Psychological factors to motivate sustainable behaviours

Journal: Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers- Urban

Design and Planning

Date: 22nd January 2014

Title: Psychological factors to motivate sustainable behaviours

Authors:

Dr. Joan Harvey (PhD, MPhil, BSc, AFBPsS, CPsychol); Senior

Lecturer, School of Psychology, Newcastle University. NE1 7RU, UK,

Tel 01912228829; [email protected]

Dr. Oliver Heidrich1 (PhD, MSc, MEng, Dipl.-Ing.); Senior Researcher,

School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Newcastle University,

NE1 7RU, UK, Tel 01912226563; [email protected]

Ms. Kate Cairns (DIC, MSc, BEng); Independent Sustainability

Advisor, Newton-by-the-Sea, Northumberland. NE66 3DY, UK

Number of words in main text: 5028

Number of tables: None

Number of figures: 2

1 Corresponding Author of 18

Abstract:To encourage sustainable planning processes and behaviours in the

engineering profession and the wider public there is an urgent need

for policy-makers, urban planners and engineers to consider

psychological factors. When urban plans, policies and projects

neglect public values and beliefs, projects may be less likely to

fulfil the intended aims. This paper investigates the role of

psychological factors of belief, risk perception, trust and attitude

in the adoption of urban plans and sustainability policies by

explaining why these result in inconsistencies in behaviour. We

provide examples from the literature and recent case studies to

support this and demonstrate how these factors explain the

reluctance of the public to engage in sustainable behaviours. We

provide recommendations for urban planners, central and local

government and engineers to achieve and maintain sustainable

behaviours by the public and professionals by considering

behavioural theories.

List of notations, defining all of the symbols used - Not

applicable

A list of three keywords (click one of the below): Urban Plans,

Sustainability, Public Policy, Reviews

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Keywords: Behaviour, attitudes, risk, trust, social factors

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1. IntroductionThe aim of this paper is to investigate the role of psychological factors of risk perception, motivation, trust and attitude in the planning and adoption of sustainability policies. We explain why urban plans for infrastructure provisions can result in inconsistencies in behaviour, and identify barriers to changing behaviours. Based on this we make recommendations for action to government, engineers and planners such that if these are adopted, resulting behaviours may be more sustainable than before.

Both lay people and experts use many terms interchangeably with sustainability, including: climate change, carbon neutral, zero-carbon, eco-efficiency, energy efficiency, energy saving, and recycling . This paper is based on the premise that sustainability, behaviour and attitudes such as trust, knowledge, perceptions of risk even though linked to each other are not consistently understood by the public, engineers, planners or policy makers.

Designers and engineering companies may follow the sustainable development principle which was defined as “a global process of change” (World Commission on the Environment and Development (1987) .Sustainable development aims to: “…meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirown needs” (p.54). This concept revolutionises the thinking of government, businesses and specifically the construction industry . The Institution of Civil Engineers (2012) is embracing the concept of sustainability with its vision of “Civil Engineers at the heart of society, delivering sustainable development through knowledge, skills and professional expertise”. Recently HRH the Prince of Walesremarked at an ICE Lecture on Sustainability : “If there is one profession that has awoken to the need for sustainable development, it is civil engineering.” Sustainability in civil engineering clearly includes complex, fragmented and diverse aspects and engineers and planners can influence decision makers and communitiesin achieving sustainable behaviour .

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All of the above is encouraging, but to achieve sustainability, there is an urgent need for the public to be engaged by policy-makers, planners and engineers. The President of the Chartered Institute of Building Surveying Engineers (CIBSE), David Fisk, stated that a particular issue has been making sense of manmade climate change with respect to the “particularly British eccentricity of making it all so complicated, when the normal position might have simply been - save energy and save the planet” .These complexities compound the difficulties in creating strategies and delivering projects that will encourage responsibility and motivate sustainable behaviours.

For example there is ample evidence that people continue to waste energy despite agreeing that it is important to save it . The knowledge base relating to energy saving has been available for manyyears, periodically receiving media attention when issues such as increased carbon dioxide and global warming are debated ; further, climate change and its threats appear to be moderately well understood by the British public, albeit decreasing latterly . It has also been shown that sustainability policies, plans and projectsthat neglect values and beliefs of the public will not work . Clearly there are inconsistencies between the knowledge base, beliefsystems, attitudes and behaviour that must be understood and incorporated in urban design if we are to persuade people to change their behaviours.

2. Attitudes, motivation and behaviour

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Research into attitudes, perceptions and behaviour in terms of sustainability in engineering is limited but there is more evidence that behaviour is predicated on attitudes when addressing pro-environmental behaviour, climate change, carbon and waste management, recycling and energy efficiency . From the psychological perspective, the theory of planned behaviour [TPB] offers perhaps the best explanation of how attitudes influence behaviour through intention, how easy or difficult we perceive an act to be (perceivedbehavioural control), and how we think other people expect us to behave (subjective norms), especially when the attitudes relate specifically to the behaviour itself rather than more generally (Ajzen, 1991). A version of the TPB adapted from Ajzen (2013) is shown in figure 1, where it can be noted that trust, perceived risk and motivation are added and that some factors influence the link between intention and behaviour since one does not always follow theother. However, the umbrella term ‘sustainability’ may evoke different conceptualisations, attitudes and indeed loci of responsibility . Attitudes and behaviours may also be influenced by demographics; for example women hold more ethical and positive health related attitudes than do men . In the case of attitudes towards energy sources, energy saving, energy efficiency and sustainability, it is very likely that cognition and affect will be in conflict in determining behaviour especially when mixed messages are received .

Figure 1: Adaptation of the theory of planned behaviour

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Samuelson and Biek (1991) proposed four dimensions underlying energyuse attitudes and beliefs: comfort and health, high effort-low payoff, role of individual consumer, and the legitimacy of the energy problem and they suggest that energy conservation campaigns should be sensitive to consumers' concerns about comfort and health.However, payoff in the context of sustainability and climate change is in the future affecting one's descendants and thus comfort and health would also be deferred into the future. Research suggests that deferred rewards appear to have little motivational value and that attitudes are relatively stable, although there is evidence that large-scale publicity and information followed by legislation may change behaviour and attitudes directly, albeit slowly .

Joy ce et a l. (2004) suggest that sustainable behaviour may follow a normal curve approximating to three motivational groups: 20% are proactive and behaviour is self-initiated; 60% are complacent, responding only to government or motivational initiatives, and 20% are negative; this is illustrated in figure 2. Thus up to 80% are relatively unmotivated, difficult to engage and may require legislation to adopt sustainable behaviours. An additional incentiveis personal convenience, which has been shown to be a stronger influence on positive environmental behaviour than external motivation . Therefore appeals to altruism and responsible citizenship are likely to be effective in perhaps only 20% of any population or industry and wider appeals to the complacent or negative will need to include more compelling drivers such as convenience, as well as legislation (Lorenzoni et al., 2007). This canalso be applied to the application of sustainable engineering practices: early adopters who are proactive and enlightened; the majority keeping abreast of legislation but little more; and then those who may not even comply with legislation. For engineering businesses, there are additional motivations such as stakeholder pressures, reputation issues, convenience and legislation .

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Figure 2: Three motivational groups of sustainable behaviours

If Government wishes to motivate people to change then it also needsto consider other important psychological variables such as increased convenience, self-determination, self-identity, goal-setting and equity, many of which relate to group identity in terms of social comparison at a local level . Perhaps at the centre of these motivational theories is the fact that goals must be both desired and achievable, neither of which may have been apparent to the public. Further, whilst perceived equity is motivating, inequityis demotivating so if people feel that they are bearing the brunt ofthe inconvenience to benefit the energy needs of others, they may beless committed to sustainability; in that sense, perceived inequity may mean a lack of altruism. The trans-theoretical model of change ,whilst being inappropriate for the 20% who are highly motivated as the need to change is recognised and acted upon, it will probably beineffective with the lowest 20% who will not engage with sustainability at all; however it may have some relevance to the middle complacent 60% if convenience, comfort and cost-saving needs form the motivational core to enable the starting of the process of attitude and behaviour change in individuals. Many of these motivational elements may be difficult to introduce, but success maybe more forthcoming by combining attempts to motivate and to mandatesustainable behaviours.

3. Sustainability and the perception of risk

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People justify themselves as exempt from sustainable actions for various reasons: lack of control over the situation; uncertainty of,and no perceived link to, the consequences; remoteness from the effects of non-sustainability and natural phenomena such as global warming ). If risk is defined as the prospect of loss, there is probably little risk perception for the majority relating to non-sustainability, since it has a large unknown element (unobserved hazards, no obvious effects) and the 'dread' component (catastrophicpotential, distribution of fatal consequences) is unapparent . Thus if people cannot conceptualise or quantify risk or its consequences then they are likely to dismiss it. However, if perceived risk is amplified by natural events or media coverage, as has recently been the case in the UK with the extreme floods, then the one part of risk that could become potentially influential would be perceived lack of personal control . Personal control may be at the heart of the inconsistency between beliefs, attitudes and behaviour: evidencefrom attribution theory suggests that people are aware of their own personal control to act but believe that exerting it would make no difference because they do not think problems which are universal inorigin are actually caused by them . The locus of control is insteadoften seen to be with the Government and its agencies .

Discussions on the adoption of energy efficiency techniques and renewable energy technologies such as wind farms, photovoltaic, wavepower, nuclear power stations or new geo-engineering technologies such as fracking can decrease the perceived legitimacy of the energyproblem . Indeed, the necessity to limit energy use may be thrown into doubt if it can be produced in a relatively sustainable way. Itis known that lay people and experts perceive risk differently (e.g.Slovic et al. 2004), so perceptions of potential solutions will surely also vary and thus may become problematic in terms of the acceptability of projects. This is compounded by the fact that sustainability carries an affective component as well as a cognitiveone and their use of the affect heuristic to enable complex issues to be simplified inform public evaluations of projects . Affect registers first, before cognition, when people are making judgementsfor example the dread response by many of the public to 'fracking' or ‘pesticide’ use.

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Sustainability may be seen as manageable but not at the individual level and there can be an inherent dissonance for individuals and the easiest way to resolve this is to diminish its importance. Most people can articulate a range of potential effects of non-sustainable behaviours , but many perceive these in a fatalistic way, as predicted by social construction of risk theory and the lack of personal control of risk that has been heightened by such 'acts of God' as tsunami, earthquake or flooding . It can be said that perceived lack of personal control coupled with a high level ofperceived risk, generating dissonance, may be at the root of lack ofsustainable behaviours (Cooke and Fielding, 2010).

4. Trust in Government and policy makersPublic trust in agencies such as Government seems low but higher forexperts/scientists (Pidgeon and Fischoff, 2011; Smith and Stern , 2011); there is evidence of strong components of both scepticism andgeneral trust, which may also explain the negative attitudes of the lowest 20% of the population previously mentioned . The media and governmental agencies raise warnings of risky issues and matters of potential damage to the environment by unsustainable behaviours on an almost daily basis . The public may be overloaded with prospective actions, some of which are negated by subsequent messages on which even scientists cannot agree . Climate change has uncertainty in its modelling which encourages strong scepticism andother energy related fears may be amplified by the media expressing risks in emerging technologies such as fracking to source gas or ‘hot rocks’ to source thermal energy . Dissonance theory would predict that, in the circumstances of mixed messages and uncertainty, beliefs about these issues become relegated to a lower priority than the message senders would like, particularly since negative events have a disproportionate effect on self-reported trust and that risk management has become increasingly politicised .In addition, the amount of media coverage is likely to desensitise and even create psychophysical numbing .

These circumstances, and the accumulated effect on public response to Government, means that trust is perhaps the most important issue to address for progress in fostering public acknowledgement of the need to integrate sustainability into urban planning and civil engineering . However, it is likely instead that increased efficiency, comfort, reputation, and cost savings have the most influence on the behaviour of engineers in applying sustainability in design and build .

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5. Discussing the role of urban planners and engineersSince Thomas Telford and his bridges, Bazelgette and his sewerage system, and Brunel and his railways, civil engineers have brought technical solutions to solve the problems of society and enrich the lives of citizens .

There is increasing public awareness in the challenge for governmentand its agencies to provide acceptable solutions to problems to society. The public has prevented and/or postponed infrastructure projects, from Swampy and the Newbury Bypass which ultimately influenced the national road building strategy, to the resistance toHigh Speed 2 where campaign groups challenged the project through judicial review. There are conflicting attitudes to wind-farms, nuclear power stations and other renewable energy projects despite the widespread understanding of climate change and the need to drastically slow anthropogenic greenhouse gas emission . Local communities commonly show reluctance to bear the adverse impacts of such projects when there is no perceived local benefit . A recent response to this has been the offer of compensation from energy companies to affected rural communities but such measures have been branded ‘bribes for blight’ by critics and potential recipients alike .

There is thus an increasing necessity for engineers and urban planners to work with the public and communities towards sustainability; firstly to ensure that a development is sustainable through policies, designs and construction methodologies and secondly to ensure a positive public response .

An essential issue to consider is how far the role of the engineer can be differentiated from that of Government, in the eyes of the public. Given the increasing mistrust of the public in Government but the retention of a higher level of trust in 'science’ it is proposed that this differentiation be made completely clear in any consultation .

5.1 Urban design, policies and methodologies to achieve sustainability

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We argue that the three clusters of positive, complacent and negative attitudes (Joyce et al., 2004) may be applied in the adoption of sustainable construction working practices. Firstly, theearly adopters, innovators, or ‘enlightened’ clients, designers and contractors who implement sustainability either for altruistic purposes or for benefits such as cost and material savings, legal compliance, improved reputation, staff well-being or loyalty ; secondly, the majority of the industry who simply respond to legislation and guidance, and finally the negative, those entrenchedin traditional thinking and familiar methods and who change only when forced to do so.

Sustainability is not achieved by simply reducing environmental impact of infrastructure, which in the UK is legislated for in the statutory requirement to undertake an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) which must be robust and well documented; it also requires the maintenance of social well-being and equality within and between generations . For many projects a socioeconomic assessment sits alongside the EIA covering issues such as job creation, security, contribution to sense of place and community butit is rarely subject to the same degree of scrutiny and has no method of measurement defined in regulations . Crucially, it fails to address attitudes, motives and perceptions of the public both locally and nationally. Such assessments should be obligated to address much more fundamentally, and respond to, the issue of publicattitudes to sustainability and trust and risk perception in order to show how the project makes a contribution to social well-being and equality and how it allays fears. This requires a much better understanding of how to communicate with the public than hitherto since past communication failures have had deleterious effects (e.g.Pidgeon and Fischoff, 2011).

5.2 Positive public response and use through participation

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Engineers and planners play a role in translating government policy through the implementation of tangible infrastructure and if civil engineers are to be “at the heart of society” it is vital that society can influence and partake in the provision of infrastructures . The government’s flagship planning policy reform, the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) came into force in March 2012 and was designed to simplify the planning system; it reduced over 1000 pages of planning policy to 50 and introduced a “presumption in favour of sustainable development” . However, criticism has been widespread as “there is insufficient conformity throughout the document as to what sustainable development means. Throughout the document the language of sustainable development morphs into references to the importance of ‘sustainable economic growth’” . This echoes the problems described earlier concerning thedifferent terminologies and definitions and compounds the lack of trust, where it is already low, in government and its policies .

The low trust in Government may extend to engineers and planners if when implementing and prioritising solutions they fail to take into account factors that are important to local people. There has been much public scepticism for example in wind-farm projects because of the aforementioned doubt in the legitimacy of the energy problem, the lack of trust in their effectiveness, and the resistance to the perceived negative local environmental impacts such as noise nuisance and visual amenity . If there is trust people may agree that local negative impacts be suffered in order to solve national or global problems despite the inherent inequity in this. It followsthat acceptance of wind-farms may be more prevalent once extreme flooding is linked clearly to climate change, in turn related to energy consumption and the burning of fossil fuels but only if wind farms are perceived as the only viable alternative. There is also the motivational possibility of giving related reduced-price energy to those affected locally in order that they might share in any apparent success and it might mitigate the perceived negative effects. The consequence of not addressing local attitudes and perceptions is that mistrust will prevail and the public will perceive many projects as political risk management. Trust once lost(as it has been in Government) is difficult to re-establish. It is proposed here that engineering solutions, to appear credible and trustworthy, should be presented to the public as completely separate entities to political preferences .

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Thus engineers and planners need to reach out from what might be their comfort zone and attempt to fulfil the ICE vision of being at the heart of society by embracing public participation in projects and appreciating that local information is vital for solutions to befit for purpose. They can have an essential role in linking attitudes such as trust and risk perceptions to behaviour and in demonstrating how local actions can not only reduce local and globaladverse impacts but also help provide solutions to problems such as energy, climate change, drought, disease or crop failures. However, it is not simply a case of adopting into projects piecemeal practiceor just the language of participation. A clear working model is needed to incorporate participation meaningfully alongside technicalsolutions . To optimise knowledge and transfer of information between consulting parties training should cover the process of consultation and negotiation, an understanding of how attitudes and risk perception of stakeholders particularly the public are shaped, as well as traditional technical issues . Effective, respectful two-way dialogue between informed users and planners can be vital for the successful promotion of a scheme . In particular, feedback in the form of informing the public how their opinions have contributedto or modified the project seems essential .

For example in the development of a cycle traffic network in London it was considered necessary to work at the highest level of engagement due to the complexity of the scheme and because “there ismuch local knowledge in the minds of transport users that is useful to the designer. Many design features, although perhaps apparently relatively insignificant in nature, may be safety critical and usersare very good at identifying potential for risk.” . In order to optimise the knowledge and transfer of information between parties training was delivered to all user groups not only on design standards but also on stakeholder engagement and negotiation. It wasconcluded that discussing the scheme between users and planners was vital for its success. This higher level of participation resulted in intense involvement and commitment and therein in a higher chanceof the network being used as intended. Stakeholders, because of their involvement felt empowered to choose more sustainable modes oftransport (Deegan and Parkin, 2011). However, it may be that those who chose the sustainable option comprised the same 20% with positive attitudes to sustainability in general, meaning the notion of engagement with the majority may have been rather less apparent.

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Conversely there are cases where communities may not respond to a project in the way that developers expect or require. As well as thenecessary geographical, resource demand and availability issues, feasibility studies must routinely include a variety of environmental and social impacts . For example a wind farm might be planned to be sited in the best possible location to capture the available renewable energy resource, and yet its progress through planning may be long and laboured and generate antipathy and resistance from local residents . The suggested value of the landscape is not factored routinely into wind farm design proposals but this can be crucial to the community . In the case of the proposed wind farm at Maer Hills, Staffordshire, an assessment was carried out on the environmental and social impact and public exhibitions were held to alleviate concerns of residents. Planning officers optimistically reported to the planning committee "There isstrong and consistent planning policy support for renewable energy projects. The scheme has significant benefits in this respect, whichare considered to outweigh concerns relating to landscape and visualimpact". They concluded that “ecological impact has been fully addressed and indeed the proposal brought with it some significant benefit”. However, the proposal went on to have over 2,500 letters of objection and only 18 in favour . This is unsurprising in light of what we have said earlier in that it is not simply a lack of trust, negative perceptions and attitudes towards the landscape impacts of infrastructure that prevented progress, but also how suchattitudes are recognised and used in the shaping of a project that determined whether those attitudes are barriers . The attitudes of this impacted community, their perceptions of what is important, thevalues they hold for the landscape and existing infrastructure around them should have been considered in the project design and implementation.

6. Conclusions and suggestions for action

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Whilst government, planners and engineers can aim to strengthen the attitude-behaviour link for perhaps 20% of people at an individual level, 80% of people will not be so easily persuaded. There are possible conflicts between cognitive and affective messages and people cannot easily relate to deferred costs and benefits. Increasing knowledge of the public does not usually lead to higher trust in governments and experts; in fact the reverse may be true where information is open to challenge because of mistrust and inherent conflicting arguments in addition to the affect heuristic used to make judgements on projects. Increased information leads neither to decreased risk perception nor to increased intention to act but may instead create an overload and desensitise people; it renders information more likely to be ignored. There is an argument to avoid the word ‘sustainability’ as it has become so misused and abused in green-washing and carries both cognitive and affective interpretations.

In any social and cultural change the role of government, legislation, planners and engineers is crucial. However, many policies not only lack clarity and consistency but are actually contradictory. The new National Framework for Planning Policy appears to be so vague and ill-defined that there is an expectation of a burgeoning number of challenges and appeals; none of these willoffer any help to the potential for acceptability of new projects. Earning trust and changing attitudes take a long time to achieve.

People who are unwilling to adopt sustainable behaviours in even thesimplest way will not change when the locus of blame is seen to be with the Government or other agencies. Motivation and positive messages of sustainable behaviour are important but will be ineffectual if transmitted from Government. Before legislation, policy and projects can be effective, government, planners and engineers must take into account and act on the psychological, social and political context in which people make choices and which may be very local. This paper points to a number of important issuesand recommendations that can be derived from the above.

6.1 Encouraging responsibility and motivating people1. It can be expected that only 20% of the population (and

industry) will be self-motivated to act responsibly and altruistically; the other 80% require persuasion through incentives of convenience, comfort and cost, probably coupled with legislation.

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2. Protection and well-being of ‘future generations' is likely to be ineffective as an incentive to change the majority of behaviour.

3. Risk perception, low trust and lack of perceived control will reduce motivation to behave more sustainably and there may be continuing conflict between emotional (affective) responses and what people know (cognitive) they should do.

6.2 Communicating consistently and responsively1. Lack of agreement between experts will create dissonance and

resistance to change.2. Engineers and policy-makers need to understand and act upon

public risk perception and responses to different sustainable options in order to implement sustainable strategies and projects

6.3 Government action and legislation1. Changing attitudes may achieve little or no change in action

without legislation. 2. People will be more likely to accept legislative changes when

these are accompanied by an attitude campaign and the vast but complacent majority will wait for Government to legislate.

3. Assessment processes such as EIA should include mandatory consideration of public attitudes to sustainability, risk perception and trust to demonstrate how a project contributes to social well-being and equality.

6.4 Action for engineers and planners1. Professionals should demonstrate empathy in terms of attitudes

and perceptions whilst engaging the public and should provide information and training to enable the public to negotiate effectively with technical experts.

2. More guidance should be produced to deal with the dilemmas thatparticipation poses. More training in communication of risk anduncertainty, addressing attitudes and generating trust is essential.

3. Engagement with the public at local level allows gathering valuable local information unavailable elsewhere for use in making and then publicising resulting project changes. Such action is likely to create much greater project buy-in, ownership, and use from those who contributed to its delivery.

6.5 Final comments

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The above points imply that there is limited likelihood of increasing the recognition of benefits or the adoption of sustainable behaviour beyond existing practice although a possible result of the current economic climate is a progressively powerful latent desire for change, a tiring of excessive consumption and a slowly growing market of considerate consumption. Future research should be directed towards the sustainability and public acceptability of construction projects and the need to consider public perception of risk and uncertainty as well as the effectiveness of campaigns to build trust and change attitudes and behaviour. Emphasis should be on building trust and transparency to ensure that risk management does not become adversely politicised and engineers perceived as political tools rather than expert scientists and that when faced with a panoply of options, the publicmakes informed choices.

Innovative clients, engineers and individuals can dissolve much uncertainty and demonstrate tangible individual advantages as well as wider general benefits of changing to more sustainable behaviour.However there is a clear and probably essential role for legislationin driving both consultation and behavioural change; coupled with a campaign designed to change attitudes this is more likely to succeedin driving sustainability into the consciousness of the majority andsubsequently stimulate action.

References

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Psychological factors to motivate sustainable behaviours

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