Fun environmentalism! Potential contributions of autonomy supportive psychology to developing low carbon lifestyles in Australian households

摘要

To achieve sustainable levels of Australian household carbon emissions, individuals will have to adopt and maintain high impact pro-environmental behaviours across a number of behavioural domains. It is hypothesised that motivation type will be a critical factor in bringing about personally sustainable changes. In particular, selfdetermined (autonomous) motivation will be essential for generalisation of proenvironmental behaviour. If this hypothesis is supported, the next challenge is to identify optimal ways of promoting autonomous behaviour change, drawing on and expanding from Self-Determination Theory. It is proposed that a general move towards a positive, holistic approach to environmentalism is necessary, one aspect of which is to make environmental action more satisfying, interesting, and fun.