Interventions

Human behaviours have not changed on an appropriate scale considering the high risks of these environmental changes. Therefore, it’s important to outline ways that governments, communities and non-gov organisations can influence industries, companies and individuals’ behaviours. Knowledge, social norms, peer-perceived endorsement, reinforcement contingencies and regulations, incentives, attitudes, values, emotions, responsibility, and cognitive dissonance are often the target of interventions due to their significant influence on behaviours. Furthermore, considering the impact that human perception can have on human engagement with environmental issues, it might be useful to take an educational and promotional perspective to help reduce biases induced by anxieties and fears. Therefore, environmental education for individuals and the general public is a useful tool when intervening on littering, pollution and overexploitation. It’s important to create a culture where conservation behaviours are accessible to everyone and where people can assess their ability to cope with the stressor of environmental change positively. This would lead to less stress and more problem-focused coping mechanism rather than emotion-focused ones.

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