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Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
1
A Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes: Contrast and Assimilation Effects
in Dualistic Optimal-Use and Preservationist Attitudes
Read, S. P.1 and Innes, J. M.2
1Research School of Management, Australian National University
2Australian College of Applied Psychology
This research was conducted at Murdoch University, Perth, Australia.
Address Correspondence to: Dr J. Michael InnesShari Read, School of PsychologyResearch
School of Management, Australian College of Applied PsychologyNational University, Level
5, 11 York Street, Sydney, NSWCanberra, ACT 02000, Australia.
E-mail: [email protected]@anu.edu.au Formatted: Default Paragraph Font,Font: (Default) Arial
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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Abstract
This study explored the structure of environmental attitudes. Specifically, we examined
the extent to which the content of attitudinal structures might vary according to the context in
which it is accessed. Using the method of word association, the research addressed the
question of whether a highly accessible attitude can spread to influence the content of related
attitudes. Two scales, which measure different aspects of attitudes toward the environment,
were used to prime respondents to the attitudinal constructs of either optimal environmental
management or ecological preservation. Respondents were then asked to free associate to the
stimulus concepts of ‘economic development’ and ‘environmental preservation’. Findings
support the hypothesis that there are two distinct attitudinal structures related to the
environment, one related to optimal use of the environment and the other focused on
ecological preservation. Further, findings suggest that attitude priming affects core
associations to a stimulus concept, while context effects, such as the order in which stimuli
are presented, are influential over peripheral associations. Specifically in relation to
environmental cognition, in order to enable ‘green’ behavior, ecological, rather than socio-
politically oriented environmental attitude structures need to be made salient. Implications for
social marketing and enhancing support for public policy are discussed.
Keywords: attitude structure, ecological, environmental, priming, word association,
environmental cognition.
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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A Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
Climate change scientists from all fields of science, from all parts of the world, have
reached near-unanimous agreement, that the mean global temperature has increased
significantly from pre-industrial-age levels and that human activities are the primary cause
(Ding, Maibrach, Zhao, Roser-Renouf and Leiserowitz, 2011). However, despite scientific
consensus, the general public in most developed countries appears to remain unconvinced
that government policy and changes to everyday behaviours are urgently required to address
issues of climate change adaptation (Leviston, Price, Malkin and McCrea, 2014). In broad
terms, people in Westernized nations are willing to acknowledge that the natural environment
is a valuable resource that warrants human protection, however, scientists, public policy
makers, environmental activist groups and even green marketing have largely failed in their
attempts to motivate the masses to engage in the widespread social change that is required to
effectively address climate change (Ding et al., 2011; Phipps et al., 2013; Lewandowsky,
Gignac and Vaughn, 2012).
Consumption and consumerism are a large part of post-industrial everyday life in
developed countries. Research on ‘green consumerism’ and environmentally sustainable
behavior collectively provide support for two contradictory positions. On the one hand,
consumer research shows that people are willing to purchase ‘environmentally-friendly’
goods and services, while on the other hand, there is evidence showing that patterns of
adoption behavior are unpredictable (Ramirez, 2013). Despite widespread pro-environmental
attitudes, consumers frequently purchase the non-green alternative (Olson, 2013). Similarly,
consumers develop personal norms based on their beliefs about who is responsible for a given
outcome of environmentally significant behaviours and are thus shown to be contradictory in
what they say, compared to what they ultimately choose to do in a given context (Stern,
2000). One such context, which has been shown to influence environmental behaviours,
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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including support for climate change policies, is the socio-political context (Ding et al, 2011;
McCright, Dunlap and Xiao, 2013). While seemingly in opposition, both left and right are
embedded in an ideology of ‘consumerism’ and development. Both focus on economic
growth, but differ in the method of distribution. Attitudes toward the environment can be
integrated into capitalist systems through environmental accounting procedures, or into
socialist reform by focusing on equality and rights. Similarly, distinguishing left and right in
terms of conservatism and liberalism, the environment is still conceptualized in terms of a
resource to be utilized to maintain status quo or pursue a greater common welfare.
Environmentalism and attitudes toward the natural environment, in this view, when used to
consider matters of environmental management, continue to be influenced by traditional
aspects of socio-political beliefs of right and left politics. On the other hand, preservationist
ideals, attitudes regarding the balance of nature and its ecological systems (referred to here on
as ‘ecologism’), may be structurally separate to environmentalism (Dobson, 1995). That is, it
is hypothesized that ecologism will not be associated with the traditional ideologies in the
same way as environmentalism. Dunlap and Van Liere (1978) used the term New
Environmental Paradigm (NEP), as opposed to the Dominant Social Paradigm (DSP), to
distinguish these orientations towards the management of the environment and developed the
widely used NEP scale to measure attitudes and beliefs about the environment and its
management (Dunlap, 2008).
This paper aims to provide support for the distinction between these two types of
environmental concern and, in addition, suggest that people are dualistic in their personal
ideologies, holding elements of both systems of environmental cognition simultaneously.
Rather than people being pro- or anti-environmental. With this research, we aim to provide
support for the hypothesis that different types of concern for the natural environment exist as
an intra-personal distinction rather than as a inter-individual dissimilarity (Milbrath, 1986).
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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We suggest that environmentalism and ecologism may be independent alternatives within a
broader structure of environmental cognition rather than opposing worldviews. But while
environmentalism may be related to other socio-economic belief systems, it is hypothesized
that ecologism is not related in the same manner and may be less influential when the dual
attitude structures are primed as it has, for most people with Westernized cognitive processes,
fewer associative links within the attitudinal network.
A number of studies have examined the relationship between the DSP and
environmental attitudes and willingness to change behaviours, finding that there is a negative
relationship between the factors and further, that adherence to the DSP serves to dampen the
positive effect between environmental attitudes and willingness to change (Kilbourne and
Carlson, 2008). Kilbourne, Beckmann & Thelen (2002) have suggested that the DSP, rather
than the NEP, continues to play the greater role in guiding actions towards the environment,
as exemplified in opinion polling in several countries showing the waning support for
advocates of global warming and the ongoing support for the “climate skeptics” (e.g.
Leviston et al., 2014). Kilbourne et al. (2002) further demonstrated that as one's belief in the
DSP increases, their expressed concern for the environment decreases and, from the other
perspective, that as concern for the environment increases, their perception of necessary
changes and willingness to change to achieve environmental balance will also increase.
However, we know from findings of research examining consumer behaviour and policy
support, that the relationship between political ideology, environmental attitudes and
behaviours isn’t that direct. Henry and Dietz (2012) suggest that environmental cognition be
understood in terms of a two-dimensional space whereby individuals may be placed on a
continuum of engagement with the natural environment on one dimension and involvement in
environmental policy and ‘sub-policy’ (or policy-related) activities on the other dimension.
However, in order to fully understand fully the nature of environmental cognition, we need to
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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understand the attitudes and beliefs that underlie an individual’s level of engagement with the
natural environmental or indeed, support for policy pertaining to the environment. From this
point, we might then be able to ascertain the extent to which particular attitudinal structures,
when salient, lead an individual to engagement or involvement and further, whether the
hypothesized association between socio-political beliefs and environmentalism enables or
blocks an individual’s ‘green’ behaviour.
The present study was designed to explore the individual structure of attitudes held by
a person and to demonstrate the co-existence of different forms of environmental cognition. It
uses a methodology based upon the analysis of associations between words (Innes, 1972),
and explores the degree to which the beliefs a person holds are representative of the
associations between concepts in language. The study presented here tested whether the
cognitive context created by priming respondents to ecological/preservationist or to
environmental/optimal-use concepts, could influence access of the internal structure of each
of the attitudes. Therefore, based on the hypothesis that ecological attitudes form a separate,
and relatively independent, structure from environmental attitudes, we expected that priming
would result in qualitative differences in association outputs.
The method assesses whether the content of associations to two environmentally
relevant concepts can be differentially influenced. Consider the two concepts environmental
protection and economic development. These concepts each have a different meaning to
optimal environment users, for example corporate managers and economists, compared to
those with a more ecological orientation such as wildlife conservation officers or marine
biologists. Based on historic and contemporary evidence, optimal users perceive
environmental protection as a product of industrial society; while businesses should do all
they can to protect the natural environmental, they are free to continue to use renewable and
non-renewable resources ‘thoughtfully’. On the other hand ecologists perceive the natural
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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world to be intrinsically valuable and seek to protect the environment as an activity far
removed from the activities of business and industry. Environmental protection is thus seen
as being about conservation, in a form that respects nature, and doesn’t base its worth on
economic potential.
The concept of economic development also has different meanings to each of the two
groups. To optimal-use believers, economic development is about using the natural
environment and its resources to improve the well-being and lifestyle opportunities of
humans in a manner that is mindful of the delicacy of the natural environment, and is a
necessary and positive part of human society. However, ecologists do not perceive economic
development as a substantive component of society and argue that it is, in fact, the cause of
many environmental problems such as the depletion of resources or the pollution of rivers
and other waterways. This research is designed to demonstrate that these distinctions,
typically made between groups, might also be influential within the environmental cognition
of the individual.
Based on findings from previous research (Hodgkinson & Innes, 2001; 2000;
Kemmellmeier et al., 2002; Lundmark, 2007), it is hypothesized that respondents who are
primed to attitudes pertaining to environmentalism/optimal-use will, as a result of the extent
to which environmental attitudes are embedded in the higher order structure of socio-political
attitudes, through a spreading activation effect, produce associations that are related to
concepts such as government processes and unemployment.
On the other hand, priming an ecological belief system will produce negatively toned
associations, such as “waste”, “mining” and “nuclear”, in relation to economic development,
but will result in more ecological or ‘green’ associations such as “animal habitat” and “forest
protection” for associations to environmental protection. However, it is anticipated that there
will be overlap between associative outputs of the dual structures of environmental cognition.
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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That is, we anticipate a degree of congruency between the structures and use a method of
analysis to enable a quantitative estimate of the degree of overlap.
Method
Two attitude scales were employed as priming tools to increase the accessibility of the
associated attitude structures. The New Environmental Paradigm (NEP) was used to prime
participants to ecological attitudes. The NEP was developed by Dunlap and Van Liere (1978)
to measure attitudes that endorse ecological principles and has been found by other
researchers to have internal consistency, to be unidimensional and to have appropriate levels
of predictive, content and construct validity, (e.g. Noe & Snow, 1990 and later in a review by
Hawcrift and Milfont, 2010). The measure used to prime participants to
environmental/optimal use attitudes was the Environmental Attitudes Scale (EAS), developed
by Forgas and Jolliffe (1994) and was chosen as it includes items that relate to optimal use as
well as it being socially and culturally relevant to the intended participants in the study. This
scale also has appropriate levels of internal consistency and content and construct validity.
Participants
One hundred students from a Western Australian university took part in this study. The
sample ranged in age from 17 to 55 with an average age of 24.8 years (standard deviation =
10.8 years). The sample was 91% female which reflects the fact that students were recruited
from nursing, education and psychology to make up a convenience sample. The participants
were randomly assigned to one of the four experimental conditions, resulting in 25
participants in each group.
Measures & Procedure
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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The study used a pen and paper questionnaire for each of the two parts of the study. Four
separate questionnaires each represented one of the four experimental conditions. Two of the
questionnaires presented the New Environmental Paradigm scale (NEP) (Dunlap & Van
Liere, 1978), while the remaining two included the Environmental Attitude Scale (EAS)
(Forgas & Jolliffe, 1994).
Following the attitude measure, each of the questionnaires presented the two
concepts, environmental protection (P) and economic development (D), to elicit word
associations differentially reflecting the environmentalist or ecologist attitude structures.
The concepts of environmental protection and economic development were counterbalanced
within both the NEP primed group and the EAS primed group, forming four experimental
conditions (NEP P/D; NEP D/P; EAS P/D; EAS D/P).
Respondents were given a maximum of 15 minutes to complete the attitude measure
and the association task and were asked to attempt to write down seven (7) associations for
each stimulus concept. Space was provided for additional thoughts if participants associated
more than seven constructs with the stimuli. The time limit was enforced to encourage initial
associations rather than considered responses.
Results
Plural and singular versions of the same association were combined, for example
‘forests’ and ‘forest’. Similarly, for associations where the meaning was consistent, they were
recorded under the same heading. For example ‘bus’, ‘buses’ and ‘public transport’ were
each recorded under the heading of transport.
Fuzzy Set Analysis
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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To explore the extent to which each word belongs to the ‘core set’ of associations for
each of the stimuli, fuzzy set theory was employed. If the primes (NEP & EAS) do influence
the content of associations, then the structure of those associations should differ between the
conditions. To measure these differences accurately, a method of determining whether an
association actually ‘belongs' with the ‘set’ created within a condition was needed. Fuzzy set
theory offers this possibility and provides a method to determine the extent to which an
association belongs to the core set of associations (Smithson, 1987).
To illustrate how Fuzzy Subset Theory applies to the word associations in this study, let:
- subset = condition [NEP (P/D) or NEP (D/P) or EAS (P/D) or EAS (D/P)];
- value (x) = the frequency with which a particular association appeared within a given
condition;
- min (x) = the minimum number of mentions required for an association to acquire a
degree of membership to the set of associations for that condition (associations having a
degree of membership to the set represent the ‘peripheral’ associations for that condition);
and
- max (x) = the number of associations required for an association to gain full membership
of the set of associations for that condition (associations gaining full membership
represent the ‘core’ associations for that condition).
Weighting of Frequencies
As well as the frequency with which an association appears within a condition, it is
important to take account of the order in which an association is produced. Associations that
are produced first by a relatively large number of respondents are arguably more strongly
related to the stimulus than, for example, the seventh association produced by only one
respondent (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993). In order for this effect to be reflected by the fuzzy set
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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analysis it was necessary to weight the associations according to the order in which they are
produced by each individual. For the fuzzy set analysis of the data collected in this
experiment, the first four associations from each respondent for environmental protection and
economic development separately, were assigned a weighting of 2 points. The final three
associations produced by a respondent for each stimulus were given 1 point.
Fuzzy Subsets for environmental protection and economic development
The fuzzy analysis of the data for this study was based on the rule that to belong to the
fuzzy set of associations about each of the stimuli, environmental protection or economic
development, the minimum value to obtain a degree of membership would be 5 and the
maximum value (representing complete membership) would be 15.
degree of membership (x) = {0, if fq(x) < 5,
[fq(x) – 5]/10, if 5< = fq(x) < = 15,
1, if fq(x) > 15}
Table 1 shows the degree of membership of the sets of associations belonging to each
condition for the stimulus environmental protection and Table 2 the comparable data for
responses to the stimulus economic development, with total number of associations in the
structures and the measures of association of membership. Tables 1 and 2 also show, in
italics, the associations (and the degree of membership) that appear exclusively in the set of
associations to stimuli in the particular condition. The unique associations reveal the specific
effects of the experimental manipulations on the structure of the associations.
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
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Table 1.
Degree of membership of the core set for environmental protection
Condition Index Condition Index Condition Index Condition Index
NEP(P/D) NEP(D/P) EAS(P/D) EAS(D/P)
forest >1 animals >1 animals >1 recycling >1
Greenpeace >1 Greenpeace >1 greenhouse >1 protection 0.8
recycling >1 forest 0.9 logging >1 pollution 0.7
animals 0.9 protection 0.8 pollution >1 nuclear 0.5
pollution 0.8 recycling 0.8 protection >1 cars 0.4
resources 0.8 endangered 0.6 recycling >1 Greenpeace 0.4
garbage 0.6 Greens 0.4 forest 0.4 plants 0.4
logging 0.6 nuclear 0.4 gases 0.4 balance 0.3
ozone layer 0.4 trees 0.4 cars 0.3 chemicals 0.3
alternatives 0.3 nature 0.3 extinction 0.3 greenhouse 0.2
extinction 0.3 ozone layer 0.3 future 0.3 logging 0.2
Note. Bold indicates core associations with membership indices >1.0.
Italics indicate core associations that are unique to that experimental condition.
greenhouse 0.3 destruction 0.2 Greens 0.3 transport 0.2
nuclear 0.3 future 0.2 ozone layer 0.3 rainforest 0.2
caring 0.1 rainforest 0.2 resources 0.2 water 0.2
plants 0.1 human
domination
0.1 water 0.2 animals 0.1
logging 0.1 chemicals 0.1 protest 0.1
survival 0.1 nuclear 0.1 resources 0.1
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
14
Table 2. Degree of membership of the core set for economic development
Condition Index Condition Index Condition Index Condition Index
NEP(P/D) NEP(D/P) EAS(P/D) EAS(D/P)
industry >1 growth >1 employment >1 money 0.9
money 0.8 industry >1 money >1 employment 0.8
technology 0.8 money >1 building 0.7 industry 0.6
greed 0.5 business 0.3 pollution 0.4 cities 0.3
pollution 0.5 government 0.3 business 0.3 development 0.3
growth 0.4 technology 0.3 growth 0.2 technology 0.3
building 0.3 economy 0.2 interest 0.2 pollution 0.2
third world 0.3 employment 0.2 government 0.1 economy 0.1
change 0.2 expansion 0.2 tax 0.1 education 0.1
poverty 0.1 greed 0.2
building 0.1
environmental
compatibility
0.1
future 0.1
stock market 0.1
trade 0.1
Note. Bold indicates core associations with membership indices >1.0.
Italics indicate core associations that are unique to that experimental condition.
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
15
Effects of Primes on Core Associations
Examination of the total associations for those participants assigned to the NEP prime
and to the EAS prime showed no differences in the total number of associations in the
structures or in the number of associations having core membership. There were however,
more unique associations generated in the NEP prime groups. Examination of these tables
also shows little difference in the content of the associations summed across the two primes.
Effects of Stimulus Concepts on Core Associations
From a further comparison of the two tables, it can be seen first, that there were fewer
associations to economic development than to environmental protection that were measurable
as members of the set of responses to these stimuli. Second, there were proportionately fewer
associations that were core members of the set, with membership indices greater than unity,
in responses to economic development. Responses to the concept of environmental protection
showed that there were more associations with higher levels of membership indices.
Proportionately, there are more unique associations to economic development than
there are to environmental protection. The content of the associations also reflect the valence
of the stimulus concept; development elicits development thoughts, protection elicits thoughts
about recycling, nature and forests, at least with respect to the core, shared associations.
It is evident, however, that the attitude prime and/or the order of presentation of the
stimuli had differential effects on the attitude structures through increasing the accessibility
of specific types of associations. These unique associations are almost invariably weak
members of the set of associations, with membership indices of less than 0.3. Core
associations tend to be shared across stimulus conditions. The theme for each set of unique
and peripheral associations is different for each condition.
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
16
Contextual Effects
There is evidence of contextual effects upon the associative structures generated by of
the prime and the order of presentation of the stimulus concepts. Examination of the
associative structures for the NEP prime groups for the conditions where there was congruity
between the nature of the prime and the stimulus concept (NEP prime with environmental
protection) show slightly greater structural associations than in the incongruent conditions.
For the EAS prime condition there was an opposite effect; EAS/development condition (18
total associations as members) compared with the EAS/protection condition (34
associations). This latter difference holds also when the core associations are tallied.
The experimental group which stands out is the group which was primed with the
EAS scale and completed the word association tasks in the order of economic development
followed by environmental protection. This group produced fewer core associations than any
other group. Further, in response to economic development, after the identification of the
weak core members of the set, there was a rapid falling away in the magnitude of
membership index of all associations, indicating weak associative links to that stimulus. The
contextual effects are revealed most strongly in the content of the peripheral, non-shared
associations elicited.
Effects on Associative Content (peripheral and non-shared associations )
The unique set of associations found to be partial members of a specific condition set
reflect the combined effects of the attitudinal prime and the context created by the order of
presentation of the stimulus concepts.
For the NEP conditions, associations about environmental protection unique to the
condition when this concept is presented first (NEP (P/D)), include garbage, alternatives and
caring. After responding to the stimulus economic development first (NEP (D/P)), the
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
17
peripheral associations about environmental protection include the concepts of endangered,
trees, nature, destruction, human domination and survival. The peripheral association set for
the NEP (D/P) condition reveals an awareness of the consequences of human domination and
of the objects most affected by these consequences. The NEP (P/D) set, on the other hand,
reveals less ‘desperate’ associations. The associations caring and alternatives are more gentle
approaches to solving environmental problems. The peripheral associations for the NEP
(P/D) and the NEP (D/P) conditions are indicative of a contrast effect (Schwarz and Strack,
1991), whereby salient preservationist cognition activated by the NEP provides a context for
associations. Respondents in the NEP (D/P) condition considered the concept of
environmental protection in contrast to economic development after being primed by the
ecologically oriented NEP scale. A possible explanation of this finding is that the sequential
order of presentation of the stimuli increases affective response to the environmental stimuli,
an area for further research.
Similarly, the NEP (D/P) condition unique associations to economic development
included expansion, environmental compatibility, future, stockmarket and trade, while the
NEP (P/D) condition peripheral set included the concepts of third world, change and poverty.
Therefore, associating about economic development prior to encountering the stimulus
concept environmental protection, increases the accessibility of market-oriented associations
to economic development. However, in the context of previously thinking about
environmental protection, associations relating to social justice are more likely to be
accessed.
In the EAS prime conditions, peripheral associations to economic development
resulted in a set including interest and taxes, supporting the hypothesis that the EAS would
prime respondents to think about political processes. The unique peripheral associations
produced in the EAS (D/P) condition included, cities, development and education, arguably
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
18
more environmentally positive concepts than interest and taxes, evoking images of progress
and advancement of human endeavors.
Discussion
This study was designed to investigate the structure of environmental cognition
dependent on the context in which it is assessed. Respondents were asked to produce free
associations to the concepts of environmental protection and economic development. Word
associations to each of the two stimulus concepts were produced in one of two priming
conditions, the NEP, which primed participants to their ecological attitudes, or the EAS
designed to activate socio-politically oriented environmental attitudes. The stimuli were
counterbalanced to allow the measurement of context effects of thinking about one or the
other first. The semantic space for each of the four conditions was analyzed to find
substructures of words that remain stable within the two primes and to discover if there were
associations to each of the stimulus concepts that are stable across conditions. These stable
structures are taken to represent the ‘core set’ of associations which indicate the shared
understanding of environmental protection and economic development.
The differences between these peripheral sets of associations reflect the context effect
created by thinking about economic development prior to thinking about environmental
protection. These findings reflect a contrast effect as described by Schwarz and Strack
(1991). Strack, Schwarz and Gschneidinger (1985) found that highly accessible historic
information about a person’s own life influenced the judgment about current happiness and
well-being, if it pertained directly to the respondent’s present living conditions. On the other
hand, if the accessible information was not relevant to the individual’s current situation, it
served as a salient standard of comparison and resulted in a contrast effect. These findings
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
19
suggest that assimilation effects occur if the previously activated information is included in
the representation that respondents form of the target category that is to be evaluated. If the
activated information pertains to a different category, it is excluded from the representation of
the category. However, the accessible information may still bear on the dimension of
judgment and may serve as standards of comparison or as reference points for anchoring the
response scale. “Either of these processes, comparison or anchoring, may result in contrast
effects” (Schwarz & Strack, 1991, p.39).
In applying Schwarz and Strack’s findings to the present study, it would appear that
participants in the NEP (D/P) condition excluded the salient associations about economic
development when they encountered the stimulus concept environmental protection, resulting
in a comparison based contrast effect. The effect of the NEP prime is still evident in the core
associations. However, the dominant socio-political attitudes activated by the economic
development stimulus produce this, somewhat defensive, contrast effect within the peripheral
associations. Therefore, regardless of an individual’s alliance with the NEP, salient ecological
attitudes combined, in sequence with accessible cognition associated with concepts related to
economic development, appear to create a contextual environment that enables the types of
cognition congruent with engagement in ‘green’ behavior and support for environmental
policy. Further research is needed to determine the generalizability of this finding and its
applicability to social marketing.
Salient ecological attitudes produce a very ‘green’ cognitive state for the individual,
more so than salient environmental attitudes (NEP average scores are consistently stronger
than EAS average scores (Hodgkinson & Innes, 2001; 2000). Therefore, it was reasonable to
expect an assimilation effect when environmental protection is the first of the two concepts
encountered following the NEP prime (NEP (P/D); that is, people produce associations that
are, colloquially, as ‘green as they get’. On the other hand, the NEP (D/P) peripheral
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
20
associations reveal a strong contrast effect produced by the stimulus economic development.
First, the NEP prime serves to increase the accessibility of ecological attitudes, then the
economic development stimulus increases the salience of attitudes related to the DSP,
enhanced further by the effects of chronic accessibility. Next, when the environmental
protection stimulus is presented, with both sets of attitudes accessible, the dominant attitudes
are used to generate associations to the stimulus. However, when the dominant attitudes are
judged to be inapplicable to the stimulus, a contrast effect is produced and, assisted by the
salience of ecological attitudes, we find the strongly preservationist associations observed
(e.g. endangered, destruction, human domination). Further research examining this effect,
specifically in relation to support for climate change policy, could reveal a highly effectual
technique to be used in social marketing campaigns.
The effects of chronic accessibility (as described by Higgins & Brendl, 1995) are also
evident in the association sets produced in the EAS conditions, particularly for associations
about environmental protection. However, for both stimuli, the core association set of EAS
(D/P) is completely contained within the core set of EAS (P/D). A larger number of
associations about environmental protection are available to EAS respondents when it is not
considered within the context of economic development, suggesting that economic
development associations suppress the content of information associated with environmental
protection. This finding further supports the argument that, for most individuals, accessible
socio-political attitudes continue to be dominant, particularly over salient ecological attitudes.
This findings suggests that, in terms of application in a social marketing milieu, ‘green’
behaviours and decision-making, for many individuals, are likely to be blocked where social-
political attitudes are salient together with economic considerations.
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
21
Conclusions
The findings of this study suggest that attitude priming affects core associations to a
stimulus concept, while context effects, such as the order in which stimuli are presented, are
influential over peripheral associations. Specifically in relation to environmental cognition, in
order to enable ‘green’ behavior, ecological, rather than socio-politically oriented
environmental attitude structures need to be made salient. Further, findings suggest that
creating a contrast effect, within the context of salient ecological attitudes will enhance the
enabling effects of the salient attitudes.
In terms of the theoretical underpinnings of attitude structure, primes activate specific sets
of pre-existing attitudes, which have been developed through experience with the attitude
objects, and are able to produce consistent evaluations of that object and associated objects,
in this case, the natural environmental and related concepts. Context effects created by
temporary stimuli, increase the salience of more distant and peripheral parts of the activated
attitude network, altering the accessibility of available associations. If the accessible
associations are relevant to the stimuli being judged (e.g. the natural environment), then
subsequent evaluations will be assimilated. If however, the accessible information is judged
to be inappropriate for use in evaluating the stimulus, it will be used as a comparison tool,
which can result in a (sometimes desirable) contrast effect. In this way, examining the content
of ecological and environmental attitudes across individuals has resulted in evidence to
support the hypothesis that two separate sets of environmentally relevant attitudes exist. The
consistency found between the associations produced in the two NEP conditions and the two
EAS conditions is congruent with Kerlinger’s (1984) model of personal ideology. That is, the
core sets of associations (corresponding to Kerlinger’s critical referents) support the idea that
environmental attitudes are based on a separate set of referents than ecological attitudes.
While a degree of overlap was evident between the NEP and EAS conditions, the differences
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
22
in associations offer insight into the underlying foundations of each set of attitudes. These
foundations are thought to function as an ideology in that they provide consistency and
organisation for individual attitudes. The higher order structure provides the stable
framework required to support a set of core associations and the network that allows access to
other available associations through spreading activation.
The influence of contextual effects upon the associations that are elicited is not
merely a phenomenon which has interest only to those concerned with measurement and
matters of the structure of social attitudes and environmental cognition. There are
implications for the methodology of opinion surveys examining environmental attitudes and
marketing campaigns addressing consumer behavior and policy support. The ways in which
questions are worded in opinion surveys, and the order in which they are placed, have been
shown to have strong effects upon the opinions that are consequently stated by respondents
(Schwartz & Strack, 1991; Krosnick and Fabrigar, 2013) which can in turn has effects upon
the interpretation of the results by the pollsters and the government institutions which use the
results in decision making pertinent to environmental policy.
The accessibility of cognitive structures may also play a role in the degree to which
attitudes may be influenced through persuasion and education. Results from this study
demonstrate that priming of attitudes may produce one set of outcomes while the order of
presentation may have quite strong contrast effects upon the conscious and accessible
cognition of the individual, which in turn, has relevance to the ways in which campaigns may
be designed to produce practical outcomes of yielding or resistance to information about
climate change. These effects have been well exemplified by the work of McGuire (1999) on
the structure and function of thought systems and their role. However, while order and
presentation effects can be manipulated by the media and marketers, in real-world situations
attention must also be taken into account. More research is needed to understand the factors
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
23
and variance in attention to climate change and engagement in policy support as we can only
utilize the positive effects of attitude priming if the public is ‘attentive’ to the prime.
Running head: Structural Analysis of Environmental Attitudes
24
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