The Impact Of Climate Change Coping Strategies On Pro-environmental Behavior Of College Students

Climate Change Strategy is a method of individuals or groups to cope with climate change. The current study found that there are three major strategies response to the climate change: emotion focused coping and problem focused coping. Emotion focused coping refers to use some common strategies like fear, avoidance and emotional alienation to deny climate change’s stress source and to get rid of the stress caused by negative emotions. Problem focused coping searching the information about solving problems and formulate action plans and specific measures to improve one’s self-efficacy and group’s efficacy in response to climate change. Proenvironmental behavior is on the basis of individual responsibility and values, and its purpose is to protect or to solve all sorts of environmental problems. The climate change mood- dual path model is believed that the problem focused on coping which on the purpose of improving group’s efficacy have a significant effect on increasing the pro-environmental behavior, and to the fear-based emotions focused coping can make individuals produce more environmental behavior directly, but the problem focused and emotion focused on the influence of pro-environmental behavior of individuals are independent, there is no interaction effect. The existing research has been mainly on the fear that emotions should gather strategy, but lack the investigation of denial strategies; and mechanisms that strategies how to influence pro-environmental behavior is still unclear.This study will through three experiments investigated the relationship between deny and group effectiveness as an indicator of sentiment- focused coping behavior problems and pro-environment relationships and explore life satisfaction and satisfaction as indicators of climatic significance gathered coping strategies to deal with climate impact of pro-environmental behavior regulation.Experiment 1 using 2(Fear: yes / no) × 2(group efficacy: Yes / No) betweensubjects design, the 130 college students were randomly divided into four groups, examined that if the emotional dual-path model can been verified in Chinese college students. The results showed that the fear as an emotion focused coping can promote subjects’ intentions of pro-environmental behavior effectively, and the group efficacy as a problem focused coping can promote pro-environmental behavior intention significantly, and both coping strategies are independent of each other, and no interaction.Experiment 2 using 2(denial: yes / no) × 2(negative population efficacy: Yes / No) will be designed to test among 136 college students, they were randomly divided into four groups, they were investigated the relationship between denied, group efficacy and pro-environmental behavior intention students, and the actual participation in environmental behavior, examining the interaction of the denial group efficacy to the intention of pro-environmental behavior, and the actual behavior. The results found that as one kind of the emotional focused coping deny can restrain the subjects pro-environmental behavior intentions effectively, and the group efficacy as a kind of problems focuses coping can affect the pro-environmental behavior intention significantly at the same time, and two strategies are independent of each other, and no interaction effect. Further analysis showed that students’ pro-environmental behavior intention can be a good representative of the actual action, therefore, you can believe that the strategies that response to the climate change not only affect the individual behavioral intention, but also have the external validity in practical proenvironmental behavior.Experiments 3 using 2(denying information: yes / no) × 2(a sense of negative population effectiveness information: yes / no) between-subjects design, the 150 college students were randomly divided into four groups, measured life satisfaction, satisfaction and pro-climate environmental behavior intention reactions after the completion of the corresponding experimental task. The results showed that deny climate change, group efficacy have a very low correlation with students’ life satisfaction and climate satisfaction, that is denial and negative groups’ efficacy have no directly relation with the life and climate satisfaction. The further path analysis found that college students subjects’ life and climate satisfaction can function independently of climate pro-environmental behavior, indirectly shows that life satisfaction is the unique factor of meaning focused coping strategies, and the experiment also proved that the correlation of the rest of the individuals’ proenvironmental behavior.In summary, we can have the following conclusions:1. Climate change dual-path has the cross-cultural adaptation. Emotion focused coping and problem focused coping can effect college students’ pro-environmental behavior intention independently, and no interaction.2. When the climate change of emotion focused coping is denied, may restrain college students’ pro-environmental behavior intentions. When the issue of climate change policy for the negative focus group efficacy, it also can inhibit individuals’ pro-environmental behavior intentions.3. Although there has not very high correlation between deny climate change, improve the effectiveness of groups and college students climate satisfaction, but the individual’s own climate satisfaction was able to partially explain the final proenvironmental behavior of individuals’ intentions.4. The two path way model impact behavioral intention to predict the actual Proenvironmental behavior.