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Energy Conservation: Two Easy Ways Out 1
Author(s) -
Pligt Joop van der
Publication year - 1985
Publication title -
journal of applied social psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.822
H-Index - 111
eISSN - 1559-1816
pISSN - 0021-9029
DOI - 10.1111/j.1559-1816.1985.tb00890.x
Subject(s) - psychology , habit , context (archaeology) , personality , social psychology , preference , energy conservation , energy (signal processing) , population , consumption (sociology) , ecology , microeconomics , economics , sociology , geography , mathematics , social science , statistics , demography , archaeology , biology
This study investigated attitude‐behavior relationships in the context of energy conservation. Results indicated that general environmental concern is a poor predictor of energy‐conservation behaviors. Direct evaluative comparisions of various non‐conservationist behaviors with a more conservationist alternative showed a clear relationship with behavioral preference. Non‐conservationists, however, evaluated their own behavior only marginally favorably and in some cases clearly unfavorably. This was accompanied by an overestimation of the common occurrence of these behaviors among the general population and by an unwillingness to relate these behaviors to personality characteristics. It is argued that these biases (i.e., considering one's behavior as a habit that is shared by many others) could hinder behavioral change. These findings are discussed in terms of effective public policy on the issue of energy consumption.