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The COVID-19 pandemic may have altered visitation patterns to parks, with potential effects on human health. Little is known about park use early in the pandemic, how park availability influenced use, and whether park visits accelerated COVID-19 spread. Using weekly cell phone location data for 620 U.S. counties, we show park visits decreased by an average 26% between March 15 and May 9, 2020. Net of weekly trends, park visits were 2.2% lower when stay-at-home orders were in effect, yet increased by 8.4% with school closures and 4.4% with business closures. Park visits decreased less during the pandemic in counties where park availability was high. Levels of park visits were not associated with COVID-19 growth rate or incidence in the following weeks. Thus, parks served as recreation and leisure outlets when schools and businesses closed, especially where parks were more available, with no evidence of park use increasing COVID-19 spread. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Moral motives are important for pro-environmental behavior. But such behavior is not only motivated by moral or environmental concerns. We examined what higher order motives, other than morality, may be important for understanding pro-environmental behavior, by studying consumer identities. In three studies (N = 877) four consumer identities were distinguished: moral, wasteful, frugal, and thrifty. Frugal and moral consumer identities were most salient and were the strongest predictors of pro-environmental behaviors, but in different ways. Frugality, which is related to, but distinct from thriftiness, was particularly important for behaviors associated with waste reduction of any kind (including money). The findings suggest that people adopt the same behavior for different reasons, in ways consistent with their consumer identities. People manage multiple consumer identities simultaneously, and environmental policy is likely to be more effective if it addresses these multiple identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a growing tendency for policy makers to frame climate change action in terms of non-climate benefits, raising important empirical questions regarding the utility of such approaches. Across three studies we explore whether (and when) non-climate frames can lead to greater support for climate policy relative to climate frames. In Study 1 we framed a car-use reduction policy in relation to climate change or public health and showed that non-climate frames can stimulate greater support for climate policy. Study 2 explored frame relevance as a potential boundary condition to the efficacy of non-climate frames. Study 3 found that attempts to frame climate policy in relation to non-climate issues that affect participants personally can fail if that issue is not seen as being sufficiently relevant. We suggest that non-climate frames can be an effective tool in stimulating support for climate policy, however greater consideration of the key mechanisms is required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We proposed and tested a conceptual model of how cultural cognition worldviews, climate change risk perception, and psychological barriers are related to reported energy conservation behavior frequency. Egalitarian and communitarian worldviews were correlated with heightened climate change risk perception, and egalitarian worldviews were correlated with weaker perceived barriers to reported energy conservation behavior. Heightened climate change risk perception was, in turn, associated with fewer perceived barriers to engagement in energy conservation behavior and more reported energy conservation behaviors. The relation between cultural worldviews and perceived barriers was partly mediated by climate change risk perception. Individuals with distinct worldviews perceived psychological barriers differently, and some barrier components were more strongly related to energy conservation behavior than others. Overall, climate change risk perception was the strongest predictor of perceived barriers and of energy conservation behavior frequency. Future efforts should focus on reducing the psychological barriers to energy conservation behavior identified in this study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study proposes, from a cross-national perspective, a model of environmental citizenship that includes predictors at the individual and contextual levels. The model is based on multiple theoretical considerations from environmental sociology, media studies, and economics. The study, based on secondary data, reports that at the individual level, media use, environmental concern, and postmaterialism positively predict environmental citizenship. However, the data also allow to test whether the effects of these variables vary depending on social and environmental contexts. Beyond the individual level, results show that, overall, the effect of environmental concern is stronger in countries with better environment quality. The results also show that economic development at the country level positively explains a stronger effect of postmaterialism on environmental citizenship than in less developed countries. The study shows that environmental citizenship is stronger in countries with lower levels of environment quality, and in countries with less developed media systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, the authors develop a model of the formation of public acceptability judgments. The model suggests that in judging environmental management, people apply their values for the natural environment through psychological processes involving beliefs, aesthetic experience, and trust. A key aim of the study was to explore relationships among these processes. Through a mail survey, 487 Australians judged the acceptability of forest landscape management in Southern Tasmania. Structural equation modeling with these data provided general support for the model, confirming that all of the psychological processes are significant in the formation of acceptability judgments. The most important factor was found to be beliefs about consequences for the natural environment. A new finding to emerge from exploration of the model is that aesthetic experience is informed by values, particularly use/intrinsic values for nature, and in turn influences acceptability judgments mainly by influencing beliefs about consequences for the natural environment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Although the determinants of trust in governments have received significant attention in the literature on political trust, there has been no attention paid to whether environmental concerns affect governmental trust. Yet, if individuals are worried about local and global environmental degradation, they may think that the government has failed in providing them with the best living conditions. Hence, it is plausible to expect local and global environmental concerns and trust in government to be inversely correlated. Using 2005 data from 24 countries, this hypothesis is tested against competing theories of civic participation, interpersonal trust, and economic considerations to explain individual trust in government. Multilevel models that specify the impact of individual- and national-level factors provide evidence that global environmental concerns do actually matter. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The present study evaluated the hypothesis that people who strongly adhere to Christian orthodoxy may be less proenvironmental to the extent that they are less aware of the biospheric consequences of environmental problems (biospheric AC) but that they may be more proenvironmental than others to the extent that they are more aware of the egoistic and social-altruistic consequences of environmental problems (egoistic AC and social-altruistic AC, respectively). College students (N = 192) completed measures of awareness of negative consequences (AC), Christian orthodoxy, and environmental behavior. Results showed that Christian orthodoxy negatively related to all measures of environmental behavior. Additionally, biospheric AC was a complete mediator in Christian orthodoxy's relationships with environmental intentions and willingness to pay for environmental protection and was a partial mediator in Christian orthodoxy's relationship with proenvironmental political behavior. Neither egoistic AC nor social-altruistic AC correlated with Christian orthodoxy, so their mediating properties were not assessed. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In proposing that value endorsement level is dynamic rather than static, this study investigated how value importance judgments would vary with situation. Questionnaires were mailed to community residents (N = 276), using a scenario that described a realistic value conflict in an environmental issue. The results demonstrated that value importance judgments varied with situation, but the degree to which the situation influenced the judgment was moderated by the preexisting value endorsement level. Moreover, the study suggests that when 2 values are in conflict, the degree of difference in preexisting level of endorsement of the 2 values may be a better predictor of the judgments than the endorsement level of a single value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the impact of visual images and perspective taking on concern for environmental problems. Participants in the experiment were 193 university students. Results replicated earlier results showing that perspective taking, combined with images of animals harmed by nature, caused an increase in biospheric environmental concerns. In addition, results showed that the empathic dimension of personal distress moderated the relationship between kind of image and kind of perspective on both biospheric and egoistic environmental concerns. Results about the lack of other moderating effects are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two reliable and valid instruments to assess first- and second-grade children's (N = 100, M = 6.8 years) environmental attitudes and behaviors are presented. A series of games derived primarily from dimensions of the new ecological paradigm theory of environmental attitudes are described for the assessment of environmental attitudes. The games include felt board construction, a board game, and an adjustable worry thermometer. Environmental behaviors are assessed in the same sample using magnitude estimation (jumping different distances to indicate frequency of engagement in behavior) based on an adoption of Kaiser's General Environmental Behavior Scale for adults. The behavior scale employs a Rasch measurement model because environmental behaviors are viewed as a consequence of attitudes in concert with difficulties to implement actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The differences in public support for environmental protection among individuals from 50 nations were investigated. Support was determined by the willingness of individuals to make financial sacrifices to protect the environment. The results from multilevel analyses indicated that significant variance exists within and among nations in the level of support. The contextual-level variance was to a substantial degree explained by individual-level variables, capturing compositional effects. Income, postmaterialism, educational attainment, environmental involvement, and age related directly to support for environmental protection. Contextual-level variables—GDP, GDP growth, and average postmaterialist value-orientation of publics—also related directly to levels of support among nations and explained a significant part of the contextual-level variance. The findings are congruent with the affluence hypothesis and Inglehart's subjective values hypothesis. They also point to the necessity of simultaneously assessing the effects of individual- and contextual-level characteristics on proenvironmental attitudes in cross-national research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spatial theories identify three aspects of the environment that are used to various degrees in route-learning tasks; namely, landmarks, routes, and configurations. Although research has demonstrated sex differences in the relative predominance of each aspect in route-learning strategies, it is unclear how these sex differences correspond to route-learning abilities in a large-scale environment. The present experiment addresses this void by examining route-learning abilities in an indoor environment. Participants are taken through an unfamiliar route and instructed to find the point of origin using one of three strategies: (a) direct, (b) retrace, and (c) choice. Results reveal sex differences in route-learning abilities in the direct condition. Furthermore, a landmark-biased strategy is used more by females and is associated with better route-learning abilities. The same relationship is not found in males. These findings suggest that sex-specific patterns of relationships exist between strategy use and route-learning abilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the role of environmental conditions and government policies in the genesis of proenvironmental behavior among Canadians. Construction and validation of the Environmental Satisfaction Scale (ESS); Measurement of individuals' satisfaction with local environmental conditions; Evaluation of psychometric properties.