Environmental Charity Research Articles

The case for longtermism: concern for the far future as a catalyst for pro-climate action

Amid escalating climate challenges, we examine relationships between longtermism beliefs with policy-level and grassroots climate-protective attitudes and actions. Across four primary pre-registered studies (N = 4451) and two supplementary pilots (N = 1858), we find that a significant portion, approximately 25% of our participants, who endorse the longtermism ethical philosophy, report heightened climate change concerns. Furthermore, longtermists show stronger support for pro-climate policies, advocate for initiatives in line with climate justice for future generations and present-day minoritized groups and make proactive contributions to environmental causes and initiatives. Moreover, we find that responsibility to distant future generations drives these associations. Through a targeted intervention, we boosted intergenerational responsibility and increased donations to an environmental charity. These findings highlight how longtermism beliefs shape pro-environmental attitudes and actions, offering valuable insights for climate advocacy strategies and cultivating more widespread support for comprehensive environmental policies.

Experimental evidence of the impact of framing of actors and victims in conservation narratives.

Media narratives play a crucial role in framing marine conservation dilemmas by depicting human actors, such as fish consumers or the fishing industry, as responsible for negative effects of their actions on species and ecosystems. However, there is little evidence documenting how such narratives affect preferences for reducing bycatch. Behavioral science research shows that people can act less prosocially when more actors are responsible for a collective outcome (responsibility diffusion effect) and when more victims need to be helped (compassion fade effect); thus, the media's framing of actors and victims may have a significant effect on preferences. We conducted the first test of responsibility diffusion and compassion fade in a marine context in an online experiment (1548 participants in the United Kingdom). In 9 media narratives, we varied the type of actors responsible for fisheries bycatch (e.g., consumers and industry) and victims (e.g., a single species, multiple species, and ecosystems) in media narratives and determined the effects of the narratives on participants' support for bycatch policies and intentions to alter fish consumption. When responsibility for negative effects was attributed to consumers and industry, the probability of participants reporting support for fisheries policies (e.g., bycatch enforcement or consumer taxes) was ∼30% higher (odds ratio=1.32) than when only consumers were attributed responsibility. These effects were primarily driven by female participants. Narratives had no effect on personal intentions to consume fish. Varying the type of victim had no effect on policy support and intentions. Our results suggest that neither responsibility diffusion nor compassion fade automatically follows from increasing the types of actors and victims in media narratives and that effects can depend on the type of outcome and population subgroup.

Advocating for the Environment, Charity Law and Greenpeace: A New Zealand Perspective

Abstract In terms of environmental protection (and with reference to the filming location of the Lords of the Rings), New Zealand has been described as ‘a friend to Middle Earth, but no friend of the Earth’, which is in stark contrast to its international image that it seeks to foster of being ‘100% pure New Zealand’. This article considers the tension between New Zealand’s approach to environmental advocacy from a charity law perspective, and in particular, the way in which charitable advocacy for the environment has been impacted by the limitations imposed on environmental charities through the charity law doctrine of political purposes. In carrying out this analysis, the article tracks the legal evolution of this doctrine and considers whether recent legal changes have resulted in charity law enabling New Zealand to become ‘a friend to Middle Earth, and a friend of the Earth’ through the apparent broadening of the actions that can be taken by environmental charity advocates.

Can Sustainability Cues Make Us Worse People?

In recent years, due to rising concerns with environmental issues, sustainability-related design or communication features have become ubiquitous. Many of these features are devoid of statements about the sustainability credentials of specific products or firms, and can be called sustainability cues in that they are contextual stimuli that could prompt sustainability-related thoughts and emotions in people’s minds. We find that these features, innocuous or well-intentioned as they might seem, negatively affect people’s moral behavior. Specifically, we theorize and find empirical evidence that the presence of these sustainability cues during purchase decisions has a negative influence on subsequent prosocial behavior – an effect we label as “pseudo-licensing” for its parallels to licensing effects on prosocial behavior due to prior moral actions. We empirically examine this effect in the three online experimental studies. The findings reveal that participants who make purchase decisions over products without explicit claims about sustainability benefits subsequently donate less to a charity, if features such as text in green or sustainability-related textual messages accompany the purchase decision. We also find that this negative effect is mitigated when the donation target is an environmental charity or when the participants are exposed to the sustainability cues without making purchase decisions.

The Evaluation of Business Tools for Encouraging Social Responsibility in Older Consumers

Being close to consumers, retail chains have a considerable influence on the formation of social responsibility in society. By applying various means of encouragement, these entities try to draw the attention of consumers to problems in the society and encourage them to contribute to socially responsible activities. The aim of this research was to evaluate whether the means of promoting social responsibility applied in the biggest retail chains of Lithuania selling alimentary products have an influence on a consumer and encourage them to contribute to the promotion of the idea of social responsibility. Analyses of scientific literature, qualitative approaches based on 482 in-depth interviews, analyses of data obtained during the survey, mathematical–statistical analyses and comparative analyses were applied in this research. This article represents the results of the obtained research and emphasizes the main factors promoting and limiting the social responsibility of consumers. It was identified that the social responsibility of consumers in the field of environmental protection is formed by information provided by business entities, company images and other people surrounding the consumer. Social responsibility in the field of charity and support was influenced by information provided by business entities and other people’s opinions. Furthermore, the article concludes with the development of models showing which elements business entities should orient towards in order to promote the social responsibility of consumers in the field of environmental protection or charity and support. The compiled model can be used by all business subjects acting in the retail trade and trying to encourage users to become involved in socially responsible activities.

“Nature needs you”: discursive constructions of legitimacy and identification in environmental charity appeals

Abstract This study traces how discursive constructions of legitimacy and identification are enacted textually and visually with respect to environment-oriented causes, such as landscape or species restoration. Such conservation projects actually clash with human economic priorities typical of the Anthropocene. Drawing on models of social trust and assuming the discursive nature of legitimacy and identification, we explore how environmental charity organizations represent their conservation efforts, reproduce sustainability discourses and advocate self-regulatory practices. We use a sample of mission statements and donation appeals by six prominent environmental charities from the UK. Through keyness and concordance analysis, we identify textual strategies that position the prospective donor as a “beneficiary” of environment-oriented actions. We also analyze rhetorical strategies and visual resources that align the aims of the organization with the social imaginaries and emotional dispositions of prospective donors.

Enhancing spatial coordination in payment for ecosystem services schemes with non-pecuniary preferences

The environmental benefits from Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) schemes can often be enhanced if private land managers are induced to enrol land in a spatially coordinated manner. One incentive mechanism which has been proposed to achieve such spatial coordination is the agglomeration bonus, a two-part payment scheme which offers a pecuniary (financial) reward for decisions that lead to greater spatial coordination of enrolled land. However, farmers respond to a range of motives when deciding whether to participate in such schemes, including non-pecuniary motives such as a concern for the environment or social comparisons. This study implements a de-contextualised laboratory experiment to test the effectiveness of the agglomeration bonus when non-pecuniary motives are explicitly incorporated into the decision-making environment. We capture intrinsic preferences for the public good dimension of environmental improvement through a real donation to environmental charities and examine the relative impact of a group-ranking nudge. The experimental results show that the agglomeration bonus does indeed improve participation and spatial coordination when non-pecuniary motives are accounted for, but that its performance is not enhanced by the nudge.

Exploring Environmental Volunteers’ Perceptions of Health to Design a Health-Related Impact Measurement Tool

This article aims to explore the use of the user-centered design (UCD) method, mental model approach, of those who engage in environmental volunteering to work toward the development of a health-related impact measurement tool. It reports a case study which explores the use of one UCD method, a mental model approach. This is an understudied area of research that would be considerably valuable for practitioners in the voluntary sector who wish to create their own health-related impact measurement tool. Focus group interviews are used to explore how volunteers perceive the term health, their conceptual understandings, terminology used, and the attributes to measure it. This study is reported from the perspective of U.K. environmental charity, The Conservation Volunteers (TCV). Findings from this article can be used by other voluntary organizations and charities to help shape their own health-related impact measurement tool and the ways in which these tools can be tailored to suit their individual needs.

Friend or foe: Stakeholder attitudes towards biodegradable plastic packaging in food waste anaerobic digestion

Consumers are becoming increasingly attuned to sustainability issues in the food supply chain and demanding retailers to keep pace with their changing expectations. The visual nature of plastic pollution has strengthened public awareness of the environmental impact of plastic packaging. Against this backdrop, biodegradable plastics have been promoted as an alternative to conventional polymers, offering the potential to tackle hard-to-recycle plastics while being compatible with food waste recycling. Given increased recognition of food waste as an untapped resource worldwide and the incoming policy mandating separate collections for household and commercial food waste across the EU from 2023, anaerobic digestion is a particularly promising strategy and can make an important contribution to the transition to circular waste management practices. However, currently no industrial standard exists for ‘digestible’ packaging. Our research addresses stakeholder attitudes towards the treatment of biodegradable plastic packaging in food waste anaerobic digestion. We conducted 19 semi-structured interviews with a range of stakeholders, including the biowaste recycling sector, retail, governmental bodies and environmental charities. Qualitative data were categorised into thematic nodes based on inductive and deductive strategies. Content analysis showed significantly divergent views on biodegradable plastics. Though most respondents acknowledged the merits of biodegradable plastics, concerns over their compatibility with the current anaerobic digestion infrastructure (e.g. systematic depackaging, retention times) and their ultimate biodegradability were raised. In light of these issues, potential solutions are discussed and the role that legislation and consumer education can play in ensuring that the anaerobic digestion sector can accommodate these novel materials are highlighted.

The Hidden Benefits of Corporate Social Responsibility

Environmental activities, for instance actions against climate change, are an important part of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). This paper studies how a employer's environmental CSR activities affect the pro-environmental behavior of its employees. To do so, we conducted a large-scale field experiment on a crowd-working platform in which the employer's environmental CSR level varied exogenously. We find that employer CSR positively influenced workers' pro-environmental behavior outside the job. Workers who received information that their employer engaged in environmental CSR were more likely to contribute, and contributed higher amounts, to an environmental charity in a private donation decision. Our findings indicate that the impact of CSR may be farther reaching than directly observable by firm activities alone. By using CSR, employers have the potential to influence the behavior of their employees in non-work domains. Our findings have important implications for managers of organizations engaging (or planning to engage) in environmental CSR.

Power on environmental emotions and behavior

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to reveal indications of effective climate change communication through presenters holding powerful positions. This study aims to achieve this by examining how people perceive emotional campaigns on climate change and to what extent they ultimately perform actions to achieve adequate responses to environmental hazards and protection.Design/methodology/approachThis study measured environmental behavior directly through donations to environmental charities in two experimental conditions (i.e. top-down vs same-level communication). Environmental emotions were measured via pride and guilt levels about their own country’s environmental actions.FindingsPowerful individuals appeal to those people who are usually less driven to behave sustainably, and thus induce guilt regardless of the participant’s environmental identity. Conversely, powerful speakers did not succeed in addressing low identity participants using positive emotions. In fact, high power results in even lower pride levels, indicating a potentially adverse effect of power.Research limitations/implicationsWhile this paper successfully used an organizational leader as a powerful individual, it would be a fruitful avenue to use the experimental framework and examine different presenters (such as politicians, non-governmental organization leaders or scientific experts) who embody environmental advocacy.Practical implicationsThe results on top-down communication are intended to add to the understanding of emotional power in environmental contexts and help policy-makers to foster environmental advocacy using emotion-inducing campaigns.Originality/valueThe study is among the first to examine and elucidate the circumstances under which powerful individuals can encourage pro-environmental behavior. This study provides evidence that power can be a useful tool to appeal to those people who are usually less driven to behave sustainably. However, this paper also found that power does not increase emotions and behavior per se.

Greener Than Thou: People who protect the environment are more cooperative, compete to be environmental, and benefit from reputation

Protecting the environment is a social dilemma: environmental protection benefits everyone but is individually costly. We propose that protecting the environment is similar to other types of cooperation, in that environmentalism functions as a signal of one’s willingness to cooperate with others. We test several novel predictions from this hypothesis. We used a mathematical model to show that environmentalism can indicate one’s valuation of others and thus one’s cooperative intent. We found support for this prediction in two online studies, and then conducted two laboratory studies to extend the idea that environmentalism signals one’s willingness to cooperate. Participants donated more to an environmental charity when donations were public than when anonymous, but they donated the most when competing to be chosen by an observer for a subsequent cooperative game. In other words, people competed to donate more to the environment. Bigger donors benefited, as they were subsequently chosen more often and received more cooperation from their partners. Partners benefited from choosing environmental donors: bigger donors cooperated more with subsequent partners, such that environmental donations were reliably informative about participants’ future cooperativeness. We compare multiple theories about why people behave environmentally (indirect reciprocity, signal of wealth, signal of cooperative intent), and find most support for our proposed theory of signaling cooperative intent. By understanding the function of environmental behaviour and stimulating competitive giving, we can increase people’s support for environmental and other charitable causes.

Are environmental charities getting their feet wet when they lobby for marine protection around remote islands?

Abstract Recent ‘Extinction’ protests in the UK and elsewhere highlight contemporary concerns about the environment and the shared responsibility of all to take meaningful steps to save it. Key players in this advocacy are environmental charities. One of the areas in which they have been most active – in the UK and elsewhere – is in persuading governments to establish large Marine Protected Areas, especially around island territories. These are often created as ‘no-take’ areas, meaning that fishing – other than subsistence fishing – and other marine activities are prohibited, often to the detriment of local fishers. Invariably this requires a change in the current law. This article queries whether, in advocating for marine-protected areas, environmental charities are overstepping the principles which determine charitable status.

Materialism, Awareness of Environmental Consequences and Environmental Philanthropic Behaviour among Potential Donors

We explored the relationship between materialism, awareness of environmental consequences and environmental philanthropic behaviour with a web survey (n=2,079) targeted at potential donors living in Finland. Environmental philanthropic behaviour comprise of donations of money and/or time to environmental charities. The awareness of environmental consequences was divided into egoistic, altruistic and biospheric concerns. Biospheric and egoistic concerns were positively, while materialism was negatively related to environmental philanthropic behaviour. Materialism was related to preference of charismatic species when choosing a target for donation. The results have implications for conservation marketing emphasising the importance of taking the different donor segments into account.

The role of context in the nature and development of DIY impact measurement tools: a case study

This article aims to explore the nature of do-it-yourself (DIY) impact measurement tools used in the voluntary sector, using a contextual inquiry approach. This is an understudied area of research, knowledge that would be considerably valuable for practitioners in the sector who wish to create their own DIY impact measurement tool. Semi-structured interviews and observation sessions are used to explore an example of a DIY impact measurement tool, the processes of its creation and operation, and how it has been shaped, from the perspective of a UK environmental charity. The study identifies how and why the tool was created as well as which resources are being used to build it. Findings show that the functionality and requirements of the DIY impact measurement tool are mostly shaped by the charity’s social, cultural and organisational characteristics.

Framing nitrogen pollution in the British press: 1984–2018

Awareness of the risks posed by excess nitrogen is low beyond the scientific community. As public understanding of scientific issues is partly influenced by news reporting, this article is the first to study how the British press has discussed nitrogen pollution. A corpus-assisted frame analysis of newspaper articles (1984–2018) highlighted five frames: Activism, where environmental charities and organizations are portrayed as having an active role in fighting pollution; Government Responsibility, where privatization is presented as central and positioned as one of the main causes of pollution; Industry Responsibility, in which industries’ actions are depicted as causing pollution to increase; Pollutions as Politics, in which pollution is not discussed as a problem to be solved but rather as a means to increase votes; and Risk, where readers are warned about the possible effects of pollution on human health, flora and fauna. The analysis also points to the absence of named scientists and sources with the coverage being dominated by politicians.

The influence of environmental identity labeling on the uptake of pro-environmental behaviors

In this era of green marketing, consumers can earn the label of being pro-environmental for relatively simple and mundane actions. Researchers and practitioners have raised concerns that highlighting consumer behaviors as green might spill over, therefore increasing (positive spillover) or decreasing (negative spillover) an individual’s propensity to adopt a subsequent pro-environmental behavior (PEB). We report the results of two experimental studies that sought to investigate how labeling a person’s consumer behaviors or preferences as pro-environmental or not influences their decision to engage in a second PEB (donating to an environmental charity). Study 1 found that receiving a green label had no effect on environmental donations. Study 2 revealed that when a respondent’s consumer preferences were labeled as “not green”, they were significantly less likely to donate to an environmental cause relative to the control. We also find evidence that green labels interact with political identity. When Republicans were labeled as green, they were more likely to make an environmental donation than Republicans in the control condition. The donation behaviors of Democrats and Independents were not responsive to the label manipulation. Finally, both studies suggest that pre-existing environmental values are predictive of donation behavior. With additional research, the policy implications of using social labels to encourage PEBs can be better understood.

Glasgow City Region sets a new benchmark for dealing with climate change

Kit England and Ruth Wolstenholme from environmental charity Sniffer and Graham Edmond of Transport Scotland and ICE Scotland describe Glasgow City Region’s pioneering risk assessment for adapting to climate change. It offers numerous opportunities for civil engineers.

Save the planet or close your eyes? Testing strategic ignorance in a charity context

Do people try to avoid unpleasant information about the environmental consequences of their actions? If so, do they react with hostility towards others who provide the unwanted information? Fearing such hostility, do others abstain from providing the information? These are the questions we set out to explore by means of lab experiments presented here. To our surprise, and in stark contrast to related previous literature, we found few indications of willful ignorance. In a binary dictator game with an environmental charity as the recipient, an option to stay uninformed about the effects of one's actions for the charity was infrequently chosen, and did not significantly affect generosity. When another subject might choose to impose information on the dictator, almost all dictators asked for information themselves – but this was not associated with increased dictator generosity. We argue that the phenomenon of strategic ignorance is likely to be less robust and more context-dependent than one might expect based on previous research, and that this result may be important from an environmental policy perspective.

Exploring the use of user-centred design methods to inform the development of impact measurement practices: lessons learnt in the environmental volunteering sector

This paper reports on the findings of a research project delivered in collaboration with the UK environmental charity, The Conservation Volunteers (TCV), which evaluated the applicability and effectiveness of user-centred design (UCD) methods to assist voluntary organisations designing impact measurement tools. The findings indicate that there is scope for these methods to be applied more broadly within the voluntary sector, in particular by organisations wanting to critically examine their existing impact measurement practices, or by those seeking to develop and implement approaches to monitoring and evaluation that are more user-centred.