The structure of attitudes to doomsday issues: A Replication

Abstract

The issues of overpopulation, pollution, and the prospect of nuclear war have all been discussed as environmental crises with doomsday ramifications. Braithwaite and Law (1977) developed a three-faceted 24-item doomsday issues questionnaire. The present study is a replication of this earlier study and is designed to investigate the underlying structure of the doomsday belief statements along the three theoretical facets. A total of 168 introduction to psychology students were administered the doomsday issues questionnaire and a liberalism-conservatism ale as a marker variable. The five components retained were rotated using the Harris-Kaiser independent cluster oblique solution. The analyses revealed two general components of doomsday consciousness. Component 1 was a general component primarily concerned with the ineffectiveness of actions taken by individuals and humanity in general. Component 2 also was a general component in terms of both personal and societal commitment to action. Component 3 defined a nuclear war component referencing societal concerns. Component 4 defined an overpopulation component concerning the effectiveness of personal actions with a high liberalism-conservatism loading. Component 5 defined a general pollution-overpopulation component.