Changes in Environmental Awareness and Its Connection to Local Environmental Management in Water Conservation Zones: The Case of Beijing, China

Yi Du, Xiaoyan Wang, Daniele Brombal, Angela Moriggi, Andrew Sharpley and Shujiang Pang
Additional contact information
Yi Du: College of Resources, Environment & Tourism, Capital Normal University, Beijing 100048, China
Xiaoyan Wang: College of Resources, Environment & Tourism, Capital Normal University, Beijing 100048, China
Daniele Brombal: Department of Asian and North African Studies, University Ca’ Foscari Venice, Dorsoduro 3462, 30123 Venezia, Italy
Angela Moriggi: Department of Asian and North African Studies, University Ca’ Foscari Venice, Dorsoduro 3462, 30123 Venezia, Italy
Andrew Sharpley: Department of Crop, Soil and Environmental Sciences, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR 72701, USA
Shujiang Pang: College of Resources, Environment & Tourism, Capital Normal University, Beijing 100048, China

Sustainability, 2018, vol. 10, issue 6, 1-24

Abstract: This paper aims at investigating the change over time in the environmental awareness in rural Chinese communities and its correlation with environmental management measures implemented at the local level. We identify three main components of awareness, namely: perception, behavior, and attitude toward environmental management measures. Data were collected from two surveys in three villages in northern China in 2006 and 2015 that interviewed 125 and 129 respondents, respectively, and were analyzed employing an Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) approach. The results discussed in the paper show that environmental awareness increased between 2006–2015, and was mainly manifested in better environmental behavior and understanding of environmental status due an improvement in rural infrastructure and a greater amount of information provided to rural residents about the environment. Place of residence had a considerable influence on respondents’ environmental awareness: residents in eco-villages had a higher environmental awareness than those living in common agricultural villages. This appears to indicate a positive nexus between the comprehensiveness of environmental management measures implemented locally, and environmental awareness. Also, the universality of environment issues reduced the importance of socioeconomic and demographic factors in determining the degree of environmental awareness. However, more attention should be paid to villagers’ external behavior and inner feelings, such as their attitude to governmental management policies. These findings yield important policy implications that are relevant to the promotion of environmental awareness in China’s rural communities, and the adoption of more effective environmental management measures.

Keywords: environmental awareness; environmental behavior; environmental perception; environmental attitude; environment management; Beijing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/10/6/2087/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/10/6/2087/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:10:y:2018:i:6:p:2087-:d:153336

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().