Abstract

AMERIGO, María; GARCIA, Juan A  and  SANCHEZ, Trinidad. Attitudes and Behavior towards Natural Environment. Environmental Health and Psychological Well-Being. Univ. Psychol. [online]. 2013, vol.12, n.3, pp.845-856. ISSN 1657-9267.

The natural environment has largely been overlooked by research into subjective well-being. The few studies to have addressed the issue have focused on the beneficial effects of contact with nature, but have not looked at how attitudes and behaviours towards the natural environment are related to subjective well-being. The present paper seeks to fill this gap through the analysis of the relationships between environmental attitudes and self-reported ecological behaviours, and subjective well-being. The results obtained from a sample of 320 university students show that to think and behave pro environmentally is not only good for the natural environment but also leads directly to higher levels of subjective well-being. Some implications regarding anthropocentric attitudes and how they relate to subjective well-being are discussed.

Keywords : Environmental Attitudes; Anthropocentrism; Acological Behavior; Satisfaction with Life; Personal Distress; Environmental education; natural environment; psychological well-being; confirmatory factor model.

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