Energy And Material Resources

Attitudes, Values, And Public Policy

W. David Conn

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9780367019662
• eBook ISBN: 9780429725265
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Sociology
• Index: Social Sciences

Knowledge of public attitudes and values is essential to the formulation and implementation of government policies affecting energy and other natural resources, but it is difficult to obtain and use this knowledge, for the pertinent issues are complex and involve such difficult-to-define concepts as degree of acceptable risk for both present and future generations. Recently, survey researchers have attempted to measure and explain public attitudes related to energy and resource conservation. This volume examines what policymakers need to or would like to know about these attitudes, what kinds of results the researchers have been able to obtain, and the extent to which their results currently influence the policymaking process.

1. Introduction and Overview

W. David Conn

Marty attitudinal surveys conducted in the past decade or so have included questions on topics relating to the production and use of material and, especially, energy resources. In presenting the results of these surveys, the researchers have often suggested or asserted that they hold significance for public policymaking, and indeed one might expect this to be so. However, since most policymakers are not themselves experts in attitudinal research, it cannot be taken for granted that they can or will make proper use of the data. On the one hand, for example, the researchers may not be measuring what the policymakers really want to know, or they may not be asking the right people. On the other hand, the policymakers may not possess a sufficient understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of the whole approach to permit an appropriate interpretation of the results.

As an economist/planner with a major interest in materials policy (but without specific expertise in attitudinal research) I have found that the links between researchers and policymakers have not always been drawn very tightly. This volume sets out to bridge the gap by presenting a selection of papers that consider what policymakers in the materials and energy fields might be interested in knowing, what kinds of results the researchers are able to obtain, and the extent to which the results are actually used in the policymaking process.

In this introductory chapter I first draw attention to the fact that terms such as "attitudes," "beliefs," and "values" are used differently by different people; next, I briefly review the kinds of information that are likely to be of interest to policymakers concerned with material and energy resources (with illustrations from the materials field); then. I identify some special problems faced by policymakers in these particular fields; and finally, I present an overview of the chapters to follow.

Use of Terms

Potentially a source of great confusion for non-experts in attitudinal research is the fact that different people use terms such as "attitudes," "beliefs," and "values" in different ways. While it might not necessarily be desirable or possible to force a consensus on the way that terms are used, it seems important to achieve mutual understanding on the use of a term in a specific instance. In this section I draw attention to some differences commonly encountered. The authors of later chapters in this volume were asked to clarify their own terminologies.

One of the simplest statements that distinguishes between attitudes, beliefs, and behavior has been made by Dillman (1978); he describes them as follows:

Attitudes - what people say they want;
Beliefs - what people think is true;
Behavior - what people do.

Although his description of "behavior" seems to be fairly generally accepted, his distinction between the other two terms is not universally shared. Dillman expands on his simple statement by adding that attitudes describe how people feel about something; they are evaluative in nature and reflect respondents' views about the desirability of something." On the other hand, he argues, "beliefs are assessments of what a person thinks is true or false. There is no implied goodness or badness in beliefs, but only an assessment of what one thinks exists or does not exist." Another way of making this distinction is to say that attitudes are normative; that is, they are not subject to empirical verification since they are ultimately based on values. In contrast, beliefs are positive; that is, they are subject (at least in principle) to empirical testing, and can be shown to be correct or incorrect.

Among other authors, however, Rokeach (1973) makes different use of the terminology. He defines belief as "any simple proposition ... capable of being preceded by the phrase I believe that ...." Such a proposition may be evaluative; indeed, Rokeach specifically identifies "existential beliefs" which are of the true-false kind, and evaluative beliefs" which are of the "good-bad" type. Rokeach reserves the term "attitude" for a "relatively enduring organization of inter-related beliefs that describe, evaluate, and advocate action with respect to an object or situation." The normative-positive distinction between beliefs and attitudes no longer holds in Rokeach's terminology. It is clear that these differences are significant, and should be understood by anyone wishing to use the results of attitudinal research.

Another term that is often used with different meanings is "value." Economists, for example, typically talk about values that objects or situations have for people, and examine preferences revealed in the marketplace as indicators of these values. Attitudes may also be expressions of these values, although economists are generally cautious in their interpretation of attitudinal data; they usually point to observed discrepancies between what people say and what they do, and argue that the only way to find out what people truly feel and want is to observe their behavior when faced with "real" choices.

However, the term "value" itself may be used differently. For example, Rokeach (1968) defines "human value" as "a single belief that transcendently guides actions and judgments across specific objects and situations and beyond immediate goals to more ultimate end states of existence" (note that "belief" here is used in the evaluative sense). Another explanation is given by McAllister (1980), who suggests that "human values serve as guides for personal decision-making, attaching significance and importance to objects and events, directing choices toward things considered desirable or good and away from things considered undesirable or bad. Seldom is only a single value involved in a decision; most require selecting and weighing severa! values simultaneously."

Once again, it seems important not so much to force the use of a single definition, but rather to ensure that differences in terminology, when they arise, are clearly recognized and understood.

Information that Policymakers Might Like to Have

To the non-expert, attitudinal research appears to have the potential of providing a great deal of useful information to policymakers concerned with material and energy resources. Later contributions to this volume are intended to explore whether this potential is or can be realized. In this section I briefly review some of the kinds of information that policymakers might like to have, giving illustrations from the materials field.

Beliefs

People's beliefs about past, present, and future states of affairs are likely to be of interest. What, for example, are their beliefs about the causes of past materials shortages? ... about our present dependence on foreign suppliers? ... about current rates of recycling? ... about the likelihood of materials scarcities in the future? ... about our per-capita use of materials in relation to per-capita uses elsewhere in the world? if some of these beliefs are known to be erroneous, policymakers may wish to give attention to correcting them; in the meantime, however, they are likely to be especially cautious in interpreting other survey responses that may themselves be influenced by mis-information.

Behavior

Policymakers may be expected to have an interest in reported behavior, at least to the extent that it can be assumed to approximate actual behavior. Do people use throw-away items such as plates and cutlery? ... do they separate and recycle their newspapers? ... have they installed flow restrictors on shower heads? In alerting policymakers as to how people are acting under present conditions, such information may be used, for example, to assess the effectiveness of policy measures taken in the past, as well as to provide a baseline from which to gauge the effectiveness of policy measures newly introduced.

Attitudes

Beliefs and reported behavior are positive items of information (in the sense discussed earlier); if we turn now to the normative information that might be obtained from surveys, we find that policymakers are likely to be interested in people's preferences regarding both the different goals and objectives (i.e. the ends) which might be adopted for public policy, and the means for achieving them.

Examples of ends-related questions are: what might the government attempt to achieve with a materials policy, if it should have one at all? ... how should trade-offs with other, competing social priorities be resolved? ... what level of accessibility to materials is considered equitable for those living in poorer countries, and for future generations? Means-related questions include: to what extent should emphasis be placed on conservation measures rather than measures to increase supply? ... if shortages occur, should there be rationing by allocation? ... by price? ... should the government attempt to control or influence the way products are packaged, and if so, how?

To the extent that attitudes are thought to reflect what people truly want, policymakers might be expected to seek attitudinal data on questions of this kind, both in order to guide the initial selection of policies and programs and to aid in anticipating the subsequent level of public support for those chosen.

Inter-Relationship

Policymakers are likely to be interested not only in acquiring information regarding individual attributes (i.e., beliefs, behavior, attitudes) but also in exploring the inter-relationships between these attributes and the ways in which they relate to underlying human values (as defined by Rokeach). One purpose is for policymakers to obtain some understanding of why people think and act in the ways they do and, perhaps, of how they might be influenced to act differently; another purpose is to develop models that can be used to predict how the attributes might change in the future.

Special Problems

As will become evident later in this volume, supplying policymakers with the kinds of information discussed in the previous section can prove a difficult task. In the materials and energy fields, particularly, there are some special problems, as illustrated by the following:

1. Policymakers in these fields must deal with technical complexities that neither the public at large nor, in many cases, even the technical experts fully understand. For example, many people do not appreciate the crucial distinction between a "reserve" and a "resource" and therefore risk being misled by forecasts of future materials availability based solely on estimates of reserves. The fact that the intricacies of the tax system, and its impact on the use of virgin rather than recycled materials, challenge the understanding even of professional researchers, provides another illustration. Under these circumstanc...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• About the Editor and Authors
• 1 Introduction and Overview