Abstract
This study extends the theory of planned behavior by taking communication factors into account to examine the determinants of pro-environmental behavioral intention in haze mitigation. Unlike other theory of planned behavior (TPB) extension studies, we shift the focus of inquiry from examining the mediating role of TPB variables to investigating the moderating role in promoting pro-environmental behavior. Using an online survey in China, the results indicated that attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, and attention to haze-related efficacy messages were positively associated with pro-environmental behavioral intention. Notably, attention to haze-related threat messages had no significant relationship with behavioral intention. Moreover, moderation analyses revealed that the interaction effects between attention to efficacy messages and attention to threat messages on behavioral intention vary among people with different attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control. Theoretically, this study contributes to the literature of the TPB by analyzing its moderating role in promoting behavior change. Findings from this study suggest the importance of disseminating distinctive media messages to audiences with different personality traits, which is beneficial for practitioners to tailor specific messages in environmental campaigns.
Highlights
With the rapid industrialization and urbanization in recent years, haze pollution is becoming a serious environmental issue in China
Given a significant number of empirical evidence supports the usefulness of theory of planned behavior (TPB) in explaining individuals’ pro-environmental behavioral intention [20,25], we posit the following hypotheses regarding the relationships between TPB variables and behavioral intention to engage in haze mitigation: H1: Attitude toward pro-environmental behaviors is positively associated with pro-environmental behavioral intention to engage in haze mitigation
The hypothesis is postulated as follows: H4: Attention to haze-related efficacy messages is positively associated with pro-environmental behavioral intention to engage in haze mitigation
Summary
With the rapid industrialization and urbanization in recent years, haze pollution is becoming a serious environmental issue in China. The theory of planned behavior (TPB) is one of the most prominent theories in examining the determinants of behavior. It posits that individuals’ behavior is shaped by their attitude, social norm, and perceived behavior control [4]. A significant number of studies have demonstrated the role of these factors in shaping pro-environmental behavioral intention [5,6]. Despite these encouraging findings, a number of studies noted that when media consumption is measured, the amount of attention that people pay to media messages could predict future behavior [7,8]. Ho, Liao, and Rosenthal [8] found that both media attention and TPB variables had significant relationships with
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