A blog post by N. J. Sockhill, author of the article ‘Beyond the ecocentric: Diverse values and attitudes influence engagement in pro-environmental behaviours’, which was shortlisted for the Rachel Carson Prize for Early Career Research.

Read the full paper discussed here in our Open Access journal.

Read the Plain Language Summary for this paper at Relational Thinking.

Working at the intersection of disciplines can be challenging, but rewarding. Our UQ-based study utilised the expertise of a small group of researchers from both conservation and social science to produce a novel piece of work. This research not only brought to light new findings about people and their relationship with nature, but enabled us to challenge our own biases in this space. By working across disciplines we found a relatively unexplored area of research, with potential to shape the future of conservation communication.

We found that large groups of the Australian population, who have traditionally been expected to not care about the environment, actually do show strong support for the environment through conducting pro-biodiversity behaviours and supporting pro-biodiversity policies.

Most people are familiar with the groups who are traditionally believed to support the environment—left-leaning voters and ecocentric people (those who value nature for its intrinsic worth)—but we also found that support comes from people on the other side of these spectrums. That is, right-leaning voters and anthropocentric people (those who value nature for its worth to humans).

People across the political spectrum show equal levels of support for biodiversity policies, with very strong support from both the left and the right. Pro-environmental behaviours are also consistent across left and right-leaning voters. These findings challenge our preconceptions about who may be supporting nature with their behaviour, or their vote; we would have previously assumed this would have been mainly restricted to left-leaning people, but this is not the case at all. Australia is experiencing political swings with environmentally-focussed political parties winning seats (and entire states!) over right-leaning parties in recent elections.

In addition to the political findings, we found that a large proportion of people who value nature for anthropocentric (human-centric) reasons strongly support the environment through their behaviour. Previous research and anecdotal lore would dictate that only those who value nature for ecocentric reasons (who value nature for its intrinsic worth) would undertake pro-environmental behaviours. This is far from true, with many anthropocentric people reporting a strong connection with nature and higher levels of pro-environmental behaviours than their ecocentric counterparts.

These misconceptions about right-leaning voters, and people who value nature for its worth to humans, mean that we are discounting the potential power of huge groups of people to be proponents for the environment. Politicians and conservationists alike should reframe their view of how different groups of people can be engaged in supporting the environment.

Politicians across the spectrum should be careful about their assumptions about how to garner continued support of their voter base. This is true for politicians on the right and left: right-leaning politicians should not assume their entire voter base share their dismissive views on environmental protection; left-leaning politicians should not assume that current right-leaning individuals are not interested in biodiversity protection, and should be careful not to disenfranchise potential voters with messaging designed for their traditional voter base.  

Similarly, conservationists should work to engage all members of society who might already be, or have the propensity to be interested in, supporting environmental policy or undertaking environmental behaviours. Conservation messaging strategies typically target the ecocentric subgroup of the population, assuming they are more likely to respond to pro-environmental campaigns. Where messaging does target the anthropocentric group, it may be created with the assumption that they aren’t connected to nature, or that they don’t already perform pro-environmental behaviours. This may lead to the disenfranchisement of these groups and reduce their likelihood to participate in environmental protection.

Future conservation success relies on communication, and this is only possible when we understand the nuances of how different groups respond to conservation messaging, including what pro-environmental behaviours and policies they are willing to undertake and support. To encourage the support of much larger groups of the population, continued research in this cross-disciplinary space is necessary. Ongoing interdisciplinary collaboration is likely to yield interesting and useful research that will enable effective conservation moving forward.

Media: Nicola Sockhill, n.sockhill@uq.edu.au, +61 (0)497 215 581, Professor Richard Fuller, r.fuller@uq.edu.au, +61 (0)458 353 102, Faculty of Science Media, science.media@uq.edu.au, +61 (0)438 162 687.

Follow Rachel and her team on Twitter: @NicolaSockhill @AngelaSocSci @rachelohry