Motivating Society-wide Pro-environmental Change

The world is facing environmental crises, but pro-environmental action is seriously lagging behind. Contrary to popular beliefs, Thijs Bouman and Linda Steg argue that this is not caused by people undervaluing the environment, but rather by people structurally underestimating how much others care. Only through showing that many do value the environment it will be possible to inspire society-wide pro-environmental action.

Bouman and Steg published an article on this subject on the online magazine One Earth. Both authors are colleagues at the Expertise group Environmental Psychology at the Department of Psychology of the University of Groningen. One Earth publishes research across the full spectrum of global environmental change and sustainability science.

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• Read the article
• Linda Steg
• Thijs Bouman