Hochschule für Angewandte Psychologie FHNW
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Publikation Eating green. Consumers’ willingness to adopt ecological food consumption behaviors(Elsevier, 12/2011) Tobler, Christina; Visschers, Vivianne; Siegrist, MichaelFood consumption is associated with various environmental impacts, and consumers’ food choices therefore represent important environmental decisions. In a large-scale survey, we examined consumers’ beliefs about ecological food consumption and their willingness to adopt such behaviors. Additionally, we investigated in more detail how different motives and food-related attitudes influenced consumers’ willingness to reduce meat consumption and to buy seasonal fruits and vegetables. We found consumers believed avoiding excessive packaging had the strongest impact on the environment, whereas they rated purchasing organic food and reducing meat consumption as least environmentally beneficial. Similarly, respondents appeared to be most unwilling to reduce meat consumption and purchase organic food. Taste and environmental motives influenced consumers’ willingness to eat seasonal fruits and vegetables, whereas preparedness to reduce meat consumption was influenced by health and ethical motives. Women and respondents who preferred natural foods were more willing to adopt ecological food consumption patterns.01A - Beitrag in wissenschaftlicher ZeitschriftPublikation Consumers’ knowledge about climate change(Springer, 11.01.2012) Tobler, Christina; Visschers, Vivianne; Siegrist, MichaelSeveral studies have unveiled various misconceptions about climate change that the public holds, for instance, confusion about climate change and ozone depletion. However, so far, there has been no uniform and standardized way to measure climate-related knowledge, which complicates comparisons between different countries or samples. To develop an extensive knowledge scale, we therefore examined the Swiss public’s understanding of climate change in a mail survey and related this scale to attitudes toward climate change. We thereby aimed to consider a broad range of climate-related knowledge, namely physical knowledge about CO2 and the greenhouse effect, knowledge about climate change and its causes, knowledge about the expected consequences of climate change, and action-related knowledge. The questionnaire included items of different degrees of difficulty, ranging from knowledge that is covered by newspapers to experts’ knowledge. Our findings indicate that people still hold several misconceptions, although people’s knowledge related to CO2 seems to have increased compared to previous studies. Of all knowledge subscales, knowledge about climate change and causes was most strongly related to attitudes toward climate change.01A - Beitrag in wissenschaftlicher ZeitschriftPublikation Addressing climate change: Determinants of consumers' willingness to act and to support policy measures(Elsevier, 09/2012) Tobler, Christina; Visschers, Vivianne; Siegrist, MichaelConsumers influence climate change through their consumption patterns and their support or dismissal of climate mitigation policy measures. Both climate-friendly actions and policy support comprise a broad range of options, which vary in manifold ways and, therefore, might be influenced by different factors. The aims of the study were, therefore, two-fold: first, we intended to find a meaningful way to classify different ways of addressing climate change. Second, we aimed to examine which determinants influence people's willingness to engage in these behaviors. We conducted a large-scale mail survey in Switzerland in which respondents rated, among other items, their willingness to act or support a range of possible actions and mitigations measures. A principal component analysis indicated that a distinction in terms of a behavior's directness as well as a differentiation according to perceived costs seem to be appropriate to classify climate-friendly actions. Multiple regression analyses showed that perceived costs and perceived climate benefit turned out to be the strongest predictors for willingness to act or to support climate policy measures. The strong influence of perceived climate benefit might reflect a strategy of reducing cognitive dissonance. As high-cost behaviors are more difficult to adopt, consumers may reduce dissonance by dismissing high-cost behaviors as not effective in terms of climate mitigation. Political affiliation proved to be another strong determinant of willingness to act or support. Participants on the right wing were less willing to show indirect climate-friendly behaviors, change their mobility behaviors, and to support any type of climate mitigation policy measures. Climate-friendly low-cost behaviors, however, were not influenced by political affiliation.01A - Beitrag in wissenschaftlicher ZeitschriftPublikation Konsumverhalten und Förderung des umweltverträglichen Konsums. Bericht im Auftrag des Bundesamtes für Umwelt BAFU(Consumer Behavior, ETH Zürich, 18.08.2010) Visschers, Vivianne; Tobler, Christina; Cousin, Marie-Eve; Brunner, Thomas; Orlow, Pascale; Siegrist, MichaelDer Bericht fasst das derzeitige Wissen zu Konsumverhalten und der Förderung des umweltverträglichen Konsums zusammen. Ziel der Arbeit ist es, für zukünftige Kommunikationsaktionen erfolgversprechende Ansatzpunkte und Kommunikationsstrategien aufzuzeigen. Der Schwerpunkt liegt dabei auf individuellen Entscheidungen von Konsumentinnen und Konsumenten. In einem ersten Teil werden die wichtigsten psychologischen Modelle zu Konsumverhalten und Verhaltensänderungen erläutert. Anschliessend wird eine mögliche Segmentierung der Schweizer Konsumentinnen und Konsumenten diskutiert. Dabei wird auf die Determinanten des ökologischen Konsumentenverhaltens bezüglich vier verschiedener Bereiche, nämlich Mobilität, Wohnen, Lebensmittel, Konsumgüter und Dienstleistungen, eingegangen. Zudem werden verschiedenen Möglichkeiten für Umweltkampagnen, deren Entwicklung und Evaluation vorgestellt. Schliesslich werden Faktoren, die für Erfolg und Misserfolg von Kampagnen verantwortlich sein können, analysiert.05 - Forschungs- oder ArbeitsberichtPublikation Organic tomatoes versus canned beans: How do consumers assess the Environmental Friendliness of Vegetables?(SAGE, 09.01.2011) Tobler, Christina; Visschers, Vivianne; Siegrist, MichaelThe assessment of a food product’s environmental friendliness is highly challenging for consumers because such an assessment requires the consideration of various product characteristics. Furthermore, products often show conflicting features. This study uses a choice task and a questionnaire to examine how consumers judge the environmental friendliness of several vegetables. The consumers’ assessment is compared with life cycle assessment (LCA) results, which represent the overall environmental impact of a product throughout its lifespan. In contrast to the LCA, consumers consider transportation distance rather than transportation mode and perceive organic production as very relevant for the environmental friendliness. Furthermore, consumers assess the environmental impact of packaging and conservation as more important than the LCA results show. Findings also suggest the current product information for vegetables is insufficient for judging their environmental friendliness. Implications for information campaigns and ecological food labeling are discussed.01A - Beitrag in wissenschaftlicher ZeitschriftPublikation Affect or information? Examining drivers of public preferences of future energy portfolios in Switzerland(Elsevier, 2019) Jobin, Marilou; Visschers, Vivianne; Arvai, Joseph; Siegrist, MichaelThe energy transition in Switzerland, as in many other countries, aims to increase the proportion of electricity produced using renewable energy technologies. In this context, governmental agencies and other institutions have attempted to communicate the implications of (domestic) electricity systems through the use of web-based and interactive decision support systems (DSSs). Studies show that, when no additional information is provided, preferences concerning the future electricity mix are mainly driven by the affective reactions that energy technologies evoke. A question remains, however, regarding how people engage with the information provided in a DSS, as well as whether such information is influential in terms of shaping people’s choices. We asked our participants to build an electricity portfolio using a DSS, which modeled the Swiss electricity system. The participants’ political orientation and their affective reactions to different energy technologies guided their information search, as well as the choice of energy technologies within their portfolio. The attention paid to the information provided was not directly related to the participants’ portfolio choices. The selective processing of information, which was based on the participants’ prior attitudes, suggests that they target information they are already familiar with in the DSS. However, this also illustrates a caveat previously identified in motivated political reasoning, since selective information processing, together with the tendency to disconfirm information that is incongruent with prior beliefs, can lead to the polarization of previously held views. As the information provided through the DSS we tested was unable to change the participants’ affective-cognitive evaluation of energy technologies, its use should be carefully considered in light of the possible effects of consolidating existing beliefs.01A - Beitrag in wissenschaftlicher ZeitschriftPublikation Differences in risk perception between hazards and between individuals(Springer, 2018) Visschers, Vivianne; Siegrist, Michael; Raue, Martina; Lermer, Eva; Streicher, BernhardHow people think about a hazard often deviates from experts’ assessment of its probability and severity. The aim of this chapter is to clarify how people perceive risks. We thereby focus on two important research lines: (1) research on the psychometric paradigm, which explains variations between the perceptions of different risks, and (2) research on factors that may determine an individual’s perception of a risk (i.e., perceived benefits, trust, knowledge, affective associations, values, and fairness). Findings from studies about various risks (e.g., genetically modified organisms, food additives, and climate change) are reviewed in order to provide practical implications for risk management and communication. Overall, this chapter shows that the roles of benefit perception, trust, knowledge, affective associations, personal values, and fairness are not always straightforward; different factors appear involved in the perception of different hazards. We recommend practitioners, when they encounter a new hazard, to consult previous studies about similar hazards in order to identify the factors that describe the public’s perception of the new04A - Beitrag SammelbandPublikation How to improve consumers' environmental sustainability judgements of foods(Elsevier, 2018) Lazzarini, Gianna A.; Visschers, Vivianne; Siegrist, MichaelFood production and consumption account for approximately one-third of households' environmental impact. Consumers thus play a major role in the shift towards more sustainable foods and diets. An overall sustainability label or simple guidelines may enable consumers to make more environmentally friendly food choices, but whether such information-based tools improve consumers' ability to choose environmentally sustainable foods has not been empirically investigated. This study's online choice task experiment shows that eco-labels and guidelines marginally increased consumers' accuracy in selecting environmentally friendly foods. Respondents adhered, however, more to guidelines than to eco-labels and led to choices with lower environmental impact. In addition, respondents showed several misconceptions related to the environmental performance of protein products, which were resistant to both eco-labels and guidelines. These findings suggest that new, costly labels may not improve consumers' environmental judgements. Instead, addressing consumers' misconceptions and finding ways to promote environmentally sustainable food purchases is essential.01A - Beitrag in wissenschaftlicher ZeitschriftPublikation Does environmental friendliness equal healthiness? Swiss consumers’ perception of protein products(Elsevier, 2016) Lazzarini, Gianna A.; Zimmermann, Jasmin; Visschers, Vivianne; Siegrist, MichaelFood production and consumption have major impacts on the environment. At the same time, changes in human diets worldwide are increasingly leading to health problems. Both issues are highly influenced by consumers’ everyday food choices and could be addressed by reducing consumption of meat and other animal products. To promote sustainable food consumption, we need to know how consumers perceive the environmental friendliness and healthiness of food products, on which criteria they base their evaluations of environmental friendliness and healthiness, and how their estimations relate to life cycle assessments and nutrient profiling. We presented 30 protein products, which varied in provenance, production methods, and processing, to 85 participants from Switzerland. They were asked to sort the products once according to their perceived environmental friendliness and once according to their perceived healthiness. The mean distances between the products were compared to the products’ life cycle assessments and nutrient profiles. The results showed that perceived environmental friendliness and healthiness are highly correlated. The main predictors of the products’ perceived environmental friendliness were product category, presence of an organic label, and provenance; and for perceived healthiness, these predictors were product category, fat content, processing, and presence of an organic label. Environmental friendliness and healthiness estimations were significantly correlated to the life cycle assessments and the nutrient profiles of the products, respectively. Hence, to promote healthy and environmentally friendly food choices, motivators related to environmental friendliness and healthiness could be used in synergy. Awareness about meat’s environmental impact should be increased and better information is needed for consumers to make an accurate environmental impact and healthiness assessments of protein products.01A - Beitrag in wissenschaftlicher Zeitschrift
