• Corpus ID: 53396442

Growing Up Green : Becoming an Agent of Care for the Natural World

@inproceedings{Chawla2009GrowingUG,
  title={Growing Up Green : Becoming an Agent of Care for the Natural World},
  author={Louise Chawla},
  year={2009}
}

• L. Chawla
• Published 2009
• Psychology

This article reviews research that suggests developmental paths to active care for the natural world in childhood and adolescence. It emphasizes studies with young people that explore experiences associated with care for elements of nature, but includes retrospective research in which adults who take action on behalf of the environment recall formative childhood experiences. To provide a framework for the review, the article applies the expectancy-value model of achievement motivation of Jacquelynne Eccles and Allan Wigfield and the synthesis of research on perceived efficacy by Albert Bandura, with the reasoning that children’s motivation to care for nature exemplifies general processes in the development of a sense of agency and motivation to achieve valued goals. Within this framework, it looks more closely at how children develop empathy and sympathy for other living things, as a motivation for care, by applying the theory of empathic morality of Martin Hoffman. The conclusion suggests areas for future research. A Framework for Environmental Action This article is guided by the question, “What childhood experiences are associated with actively caring for the natural world, and what developmental processes do these experiences suggest?” Reviews in the field of environmental education show that there have been many more assessments of children’s environmental knowledge, values and attitudes than studies to explain how children learn to take action on the environment’s behalf (Rickinson, 2001; Rickinson et al., 2004). This article is based on the principle that it is not enough to know about risks that the natural world faces and to hold pro-environmental values and attitudes: Moving to action is essential. As the naturalist E. O. Wilson observed, humanity has entered a bottleneck of maximum stress on the life-support systems of the biosphere as three great trends converge: population growth, increasing resource consumption, and the degradation of the environment (cited in Musser, 2005). To successfully pass through this bottleneck, societies must maintain human health and well-being while reducing global consumption, protecting and restoring ecosystems, and preserving biodiversity. This requires action on several fronts, including energy conservation and recycling as well as protecting natural areas and wildlife. This article reviews studies that measure pro-environmental behavior in any form, but pays particular attention to children’s interactions with plants, animals and other elements of nature—defining “nature” as the world that humans have not created. In addition, it reviews research that connects adult engagement in protecting the environment to childhood experiences. Figure 1 presents key factors that have been repeatedly associated with active care for the environment. It derives primarily from research with adults, but as this review shows, it is consistent with studies that assess the environmental behavior of children. It draws on meta-analyses of research on pro-environmental behavior by Hines, Hungerford, and Tomera (1986/87) and Bamberg and Möser (2007), as well as research syntheses by Geller (2002), Stern (2000), and Vining and Ebreo (2002). These reviews show that the intention to act and self-reported pro-environmental behavior are associated with knowledge about environmental issues or problems, knowledge of action skills and strategies, people’s perception that action for the environment is a social norm, and a sense of efficacy to do what is needed. These reviews also demonstrate the importance of understanding opportunities and barriers that shape action. Figure 1 also integrates the work of Clayton (2003) and Stets and Biga (2003), which indicates that pro-environmental behavior is related to an ecological or environmental identity, which forms when people identify with nature and consider caring for it an important aspect of their self-concept. The contribution of empathy and sympathy to pro-environmental concern and behavior has been shown by Schultz (2000) and Berenguer (2007). Another motivating factor, childhood experiences of nature, has been related to adult behavior either directly (Chawla, 2007; Horwitz, 1996; Vadala, Bixler, & James, 2007; Wells & Lekies, 2006) or indirectly, through an influence on adult values (Ewert, Place, & Sibthorp, 2005; Kals, Schumacher, & Montada, 1999). The Journal of Developmental Processes, 2009, Vol. 4(1), Pages 6-23 7 This article seeks to understand developmental processes associated with three components of Figure 1: motivation to care for nature, a sense of efficacy, and knowledge of action skills and strategies. As the figure indicates, the different components are interdependent. A sense of efficacy depends in part on knowing action skills and strategies, but children need to feel efficacious, or confident that they can apply skills successfully, in order to take action. Similarly, learning about nature and environmental issues influences environmental values and attitudes, but children are more likely to learn about the environment if they already value it. Through positive experiences in nature, children gain both knowledge and an emotional connection with the natural world. Figure 1 also represents a reiterative process. The experiences that children gain from action reconfigure their knowledge, values and skills and bring their abilities and sense of efficacy to new levels. These new cognitions and capabilities then influence how they respond to future opportunities for action. Like research with adults, studies that assess children’s behavior relative to the environment have been limited by a primary reliance on self-report or a stated intention to act, rather than observations of what children actually do and the contexts in which they do it. Another limitation of existing research is that it has made little use of developmental theory. To address this gap, Chawla (2007) and Chawla and Heft (2002; Heft & Chawla, 2006) have argued for the relevance of theory in ecological psychology for understanding the development of effective environmental action. According to the ecological approach of J. J. Gibson (1979), E. J. Gibson and Pick (2000), people simultaneously discover properties of the environment and their own competencies through action in the world, as they directly perceive the environment through movement and all five senses. This article seeks to build on this theoretical foundation by suggesting how children learn to combine environmental knowledge and action skills with the motivation to care for nature. For this purpose, it looks closely at processes of socialization that are embedded in three bodies of work: the expectancy-value model of Jacquelynne Eccles and Allan Wigfield (2002), the theory of empathic morality of Martin Hoffman (2002), and Albert Bandura’s (1997) synthesis of research on perceived efficacy. Although this work is not directly about children and nature, it suggests processes that may be pivotal, as it shows how adults structure children’s experiences and opportunities for action in multiple domains. Another characteristic of existing research on children’s environmental behaviors is that it has tended to measure simple actions like turning out unneeded lights, recycling paper or cans, or conserving water (see review by Rickinson, 2001). Bandura (1997) terms actions of this kind “fixed skills” that need to be repeated in the same way again and again, with little variation. Every expression of concern for the L. Chawla / Growing Up Green 8 environment matters, but this article is interested in how children develop a basic disposition to care for nature that also manifests itself in more complex initiatives, such as organizing to protect a natural area in their community or working to restore a natural habitat on their school grounds. These actions are examples of what Bandura (1997) calls “generative skills,” which need to be flexibly improvised in changing circumstances. In evaluating these activities, it is meaningful to talk about “standards of excellence”—the criterion which Wigfield, Eccles, and colleagues (2008) use to define “achievement motivation.” In their words, it is “motivation relevant to performance on tasks in which standards of excellence are operative” (p. 406). Young children begin by responding to everyday encounters with nature with simple actions, and this article is interested in these formative experiences, but it also seeks to understand how children take initiative to care for the natural world through increasingly complex forms of action. The Danish educators Jensen and Schnack (1997) call this goal “action competence”: the ability to analyze the sources of environmental problems critically and organize to find solutions on a societal as well as individual level. The following sections that apply the theory of achievement motivation of Eccles and Wigfield (2002) and Hoffman’s (2000) theory of empathic morality emphasize the development of individual concern and care for nature. A later section shows how Bandura’s (1997) synthesis of research on perceived efficacy provides a useful means for understanding how children learn to care for nature through collective action. Socialization to Value and Care for Nature This review introduces the expectancy-value model of Eccles and Wigfield (2002) because this model focuses attention on children’s interactions with key socializers within the context of the surrounding culture. Drawing on social learning and cultural messages about appropriate roles and behaviors, children interpret experiences, build patterns of emotional reactions and memories, begin to develop a sense of identity, and set goals. As they take action to achieve goals, they develop a sense of self-efficacy, or confidence that they can do what is necessary to achieve the goals that they value. These components of the expectancy-value model are presented in Figure 2. Withi