Personality predictors of Consumerism and

Environmentalism and Personality Simon Cohen Jeff Edgar Chris Latham-Warde Sanni Kujala

Two Studies • Hirsh, J.B. & Dolderman, D. (2007). Personality predictors of Consumerism and Environmentalism: A preliminary study. Personality and Individual Differences, 43, 1583-1593.

• Hirsh, J.B. (2010). Personality and Environmental Concern. Journal of Environmental Psychology, 30, 245-248.

Personality predictors of Consumerism and Environmentalism - Hirsh & Dolderman, 2007 Environmentalism compassion, social concern, a broader selfconcept Consumerism selfishness, possessiveness, accumulation of material possessions Is there a link between these two values and the Big Five personality domains? •

Hirsh, J.B. & Dolderman, D. (2007). Personality predictors of Consumerism and Environmentalism: A preliminary study. Personality and Individual Differences, 43, 1583-1593.

Personality predictors of Consumerism and Environmentalism - Hirsh & Dolderman, 2007 • Do we adopt personal values that are compatible with our traits? • Research suggests there is a relationship with Schwartz's value domains and the Big Five (Oliver & Mooradian, 2003) • Assessment of participants' personality, consumer goals, and environmental attitudes o o o o o

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New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) - concern over environmental issues Ecological Self Scale - sense of personal connection to the environment Consumer Values Orientation Scale - value of material possessions Behavioural Goals - either consumerist or pro-environmental behaviours Big Five Inventory (BFI) - measure of Big Five personality traits

Oliver, J.M. & Mooradian, T.A. (2003). Personality traits and personal values: A conceptual and empirical investigation. Personality and Individual Differences, 35, 109– 125.

Results • Participants: 106 undergraduate students (74 female) • Measures of Environmentalism and Consumerism were internally consistent • Principal component analysis was used to produce composite Environmental and Consumer variables • No significant gender differences in composite measures of Environmentalism or Consumerism

Results Correlations Between Composite Variables and Personality Traits • Consumerism and Agreeableness: r = -0.27

• Environmentalism and Agreeableness: r = 0.33 • Environmentalism and Openness: r = 0.24

Discussion Discussion of the Data

• Low Agreeableness tends to be associated with self focus. • High Agreeableness tends to be associated with empathic concern. • Agreeableness and Openness predict different parts of the total variance of environmentalism.

Discussion Limitations of the Study

• No demographic variables were examined. • No real world behaviour observed. • No causal relationships established.

Personality and Environmental Concern Jacob Hirsh, 2010

A follow-up study... • Previous study investigated both Consumerism and Environmentalism • Positively linked Environmentalism with Agreeableness and Openness

• This follow-up study focusses on the personality traits associated with environmental concern Hypothesis: Agreeableness and Openness will remain significant predictors of increased environmental concern

Elaborating on the previous study... • Larger Sample Size (n=2690) • Increased Age Range (26 to 93 years) • Less Imbalanced Gender Distribution (47% male and 53% female) • Different Nationality • Wider Social Grouping (not just undergraduate students) - Enables the study of Demographic Variables

Methods Measuring personality: 15 item version of the Big Five Inventory (completed by participants in 2005) Measuring environmental concern: Responses to measures in studies spanning 1994-2007 There was a focus on 3 measures: 1. Environmentally Concious 2. Importance of Environmental Protection 3. Worried about Environment

Results • Latent environmental concern factor was strongly related to each environmental factor: o

"importance of environmental protection" - β = 0.94

o

"worried about environment" - β = 0.64

o

"environmentally conscious" - β = 0.62

Results Environmental concern was in turn predicted by individual differences in the Big 5 personality traits: • Agreeableness - β = .22 • Openness - β = .20

• Neuroticism - β = .16 • Conscientiousness - β = .07 • Extraversion - β = .02

Discussion • Confirmed previous research that higher levels of Agreeableness and Openness are related to greater environmental concern (Hirsh and Dolderman, 2007) o Increased robustness due to such varied samples: adult vs student population, German vs Canadian • Higher levels of Neuroticism associated with higher levels of environmental concern o Individuals tend to be more worried about negative outcomes in general o More an egoistic form of environmental concern as opposed to altruistic

Discussion • Consciousness had a small but statistically significant effect on environmental concern o Possibly more likely to follow social guidelines and norms for appropriate environmental action

Limitations • Shortened 15 item BFI-S doesn't allow for assessment of lower-order personality traits o Some aspects of each Big 5 domain might relate more strongly than others o Also means the answers did not reflect a comprehensive coverage of the entire domain of environmental attitudes