Abstract
This study applied the affect heuristic model to investigate key psychological factors (affective associations, perceived benefits, and costs of wood heating) contributing to public support for three distinct types of wood smoke mitigation policies: education, incentives, and regulation. The sample comprised 265 residents of Armidale, an Australian regional community adversely affected by winter wood smoke pollution. Our results indicate that residents with stronger positive affective associations with wood heating expressed less support for wood smoke mitigation policies involving regulation. This relationship was fully mediated by expected benefits and costs associated with wood heating. Affective associations were unrelated to public support for policies involving education and incentives, which were broadly endorsed by all segments of the community, and were more strongly associated with rational considerations. Latent profile analysis revealed no evidence to support the proposition that some community members experience internal “heart versus head” conflicts in which their positive affective associations with wood heating would be at odds with their risk judgments about the dangers of wood smoke pollution. Affective associations and cost/benefit judgments were very consistent with each other.
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Notes
The measurements were obtained from the Armidale Dumaresq Council.
First author may be contacted to obtain a copy of the full questionnaire.
Examination of the raw correlations in Table 1 indicated that affective associations were strongly correlated with support for regulation policy but uncorrelated with support for policies related to education and rebates. Thus, we assessed mediation for regulation policy only.
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Appendix
Appendix
The 12 items were subjected to a principal axis factor analysis to identify the latent structure. The analysis produced three factors with eigenvalues greater than 1, explaining 68 % of the variance in the item set. The scree plot also indicated that three factors should be retained. Following a Direct-Oblimin rotation, all items had loadings greater than .60, and there were no cross-loadings above .20. The first factor, labeled “support for regulation,” included six items primarily dealing with placing restrictions on wood burning and implementing stricter standards for wood heaters. Three items relating to providing rebates for purchasing tools and technology to reduce emissions loaded on the second factor labeled “support for incentives.” The last factor, “support for education” consisted of two items related to providing information to the general public about proper firewood management and wood operation. Policy support scores were computed by taking the mean response for items on each subscale. Pattern matrix item loadings for each subscale are presented in the table below.
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Bhullar, N., Hine, D.W., Marks, A. et al. The affect heuristic and public support for three types of wood smoke mitigation policies. Air Qual Atmos Health 7, 347–356 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11869-014-0243-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11869-014-0243-1