Rewarding positive environmental behaviour

Writing in the Guardian on 27 November, psychologist Adam Corner maintains that

people tend to act in a way that is socially acceptable,

but that behind the social norms are pitfalls to trap the overly-righteous.

Environmental campaigns using social norms will have to be supplemented with information targeted at specific groups about the desirability of their particular behaviours. If people are doing something positive, they need to know about it,

Corner says.
So just castigating the backsliders is not enough. Positive feedback to those doing the right thing environmentally is just as important.

Recent Reading

Global Consciousness

At this post on the group blog Climate Shifts, contributor John Bruno writes:

"Our every day experience in the United States (and in many other countries) informs us that the state of our governance, where wealthy business and special interests use campaign financing, lobbying, and media control to manipulate government policy and public perceptions is not a viable system for conserving coral reefs or for sustainable living because it is predicated on the fact that; 'He who owns the political trump card wins'." ( Citation

Jameson SC (2008) Guest editorial: Reefs in trouble ­ the real root cause. Marine Pollution Bulletin 56(9):1513-1514 )

It is a great system for creating corporate profit and socializing expense at global cost, but it does not produce clean air and water in natural environments or enhance biodiversity.

Stephen is also asking: can a social, cultural community consciousness evolve into a global consciousness? There are several layers to the answer. As he argues, there may be genetically or socially based behavioral limitations that have and will preclude the development of a new form of global altruism. There are also complex competing forces that have designed a governance system incompatible with the conservation of species and ecosystems half way around the world. But I think a very deep perception gap is another key problem. Even in wealthy nations, where we have the luxury of worrying about such matters, I am struck by how few people recognize that their actions can affect other people in far away nations. Many people I talk to in the US are aware of climate change and the decline of coral reefs, but have a hard time comprehending that their choices and behaviors could actually be causing problems for people and corals in the south Pacific. Making people, especially policy makers, aware of the striking effects we are having on all the world’s oceans, including ocean chemistry and temperature, will be a critical battle in the broader campaign to address the real root cause.