Predicting college students' future intentions to engage in public-sphere water conservation behaviors

Austin Wise; Donald Johnson; George Wardlow; Kathi Jogan

doi:10.37433/aad.v2i2.107

Authors

Austin Wise University of Nebraska - Lincoln, USA https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9388-4946
Donald Johnson University of Arkansas, USA https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2592-654X
George Wardlow University of Arkansas, USA https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5701-8250
Kathi Jogan University of Arkansas, USA https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8884-0164

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.37433/aad.v2i2.107

Keywords:

subjective norms, Theory of Planned Behavior, environment

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to describe selected college students’ (N = 252) perceptions of and future intentions (FI) to engage in public-sphere water conservation behaviors, and to determine if FI could be predicted by a single or linear combination of student demographic characteristics and latent variables. A majority of respondents agreed a growing population will negatively affect water quantity (90.5%) and there is a need for water resource management (85.6%). A majority disagreed or strongly disagreed that they (53.4%), their family (57.1%), or their friends (67.5%) practiced water conservation, or that people in their hometowns were concerned about local water availability (78.1%). A majority agreed they would engage in four of five public-sphere water conservation behaviors in the future: support water conservation programs (86.4%), care more deeply about water conservation (81.2%), join a water conservation organization (79.2%), and vote for stricter water use laws (55.0%). Fewer than one-half agreed or strongly agreed they would donate money to support water conservation (45.8%). Responses to statements concerning water conservation were factor analyzed and two factors were extracted: lack of agency (LA) and subjective norms (SN). A linear combination of gender, LA, and SN explained 36.7% of the variance in FI.

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