The Impact of Socio-Demographic Variables on Pro-Environmental Behaviour

Abstract

There is growing evidence that human society has already entered the age of global environmental crises. As human behaviour is undoubtedly contributing to environmental problems, it is important to analyse pro-environmental behaviour. Socio-demographic variables are widely used to investigate individual behaviour; the aim of this study was to analyse how they influence pro-environmental behaviour in a Central and Eastern European country. An online survey was conducted among 442 participants aged 18+ in Hungary, and Spearman's rho, Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal-Wallis test univariate ANOVA and regression analysis were used to analyse the relationship between socio-demographic variables and pro-environmental behaviour. The results show that age and the number of children a person has are positively associated with pro-environmental behaviour. In addition, women and members of civic organisations tend to have higher levels of pro-environmental behaviour. Using these significant socio-demographic variables in green segmentation and in developing complex models of pro-environmental behaviour is therefore recommended.