Attitudes and Pro-environmental Consumption Behaviour: An Application of a Choice Experiment in the Netherlands

In this research we examine whether individuals consider environmental issues in their consumption behavior and also identify characteristics which shape pro-environmental behavior in the three areas of food consumption, recycling, and transportation.We bring microeconomic consumer theory together with a wide range of characteristics and attitudes identified in socio-psychological texts including: general characteristics (e.g. sex, age), environmental knowledge/attitudes, social attitudes/norms, personal traits, political affiliations, and religious beliefs. In order to elicit consumers’ preferences we utilized choice experiment methodology to observe consumers’ behavior. We applied three choice experiments in the three areas of food consumption, recycling, and transportation choice through a web-based survey of a well-educated population, that is, one more likely to be informed about climate change.Our results show that individuals do not consider the pollution generated by food production when they decide between organic and non-organic food. However, they do consider the environmental impact when they make decision regarding recycling (vs. not-recycling), and for transportation choice. Moreover, the determining factors of pro-environmental behavior are not only general characteristics, but also environmental, social and political attitudes.