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NEW PERSPECTIVES ON HOW TO CHANGE ATTITUDES AND BEHAVIORS RELATED TO SUSTAINABILITY
No full textNinety-seven percent of the scientists agrees that climate change is occurring, predominantly driven by human activities, with severe and alarming impacts on the environment and living beings (IPCC, 2022). Considering all the psychological processes involved in perceiving climate change, taking necessary action to address it, and understanding its effects on everyone’s health, psychologists have increasingly focused on this topic (Clayton et al., 2015). To mitigate the risks of climate change, individual, collective, and political actions are essential. Nielsen and colleagues (2021a) emphasized the importance of studying high-impact behaviors, i.e., those that most significantly reduce emissions. However, these behaviors often challenge the status quo, leading to psychological resistance that hinders attitude and behavior change. Through two distinct sets of studies, I investigated the psychological mechanisms underlying the energy transition and proposed a new framework for behavior change within the sustainability domain. In Chapter 2, I present two studies that examined the influence of the evaluation context on judgments of two major energy large-scale installations, such as solar farms and nuclear power plants. I hypothesized that when individuals compare these two energy sources directly, their attitudes change as they weigh the pros and cons of each, and I examined the moderators of such effect. In Chapter 3, I explored how people perceive and engage in different types of behavior change across three studies. Little to none of previous theoretical and experimental work has categorized different types of behavior change (e.g., stopping a current behavior vs. adopting a completely new one). The results show that people perceive varying levels of effort required for different types of behavior change, and is possible to reframe a behavior as less effortful to increase engagement in adopting it. Expanding our understanding of sustainability psychology is crucial, as it offers valuable insights for individuals, practitioners, and policymakers. Overcoming psychological resistance related to sustainability could facilitate interventions at both local and national levels, reducing emissions, combating climate change, and contributing to the achievement of the Sustainability Goals, ultimately improving lives globally
The impact of partially covered faces on trust attribution, sharing resources, and perceived fairness of one’s own choices in Ultimatum Game
No full textCovered faces have been linked with impaired emotion recognition; yet, it is entirely unexplored how an occlusion due to face masks may affect individuals’ behaviour in economic decisions. Across two studies, we explored whether partially covered faces (due to mask wearing or a horizontal black bar) and emotion displayed by the responder influence peoples’ sharing behaviour in the Ultimatum Game and the perceived fairness of one’s proposal. Study 1 showed participants were more willing to equally share their resources with a happy face (compared to a neutral one). In addition, they were more willing to make a fair proposal when the person displayed was not wearing a face mask. Our results also provide evidence that, when people had to judge how fair their proposal was, participants rated a fair proposal as fairer when responders showed happy faces without masks, while unfair proposals were rated as fairer with happy masked faces; similarly, angry faces led to fairer ratings for fair offers without masks and unfair offers with masks. Study 2 partially confirmed previous results, highlighting how a simple occlusion on the face does not have a direct effect on the proposal but moderates the effect of the displayed emotions. These findings indicate that social interactions might be affected by face occlusion, especially when it is represented by a face mask. Indeed, people might judge the same behaviour in different ways based on the fact that their counterpart has a partially covered face
Environmental and psychological variables influencing reactions to the COVID‐19 outbreak
Full text linkObjective. TheCOVID-19outbreakinItalycausedamajorhealthemergencyandhigh uncertainty. We studied how media outlets, risk perception, state anxiety, and emotion regulation impacted peoples’ reactions and undertaking of protective behaviours aimed at reducing the spread of the virus.
Design. Data were collected in two cross-sectional waves (N = 992 at T1; N = 1031 at T2): at the beginning of the outbreak and once the national lockdown was imposed.
Methods. ParticipantscompletedonlinesurveysontheirperceptionoftheCOVID-19 outbreak. Moreover, they were asked to self-report on their emotion regulation, state anxiety, and protective behaviours.
Results. Media exposure and wave predicted risk perception. An interaction between wave, risk perception, and emotion regulation predicted the number of protective behaviours people undertook. Specifically, in the second wave, the number of protective behaviours was predicted by risk perception only among those who were ineffective at regulating emotions. Instead, effective regulators undertook the same number of behaviours regardless of their level of risk perception. In the second wave, we also found that the risk perception by emotion interaction predicting protective behaviours was mediated by state anxiety.
Conclusions. The present study provides important insights on how people experienced the early stages of the outbreak. This information could prove valuable in the coming months to understand who might have been more impacted by the stress caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the consequent restrictive measures
Trends in State Anxiety during the Full Lockdown in Italy: The Role Played by COVID-19 Risk Perception and Trait Emotional Intelligence
Full text linkThe COVID-19 pandemic is associated with mental health outcomes in the general population. This study assessed how state anxiety changed at different time points during the pandemic and how it was influenced by risk perception and trait emotional intelligence (trait EI). The study was conducted online in two data collections, at the beginning (wave 1, N = 1031) and at the end (wave 2, N = 700) of the lockdown. Participants were asked to self-report their state anxiety, risk perception of COVID-19 contagiousness, and trait EI. The interaction between risk perception and wave showed that, in wave 1 (but not in wave 2), anxiety increased as risk perception increased. Further, trait EI by wave interactions showed that effective (vs. ineffective) regulators experienced lower anxiety and this difference was larger in wave 2 than in wave 1. Because of the cross-sectional design of the study and the convenience sample we should be cautious when generalizing the present findings to the entire population. Our findings support the moderating role of trait EI on state anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic. This knowledge provides further support for the importance of EI in coping with uncertain and stressful environmental conditions such as those posed by the COVID-19 pandemic
Promoting the energy transition: The role of decision context and climate risk in the investment in solar versus nuclear energy
No full textThe energy transition requires modernizing the energy sector and investing in alternatives to fossil fuels. Both nuclear and renewable energies are potential solutions to lower carbon emissions, although nuclear power is generally less favored by public opinion. We investigated whether support and feelings for solar farms and nuclear power plants construction vary depending on whether these energy sources are evaluated separately (SE) or jointly (JE). We also examined how climate change risk perception influences willingness to invest (WTI) in these power plants and their perceived risks. Results confirmed that solar farms elicited more positive attitudes and feelings than nuclear power plants. Crucially, when evaluated in JE (vs. SE), solar farms were viewed even more positively and received greater support, whereas nuclear plants were perceived more negatively. Climate change risk perception correlated with the perception of nuclear plants as riskier and solar farms as less risky. There was marginally significant evidence that the former relationship emerged only in SE, whereas the latter was more pronounced in SE (vs. JE). Furthermore, climate change risk perception positively predicted the WTI in solar farms, but only in JE. In contrast, the WTI in nuclear power remained unaffected in both contexts. Finally, the perceived risk of each energy source was negatively associated with the WTI in them. These results offer insights into the psychological factors influencing people's perception and support for alternative energy infrastructures and can help develop effective communication strategies to facilitate a smooth and successful energy transition
Does climate change risk perception influence people’s intention to invest in solar farms vs. nuclear power plants?
Full text linkIn the hottest year so far, the COP28 ended with a global pact aiming at “transitioning away from fossil fuels” to tackle climate change. Such transition implies an energy sector’s large-scale modernization, with particular interest in nuclear and renewable energies. Previous research has consistently found that nuclear energy is generally perceived as riskier than solar energy. However, people’s support for large-scale installations to produce solar energy - solar farms - has been little investigated, but it is necessary to rigorously compare solar and nuclear energies. Further, we explored the role of climate change risk perception in this framework. We ran an online survey with a convenient Italian sample (752 participants, 39.3 ± 16.6 y.o., 57% females), implementing a three-between-subjects design using a separate (SE) vs. joint evaluation (JE; Hsee, 1996) of two energy sources: solar farms and nuclear power plants. Thus, depending on the condition, participants were given information about either solar farms, nuclear power plants, or both. Subsequently, they were asked about their energy risk perception, and their willingness to invest public funding (WTPF) in either energy source. Further, participants were asked to report their climate change risk perception. We found that people perceived solar farms as less risky than nuclear power plants, both in SE and JE. Furthermore, people were more WTPF in solar farms than in nuclear power plants, and it also depended on their energy perceived risk. Specifically, for both energy sources, the more people perceived them as risky and the less they were WTPF in them. Finally, exploratory analyses revealed that when comparing the two energy sources in the SE conditions, the interaction between condition and climate change risk perception predicts the energy perceived risk. Specifically, in the case of solar farms, the more risky people perceived climate change and the less risky they perceived the solar farms’ energy. On the contrary, in the case of nuclear power plants, the more risky people perceived climate change and the more risky they perceived the nuclear energy produced by nuclear power plants. Similar results have been found also when people saw information about both energy sources (i.e., in JE). The present study contributes to understanding the psychological mechanism driving people’s perception and decision to support different energy sources and therefore have a great impact on effective communication. These results will be valuable for researchers, behavioral scientists, and policymakers working on climate change
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
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