Going Green (and Not Being Just More Pro-Social): Do Attitude and Personality Specifically Influence Pro-Environmental Behavior?

Jana S. Kesenheimer and Tobias Greitemeyer
Additional contact information
Jana S. Kesenheimer: Institute for Psychology, University of Innsbruck, Innrain 52, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria
Tobias Greitemeyer: Institute for Psychology, University of Innsbruck, Innrain 52, 6020 Innsbruck, Austria

Sustainability, 2021, vol. 13, issue 6, 1-12

Abstract: The current research examines the extent to which attitudes and personality traits are predictive of pro-environmental behavior (PEB). Concretely, we tested the relationship between pro-environmental attitudes, HEXACO personality traits, and actual PEB (donating potential prize money to a pro-environmental organization; N = 257). Additionally, we controlled for the influence of helping behavior (donating to a pro-social organization) by addressing whether attitudes and personality have a distinct impact on PEB or whether people are more likely to engage in PEB because they act more pro-socially in general. Analyses included correlations, multiple linear regressions, mediations, and partial correlations. Pro-environmental attitude had the most robust association with PEB and mediated the influence of openness to experiences and honesty–humility on PEB. Importantly, the relationship of pro-environmental attitudes and personality (openness to experiences and honesty–humility) with PEB was unaffected by the participant’s helping behavior, suggesting that pro-environmental people mainly care about the environment and are not necessarily more pro-social in general.

Keywords: pro-environmental behavior; pro-social behavior; pro-environmental attitude; HEXACO personality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/6/3560/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/6/3560/ (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:13:y:2021:i:6:p:3560-:d:522452

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 ().