Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivations for Being an Environmentalist

Woodsy Owl of the U.S. Forest Service has been urging children toward proenvironmentalism with statements such as. "Give a hoot, don't pollute!" for over 40 years (Fuller-Bennett & Velez, 2012). To some, this message may resonate strongly with their core values, but to others it may merely signal the societal assumption that conscientious people don't harm the environment. Among some, it may even provoke irritation toward the preachy wide- eyed bird and his dictates. With human-made environmental disasters such as climate change looming large on the horizon (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2007), understanding people's motivations to protect the environment and their responses to proenvironmental messages could be helpful for preventing such disasters. In the present work, I propose that people can be motivated to be proenvironmental for internal reasons (ie, personally caring about the environment) and/or external reasons (ie, wanting to make a good impression on others) and that these different sources of motivation are associated with distinct environmentally-related responses. Specifically, I propose that whereas internal motivation to be proenvironmental leads to genuine and effective environmental efforts, external motivation to be proenvironmental is primarily associated with a concern with the opinions of others and may even lead to less environmental efforts as a backlash against social pressures.