TY - JOUR
T1 - A new tool to map the major worldviews in the Netherlands and USA, and explore how they relate to climate change
AU - De Witt, Annick
AU - de Boer, Joop
AU - Hedlund, Nicholas
AU - Osseweijer, Patricia
PY - 2016/9/1
Y1 - 2016/9/1
N2 - For addressing climate change, public support for changes in policy is needed, as well changes in individual lifestyles. Both of these appear to be intimately related with people's worldviews. Understanding these worldviews is therefore essential. In order to research and 'map' them, we translated the theoretical 'Integrative Worldview Framework' (IWF) into an empirical, quantitative approach. We constructed a worldview-scale aiming to distinguish between four major worldviews - labeled traditional, modern, postmodern, and integrative - and explored their interface with opinions and behaviors with respect to climate change. The survey was conducted with representative samples of citizens in the Netherlands and the USA (n = 527 and n = 556). The hypothesized worldviews were found in the data with a reasonable degree of reliability, especially in the Dutch sample. We also found consistent relationships between these worldview-clusters and a range of opinions, political priorities, and behaviors. In both countries postmoderns and integratives displayed significantly more concern about climate change as well as more sustainable behaviors, compared with moderns and traditionals. The implications of these findings for environmental policy and social science are noteworthy.
AB - For addressing climate change, public support for changes in policy is needed, as well changes in individual lifestyles. Both of these appear to be intimately related with people's worldviews. Understanding these worldviews is therefore essential. In order to research and 'map' them, we translated the theoretical 'Integrative Worldview Framework' (IWF) into an empirical, quantitative approach. We constructed a worldview-scale aiming to distinguish between four major worldviews - labeled traditional, modern, postmodern, and integrative - and explored their interface with opinions and behaviors with respect to climate change. The survey was conducted with representative samples of citizens in the Netherlands and the USA (n = 527 and n = 556). The hypothesized worldviews were found in the data with a reasonable degree of reliability, especially in the Dutch sample. We also found consistent relationships between these worldview-clusters and a range of opinions, political priorities, and behaviors. In both countries postmoderns and integratives displayed significantly more concern about climate change as well as more sustainable behaviors, compared with moderns and traditionals. The implications of these findings for environmental policy and social science are noteworthy.
KW - Climate change
KW - Environmental behaviors
KW - Integrative worldview framework
KW - Integrative worldviews
KW - Modern
KW - Postmodern
KW - Sustainable lifestyles
KW - Traditional
KW - Worldviews
UR - http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:e081be0d-cc7f-4d18-9bbb-a43cef5b57f2
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84971357220&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.envsci.2016.05.012
DO - 10.1016/j.envsci.2016.05.012
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84971357220
SN - 1462-9011
VL - 63
SP - 101
EP - 112
JO - Environmental Science & Policy
JF - Environmental Science & Policy
ER -