The Influence Of Moral Foundation On Pro-environmental Behavior And Its Mechanis

At present,the global ecological environment system is facing severe challenges,such as global warming,the sharp decline of forest resources,land desertification,biodiversity destruction and other problems cannot be ignored.How to effectively deal with the current threats to human survival and development of the ecological environment has become the focus and core of people’s concern.To solve the ecological problem not only requires the state to take measures from the perspective of policy,but also needs people to pay corresponding moral attention because it is a moral problem itself.Pro-environment behavior is a kind of behavior that aims to reduce the negative impact on the environment and directly affect the well-being of individuals and groups.Therefore,it is of great practical and research value to explore the influencing factors and psychological mechanism of pro-environment behavior.The moral foundations are the universal shared moral intuition which integrates cognitive and emotional factors.It is not only the product of evolution,but also under the influence of cultural shaping and external environment,which presents diversified moral contents.Previous studies have shown that moral foundations are closely related to pro-social behavior.As a special category of pro-social behavior,pro-environmental behavior is closely related to individual moral foundations.Some studies have found that individual moral foundations can promote individuals to make pro-environment behavior based on fairness and caring motivation.At the same time,the research shows that the hedonic motivation of seeking pleasurable feeling,the gain motivation of focusing on personal resource preservation and acquisition,the personal norm motivation of moral obligation and the social norm motivation of taking "appropriate action" based on group influence are closely related to the pro-environment behavior.From the point of view of connotation,the hedonic,gain,and personal norms also reflect the focus on individual rights and well-being in the basis of individual moral foundations.However,the emphasis on duty,group loyalty and social order of the binding moral foundations is consistent with the connotation of social norm motivation.Therefore,this study first explored the moral foundations of pro-environmental behavior from the perspective of moral intuition,and the mechanism of the influence of moral foundations on pro-environmental behavior.Secondly,the research shows that the individual moral foundations are more sensitive to others’ pain because they emphasize the moral content of caring and fairness,so which are more willing to offer help.The binding moral foundations attach importance to loyalty to the group,obedience to authority,and the moral concern of pursuing holiness.Therefore,the behavior of providing help to others will be different because of the internal and external attributes of the group.One of the greatest features of pro-environment behavior is that the benefits of environmental protection will benefit most people,not just the in-group members.Therefore,this study also discusses whether the influence of moral foundations on pro-environment behavior is moderated by different group types.To sum up,this study not only provides an empirical evidence for the theoretical model of "unity of reason and emotion" of pro-environmental behavior proposed in recent years,but also enrich basic moral research in the context of Chinese culture to a certain extent,and provides ideas and countermeasures for promoting pro-social behavior in reality from the perspective of moral education.Study 1(N=484)examined the relationship between moral foundations and pro-environment behavior using questionnaires,and study 2(N=224)examined the causal relationship between moral foundations and pro-environment behavior using experiments,and further explored the mediating role of multiple motivations.Study 3(N=249)further introduced the variable of group type to investigate whether there was a difference in the pro-environment behavior between in-group and out-group based on moral foundations.The results show that:(1)both individual and binding moral foundations positively predict pro-environmental behavior,and compared with binding moral foundations,individual moral foundations has stronger predictive power.(2)Multiple motivations including hedonic motivation,gain motivation,personal norm motivation and social norm motivation did not play a mediating role.(3)Group types play a moderating role between moral foundations and pro-environment behavior.The level of individual moral foundations is higher for out-group pro-environment behavior,while the level of binding moral foundations is higher for in-group pro-environment behavior.