Connectedness in Environmentalism : How Feelings of Connectedness to Nature, People, and Self promote Environmental Attitudes and Behaviour
Year: 2026
Type: dissertation
Abstract: People want to feel connected. In this work, I examine three levels of feeling connected: connectedness to nature, connectedness to people and connectedness to self. These three levels of connectedness are investigated together with a range of environmental measures (i.e. environmental attitudes and environmental behaviours). The theory of Value-Belief-Norm model proposes that there are three orientations for environmental engagement, that is, biospheric, altruistic and egoistic. Following this model, I focus on all three levels of connectedness, as previous literature has most often focused on connectedness to nature and less on connectedness to people, but rarely on connectedness on all three levels together. In the first paper, I provide a broad overview of how each HEXACO personality dimension connects to the three levels along with other similar socio-moral orientation, and with environmental measures. In this paper, I found that Openness to Experience is the common psychological basis for socio-moral orientations (including the three levels of connectedness) and environmental measures. In the second paper, I test a model that assumes that all three levels of connectedness predict environmental measures and that their effect is mediated by moral awareness. Here, my aim was to see if the three levels of connectedness are components of moral awareness. This model shows very good fit with the data, thus, supporting the essential role of all three levels of connectedness for moral awareness. In the third paper, I use vignettes to induce feelings of connectedness to nature and people, and examine their effects on environmental attitudes. The findings show that reminders of nature/people connectedness increased environmental concerns among people whose baseline connectedness is low. This work highlights the role of three levels of connectedness in environmental engagement by contributing new insights to the existing research literature, offering a deeper understanding of how connectedness influences environmental attitudes and behaviours.
Source: Työväentutkimus Vuosikirja
Author: Drosinou, Marianna
Language: English
Subfield: Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law
Field: Environmental Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7197598235