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Environmental awareness, attitudes and actions and new ecological paradigm combined survey: A survey of the residents of the Waikato region

TR 2013/41

Report: TR 2013/41

Author: Versus Research Ltd

About this report

Waikato Regional Council recognises that sustainable resource management requires an understanding of environmental perceptions and issues of people who live in the region.

To explore trends in community views, a number of surveys have been undertaken including the Environmental Awareness, Attitudes and Action (EAAA) Survey and the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) survey.

As a result of a recent review, it was recommended to combine both surveys into one.

The EAAA survey has been reviewed in consideration of relevance and monitoring of existing indicators. Information from both the EAAA and NEP surveys contributes to the monitoring of indicators for the Waikato Regional Council’s long term plan and the MARCO (Monitoring and Reporting Community Outcomes) indicator website.

The NEP survey has been kept in its entirety within the combined survey. The NEP scale is one of many tools developed to measure people’s environmental attitudes and underlying ecological worldviews. This tool has become one of the most widely-used measures of environmental concern in the world, and has been used in more than 100 studies globally.

Specific uses of the surveys include:

  • Provision of indicators of the current state of people’s environmental awareness, attitudes and actions with comparisons to the 1998, 2000, 2003 and 2006 surveys. Indicators are reported through the Waikato Regional Council and the MARCO websites.
  • Provision of information to assess the potential for, and barriers to, undertaking environmentally beneficial behaviours for programme design and implementation.

The overall aims of the surveys discussed in this report are to:

  • track public views, attitudes and priorities about environmental issues over time
  • explore raising awareness of the impact and effects of people on natural resources
  • anticipate public response to environmental policies and programmes
  • evaluate current policies and programmes
  • help the council gain a greater understanding of the underlying worldviews of the public to determine the level of ecological support in the region and the drivers of that support, or lack thereof
  • explore the underlying perspectives of the broader population who may not actively contribute towards making submissions or attend public meetings
  • provide information that is potentially useful to agencies such as district and city councils
  • gather public opinion on environmental issues that contribute to policy development.

Read or download the survey report

You can read and download either the full report, or sections of it.

Contents

Full report

Full document [PDF, 5.5 MB]

Section 1
Introduction and objectives

Introduction and objectives [PDF, 307 KB]

Section 2
Methodology, sampling and reporting

Methodology, sampling and reporting [PDF, 451 KB]
2.1 Overall methodology  
2.2 Questionnaire design  
2.3 Sampling  
2.4 Survey method  
2.5 Sample structure  
2.6 Weighting  
2.7 Reporting  

Section 3
Environmental issues

Environmental issues [PDF, 779 KB]
3.1 Satisfaction with the local environment in general  
3.2 Most important environmental issue facing the Waikato region  
3.3 The next most important environmental issue  
3.4 The most important environmental issue in five years  

Section 4
Perceptions of changes in the environment

Perceptions of changes in the environment [PDF, 942 KB]
4.1 Water quality in local streams, rivers and lakes  
4.2 Availability of waste recycling facilties and services  
4.3 The air quality in your local area  
4.4 The amount of litter on our highways  
4.5 Overall state of the local environment  

Section 5
Level of concern regarding environmental issues

Level of concern regarding environmental issues [PDF, 1.1 MB]
5.1 Water pollution from industry  
5.2 Water pollution from farmland  
5.3 Water pollution from towns and city areas  
5.4 Loss of natural beach character through development  
5.5 Construction of seawalls to protect property from long term coastal erosion  
5.6 State of native bush and wetlands on private property  
5.7 Spread of cities/towns across farmland  

Section 6
Knowledge of environmental issues

Knowledge of environmental issues [PDF, 807 KB]
6.1 Pollution in rivers and streams mainly from farmland  
6.2 Pollution in rivers and streams mainly from industry  
6.3 Discharges of treated human sewage  

Section 7
Personal environmental action

Personal environmental action [PDF, 828 KB]
7.1 Actions taken to protect the environment  
7.2 Involvement in public actions/meetings  
7.3 Actions taken  
7.4 Effectiveness of public actions taken  
7.5 Public say in the way the environment is managed  

Section 8
Environmental regulations and controls

Environmental regulations and controls [PDF, 1006 KB]
8.1 Council enforcement of rules and laws  
8.2 Protection of significant natural sites  
8.3 Threat of urban sprawl and subdivisions to natural environment  
8.4 Government restrictions of the use of private property  
8.5 Landowners and their own land  
8.6 Council provision for construction in at risk areas  
8.7 Index of attitudes towards environmental regulations  

Section 9
Economy, business and the environment

Economy, business and the environment [PDF, 1.2 MB]
9.1 Healthy environment, healthy economy  
9.2 Sacrificing environmental quality for econmic growth  
9.3 Environmental protection and economic development  
9.4 Farm productivity and waterways  
9.5 Decline in farm economy to acheive better environment  
9.6 Business profit and the environment  
9.7 Businesses minimise negative impacts  
9.8 Businesses and environmentally friendly behaviour  
9.9 Businesses' obligation to the environment  
9.10 Business bearing the expense of meeting environmental standards  
9.11 Public understanding of investment in water quality  
9.12 Balancing economy with the environment scale  

Section 10
New ecological paradigm

New ecological paradigm [PDF, 885 KB]
10.1 The 6-item NEP scale  
10.2 Expanded ecological values scale  
10.3 Scale comparisons  
10.4 Profiling of environmental attitudes within the region  

Section 11
Conclusions

Conclusions [PDF, 301 KB]

Section 12
Territorial authority summaries

Territorial authority summaries [PDF, 1.6 MB]
  Thames-Coromandel  
  Hauraki  
  Waikato  
  Hamilton  
  Matamata-Piako  
  Waipa  
  South Waikato  
  Otorohanga  
  Waitomo  
  Rotorua  
  Taupo  

Section 13
Appendices

Appendices [PDF, 528 KB]
13.1 Appendix 1: Questionnaire  
13.2 Appendix 2: Definition of respondent classification