Navigating Environmental Attitudes

by Thomas A. Heberlein

The environment, and how humans affect it, is more of a concern now than ever. We are constantly told that halting climate change requires raising awareness, changing attitudes, and finally altering behaviors among the general public-and fast. New information, attitudes, and actions, it is conventionally assumed, will necessarily follow one from the other. But this approach ignores much of what is known about attitudes in general and environmental attitudes specifically-there is a huge gap between what we say and what we do.

Solving environmental problems requires a scientific understanding of public attitudes. Like rocks in a swollen river, attitudes often lie beneath the surface-hard to see, and even harder to move or change. In Navigating Environmental Attitudes , Thomas Heberlein helps us read the water and negotiate its hidden obstacles, explaining what attitudes are, how they change and influence behavior. Rather than necessarily trying to change public attitudes, we need to design solutions and policies with them in mind. He illustrates these points by tracing the attitudes of the well-known environmentalist Aldo Leopold, while tying social psychology to real-world behaviors throughout the book.

Bringing together theory and practice, Navigating Environmental Attitudes provides a realistic understanding of why and how attitudes matter when it comes to environmental problems; and how, by balancing natural with social science, we can step back from false assumptions and unproductive, frustrating programs to work toward fostering successful, effective environmental action.

"With lively prose, inviting stories, and solid science, Heberlein pilots us deftly through the previously uncharted waters of environmental attitudes. It's a voyage anyone interested in environmental issues needs to take."
-- Robert B. Cialdini, author of Science and Practice

" Navigating Environmental Attitudes is a terrific book. Heberlein's authentic voice and the book's organization around stories keeps readers hooked. Wildlife biologists, natural resource managers, conservation biologists - and anyone else trying to solve environmental problems - will learn a lot about attitudes, behaviors, and norms; and the fallacy of the Cognitive Fix."
-- Stephen Russell Carpenter, Stephen Alfred Forbes Professor of Zoology, University of Wisconsin-Madison

"People who have spent their lives dealing with environmental issues from a broad range of perspectives consistently abide by erroneous assumption that all we need to do to solve environmental problems is to educate the public. I consider it to be the most dangerous of all assumptions in environmental management. In Navigating Environmental Attitudes , Tom Heberlein brings together expertise in social and biophysical sciences to do an important kind of 'science education'-educating eminent scientists about the realities of their interactions with the broader public."
--the late Bill Freudenburg, Dehlsen Professor of Environment and Society, University of California, Santa Barbara

Genres: Environment, Science

240 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2012

Reviews

[Ethan Matthews · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty rage. Read for a class. The very accessible knowledge that is basically social psychology, but legible to people who have no experience in the field.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you've ever wondered about the psychology behind human behavior and how to change it, particularly in regards to environmental issues, this is an excellent book. Heberlein compares people's existing environmental attitudes to boulders in a whitewater river that environmentalists are trying to paddle. The analogy helps illuminate the fact that the strategies employed in most situations where a behavior change is desired end up simply not working (imagine the boat crashing into the rocks.)

Heberlein explains three "fixes" for environmental problems that are typically employed: cognitive, structural, and technological. In environmental education, there is a huge emphasis on cognitive fixes, which as you might guess, involve sharing information. Heberlein illustrates with example after example and study after study how information sharing simply has no impact on immediate behavior change. Education and information sharing do play a role... but generally that role is to raise awareness, not to change behavior.

For environmental educators starting to feel depressed by this news, it's important to note that over time, raised awareness can play a pretty important role in helping to establish or influence norms. And norms play a huge role in influencing behaviors, because norms come with perceived or actual sanctions for non-compliance. Recycling is a great example of something that has grown to be the norm for most people.

The first big lesson I took away from this book was that the time scales on affecting behavior through environmental education are far longer than most of us plan for (changing norms can take generations), and are often influenced by many other complex factors that are out of our control. It doesn't mean that education is meaningless or pointless, but it does provide a needed reality check on expected outcomes of an education program. The second lesson is that other kinds of fixes, which focus on changing the system or conditions rather than those pesky and hard to change humans, are often overlooked but can play a very meaningful role in improving environmental impact in a much more efficient and often quicker way.

This was a really enjoyable and accessible read- I highly recommend it to anyone involved with the EE field.

[Maia Zade · Rating 3 out of 5]

Piqued my interest in an extremely niche and nerdy way and made me feel like I was back in college - taking notes for fun, though, not because I had homework. I appreciate that there are people out there researching the intersection of psychology/behavior principles and conservation/sustainability - it is such useful knowledge. That being said, the studies were quite dry, and I questioned the way the author wrote about/depicted some of his grad students.

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

Technically I didn't quite finish. I read nearly all of it for grad school and liked it just fine, for required reading anyway. However, we didn't have to read the last chunk. It was interesting and thought provoking though.

[Ananda Woods · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book really changed my attitude through educating me on a topic

[Chloe · Rating 3 out of 5]

Class read that was actually interesting.

[University of Chicago Magazine]

Thomas A. Heberlein, AB’67
Author

From our pages (Nov–Dec/12): "With an opening quote from Aldo Leopold, the patriarch of US wilderness management, Thomas A. Heberlein makes the case for the happy marriage of environmental and sociological studies and dismisses what he calls the “fallacy of the cognitive fix” for mounting environmental problems. A University of Wisconsin–Madison professor emeritus in environmental sociology and a visiting professor at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Heberlein assumes the anecdotal tone of a Wendell Berry essay and uses evidence to engage the skeptical. He presents a plan of action, arguing for the mutually beneficial union of human and environmental concerns."

[Emily · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm marking this read although I read excerpts while studying for my Ph.D. comprehensive exams and have used parts of it to write manuscripts. There are some excellent nuggets in here on social psychological constructs and it's compelling for an undergraduate or graduate student in human dimensions of natural resources, parks and recreation studies, or environmental studies. I wouldn't use it in it's entirety as a textbook but would absolutely recommend chapters for reading.

[Kristy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Eye-opening and worth the read. Full of good analogies and anecdotes - a valuable one for anyone that believes the solution to environmental problems lies in the education of the public. A nice breakdown of how our attitudes norms and behaviors interplay.