van Prooijen, Anne-Marie, Sparks, Paul and Jessop, Donna C (2012) Promoting or jeopardizing lighter carbon footprints? Self-affirmation can polarize environmental orientations. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 4 (2). pp. 238-243. ISSN 1948-5506

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Abstract

Research has shown that self-affirmation often leads to more adaptive responses to messages that focus on behavior-specific, individual threats. However, little is known about the effects of self-affirmation in the context of an ongoing collective threat, such as climate change. In the study reported here (N ¼ 90), the authors examined whether self-affirmation might polarize orientations toward environment-related actions when people rely on their established beliefs about climate change. The authors found that self-affirmation led to more constructive pro-environmental motives among participants with positive ecological worldviews but led to less constructive pro-environmental motives among participants with negative ecological worldviews. These findings suggest that in the absence of a persuasive threatening message, self-affirmation might serve to validate a person’s initial worldviews about environmental issues.

Item Type:	Article
Schools and Departments:	School of Psychology > Psychology
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion
Depositing User:	Donna Jessop
Date Deposited:	30 Nov 2012 10:02
Last Modified:	10 Mar 2014 07:49
URI:	http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/43167

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