Abstract
China is facing tremendous pressure to improve the environment. How to promote pro-environmental behaviors at the individual level is an important research topic. This study examines the relationship between social media usage, place attachment, and pro-environmental behavior based on a survey of 550 Chinese citizens. The results show that: (1) Place attachment and social media usage for environmental information acquisition have positive correlations with pro-environmental behaviors; (2) social media usage for environmental information acquisition moderates the relationship between place attachment and pro-environmental behaviors. Our survey also finds that social media play a more important role than traditional media in influencing pro-environmental behaviors. Our findings indicate that social media is changing the traditional relationship between place attachment and pro-environmental behavior. We should pay more attention to this positive role of social media and encourage citizens’ pro-environmental behavior.
Highlights
According to the data published by NASA’s Earth Observing System Data and InformationSystem, in the 0–100 scoring system, China scores 50.74 in Environmental Performance Index, 31.72 in Environmental Health, and 63.42 in Ecosystem Vitality
Social media moderates the relationship between place attachment and pro-environmental behavior
People with more environmental knowledge are less engaged in pro-environmental behavior, which is consistent with other data already available in China
Summary
According to the data published by NASA’s Earth Observing System Data and Information. Public Health 2019, 16, 5100; doi:10.3390/ijerph16245100 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph They mainly concern the cognitive (e.g., environmental knowledge, cognitive biases) and behavioral (e.g., community membership, perceived behavior control) aspects, but no sufficient attention is paid to the emotional interaction between people and the environment. Halpenny [7], and Song et al [8] have analyzed the effects of different dimensions of place attachment on pro-environmental behaviors. Does social media usage promote the pro-environmental behaviors of the Chinese public? Do social media change the way in which place attachment influences pro-environmental behaviors? We try to identify key factors affecting the Chinese public’s pro-environmental behaviors and the role of social media in changing the relations between place attachment and pro-environmental behavior
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