Making choices in addressing sustainability problems: A link to framing effects and protected values

ABSTRACT

This experimental study illustrates how people are affected by framing effects when making decisions about sustainability problems that are common in the public sector. Using hypothetical decision scenarios and an environmental attitudes questionnaire, our results indicate that people are affected differently by framing effects in contexts involving sustainability problems in comparison with consumer, financial and life-and-death problems. This is explained by two mediating factors: susceptibility to framing effects and protected values regarding environmental issues. People with stronger utilization values towards the environment are more susceptible to framing effects, which may lead them to support policies with high negative ecological impacts.

KEYWORDS:

• Prospect theory
• framing effects
• decision biases
• protected values
• sustainability problems

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1080/14719037.2023.2180656