Ethnic Variation in Environmental Belief and Behavior

Johnson, Cassandra Y., J. M. Bowker, and H. Ken Cordell. 2004. “Ethnic Variation in Environmental Belief and Behavior: An Examination of the New Ecological Paradigm in a Social Psychological Context.” Environment and Behavior 36 (2) (March 1): 157 -186. doi:10.1177/0013916503251478.

This study utilizes the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) to analyze data from the 2000 National Survey on Recreation and the Environment. The purpose is to see if the folk ecology of African-Americans, Asian-Americans, native Latins-Americans, non-native Latin-Americans and European Americans is consistent. The theory is that each ethic group has its own cultural view of the environment that they bring with them from their points of origin.

One approach of many that is unique in this study is examining four environmental factors: environmental reading, recycling, joining an environmental group, and nature participation (going to parks or camping). These are all contrasted by ethnicity, political inclinations, education, age and income. The idea was to measure both direct and indirect effects and influences of ethnicity in the environmental outlook.

The general result of this study was that the higher the NEP score, the higher the likelihood of frequent environmental behavior. Before the inclusion of the NEP it was also consistent with expectations that there would be a significant difference between Whites and Blacks in three of the four behaviors, as well as two factors between Whites and native born Latinos and three factors between Whites and foreign born Latinos. Contrary to expectations, Whites and Asians differed in only one factor.

These differences increased dramatically when the NEP was factored in. The net result was that there are differences between ethnicities in the level of environmental participation. Whites had the highest participation in all categories. Asians were next most likely and Blacks and foreign-born Latinos. Native Latinos were in the middle. This held true across all the demographics.