To select effective interventions for pro-environmental behaviour change, we need to consider determinants of behaviour

Abstract

Encouraging pro-environmental behaviour is necessary to reduce CO₂ emissions and limit global climate change. Many reviews and meta-analyses have been published examining the effectiveness of interventions to promote pro-environmental behaviour. Yet, it remains unclear which interventions are most effective, when and why. Because interventions are more likely to encourage pro-environmental behaviour when they target key determinants of the relevant behaviour, it is critical to understand which interventions target which determinants. We introduce a classification system that links six types of interventions to 13 determinants of environmental behaviour. Our classification enables a theory-based understanding of when and why interventions are effective (or not) in encouraging pro-environmental behaviour and provides guidelines to practitioners to select interventions that are most likely to change the key determinants of a specific target behaviour, and thus likely to be the most successful in changing behaviour in the given context.