore people’s subjective self-reflections on their experiences of pro-environmental behavioral spillover in three countries; Brazil, China, and Denmark. Behavioral spillover is an appealing yet elusive phenomenon, but offers a potential way of encouraging wider, voluntary lifestyle shifts beyond the scope of single behavior change interventions. Behavioral spillover theory proposes that engaging in one pro-environmental action can catalyze the performance of others. To date, evidence for the phenomenon has been mixed, and the causal processes governing relationships between behaviors appear complex, inconsistent and only partly understood. This paper addresses a gap in the literature by investigating accounts of behavioral spillover in three diverse cultural settings using qualitative semi-structured interviews. The analysis shows that while around half of participants overall who were questioned recalled spillover effects, the other half had not consciously experienced spillover. There were few significant differences across cultures, though some forms of spillover effects were reported more in some cultures than others. More environmentally engaged participants across all three countries were significantly more likely to experience spillover than those who were less engaged. Accounts of within-domain spillovers were most commonly reported, mainly comprising waste, resource conservation and consumption-related actions. Accounts of between-domain spillover were very rare. Recollection of contextual and interpersonal spillover effects also emerged from the interviews. Our findings suggest that more conscious behavioral spillover pathways may be limited to those with pre-existing environmental values. Behavioral spillover may comprise multiple pathways incorporating conscious and unconscious processes. We conclude that targeting behavioral catalysts that generate more socially diffuse spillover effects could offer more potential than conventional spillover involving a single individual. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-19T06:05:20Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-a76c464bcc1d4a39ae1c15aae3b28033 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1664-1078 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-19T06:05:20Z |
| publishDate | 2019-06-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Psychology |
| spelling | doaj.art-a76c464bcc1d4a39ae1c15aae3b280332022-12-21T20:33:10ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Psychology1664-10782019-06-011010.3389/fpsyg.2019.00788423515Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark?Nick Nash0Lorraine Whitmarsh1Stuart Capstick2John Thøgersen3Valdiney Gouveia4Rafaella de Carvalho Rodrigues Araújo5Marie K. Harder6Xiao Wang7Yuebai Liu8Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, School of Psychology, Cardiff UniversityCardiff, United KingdomTyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, School of Psychology, Cardiff UniversityCardiff, United KingdomTyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, School of Psychology, Cardiff UniversityCardiff, United KingdomDepartment of Management, Aarhus UniversityAarhus, DenmarkDepartment of Psychology, Federal University of ParaíbaJoão Pessoa, BrazilSchool of English and Media Studies, Massey UniversityWellington, New ZealandFudan Tyndall Center, Department of Environmental Science and Engineering, Fudan UniversityShanghai, ChinaFudan Tyndall Center, Department of Environmental Science and Engineering, Fudan UniversityShanghai, ChinaIndependent Ethnographic ConsultantLondon, United KingdomResponding to serious environmental problems, requires urgent and fundamental shifts in our day-to-day lifestyles. This paper employs a qualitative, cross-cultural approach to explore people’s subjective self-reflections on their experiences of pro-environmental behavioral spillover in three countries; Brazil, China, and Denmark. Behavioral spillover is an appealing yet elusive phenomenon, but offers a potential way of encouraging wider, voluntary lifestyle shifts beyond the scope of single behavior change interventions. Behavioral spillover theory proposes that engaging in one pro-environmental action can catalyze the performance of others. To date, evidence for the phenomenon has been mixed, and the causal processes governing relationships between behaviors appear complex, inconsistent and only partly understood. This paper addresses a gap in the literature by investigating accounts of behavioral spillover in three diverse cultural settings using qualitative semi-structured interviews. The analysis shows that while around half of participants overall who were questioned recalled spillover effects, the other half had not consciously experienced spillover. There were few significant differences across cultures, though some forms of spillover effects were reported more in some cultures than others. More environmentally engaged participants across all three countries were significantly more likely to experience spillover than those who were less engaged. Accounts of within-domain spillovers were most commonly reported, mainly comprising waste, resource conservation and consumption-related actions. Accounts of between-domain spillover were very rare. Recollection of contextual and interpersonal spillover effects also emerged from the interviews. Our findings suggest that more conscious behavioral spillover pathways may be limited to those with pre-existing environmental values. Behavioral spillover may comprise multiple pathways incorporating conscious and unconscious processes. We conclude that targeting behavioral catalysts that generate more socially diffuse spillover effects could offer more potential than conventional spillover involving a single individual.https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00788/fullbehavioral spilloverpro-environmental behaviourcross-culturalBrazilChinaDenmark |
| spellingShingle | Nick Nash Lorraine Whitmarsh Stuart Capstick John Thøgersen Valdiney Gouveia Rafaella de Carvalho Rodrigues Araújo Marie K. Harder Xiao Wang Yuebai Liu Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark? Frontiers in Psychology behavioral spillover pro-environmental behaviour cross-cultural Brazil China Denmark |
| title | Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark? |
| title_full | Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark? |
| title_fullStr | Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark? |
| title_full_unstemmed | Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark? |
| title_short | Reflecting on Behavioral Spillover in Context: How Do Behavioral Motivations and Awareness Catalyze Other Environmentally Responsible Actions in Brazil, China, and Denmark? |
| title_sort | reflecting on behavioral spillover in context how do behavioral motivations and awareness catalyze other environmentally responsible actions in brazil china and denmark |
| topic | behavioral spillover pro-environmental behaviour cross-cultural Brazil China Denmark |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00788/full |
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