There is no “I” in nature: The influence of self-awareness on connectedness to nature

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Journal of Environmental Psychology 25 (2005) 427–436 www.elsevier.com/locate/yjevp

There is no ‘‘I’’ in nature: The influence of self-awareness on connectedness to nature$ Cynthia Frantz,1, F. Stephan Mayer1, Chelsey Norton, Mindi Rock Psychology Department, Severance Hall, Oberlin College, Oberlin, OH 44074, USA Available online 27 December 2005

Abstract Environmentalists and ecopsychologists claim that focusing on ‘‘I’’ leads people to feel less connected to nature. The present study empirically tests this argument by manipulating participants’ objective self-awareness (OSA). Heightened OSA has been shown to increase participants’ self-focus, but also increase the impact of individuals’ attitudes and personality characteristics. Integrating these effects, we predicted that individuals lacking pro-environmental internal characteristics (nonenvironmentalists and those high on exploitativeness) would show decreased connection to nature in response to heightened OSA, while individuals with pro-environmental internal characteristics would not. For these individuals, their pro-environmental internal characteristics should counteract the effects of OSA on connection to nature. Two studies provide empirical support for this hypothesis. Implications of this research for proenvironmental actions are discussed. r 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction That human activity has harmed the natural world has been well documented (cf., Pimm, 2001; Gelbspan, 2004). Deforestation, desertification of large areas of land and oceans, burgeoning landfills, reductions in biodiversity, and the ill effects associated with increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have all been linked to human action. Many reasons have been presented for why humans have engaged in this destructive behavior. One perennial theme (cf. Leopold, 1949; Naess, 1989; Roszak, 1995; White, 1967) that has gained recent attention (cf. Kals, Schumacher, & Montada, 1999; Kidner, 2001; Fisher, 2002; Schultz, 2002; Clayton & Opotow, 2003; Mayer & Frantz, 2004) links these environmental problems to the way that modern individuals conceive of their relationship to nature. Developing these ideas further, the present paper focuses on the modern conception of the object self, and the $ Parts of this paper were presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychological Society, Atlanta, GA (May 2003). Corresponding author. Tel.: +1 440 775 8499. E-mail address: [email protected] (C. Frantz). 1 Order of authorship of the first two authors was determined by alphabetical order.

0272-4944/$ - see front matter r 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jenvp.2005.10.002

conditions under which this modern conception of self, with its corresponding ‘‘I,’’ is linked with a decreased sense of connectedness to nature. Various authors associate the beginnings of our modern sense of self with the rise of industrialism (cf. Baumeister, 1987; Kidner, 2001). Baumeister (1987) reviews the historical research on the development of our modern sense of self in Western culture. He concludes that during industrialism, the person became the basic unit or object of attention, replacing the community. Kidner (2001) argues, however, that it is not individuality per se that is at the root of environmental problems. Rather, problems arise when people view themselves as being separate and distinct from the world around them, or, stated differently, when the individual no longer feels a sense of ‘‘resonance’’ or connectedness to the natural world. Leopold (1949) makes a similar point, arguing that the problem with the modern conception of self is that we no longer view ourselves as a ‘‘plain and simple member’’ of the broader natural world. He argues that a sense of connectedness to nature is an important component of resolving environmental problems. In Leopold’s view, connectedness is not simply a love of nature (Kals et al., 1999), although it often leads to such a feeling; nor does it require an individual to subsume the natural world into a

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broader sense of personal identity (Clayton, 2003), although this too may often happen. Instead, he focuses on a feeling of ‘‘resonance’’ to the natural world, and experiencing this sense of relatedness not as an organism that is somehow superior, but equal. Perhaps unfortunately from an environmental standpoint, in our Western, industrialized, individualistic culture people do often view themselves as being separate and distinct from the world around them. The modern sense of individuality is that of a ‘‘bounded, coherent, stable, autonomous, ‘free’ entity’’ that is disconnected from its surroundings (cf. Fiske, Kitayama, Markus, & Nisbett, 1998). Moreover, the Western cultural value of the superiority of humans to other life forms is well entrenched within this worldview (White, 1967). Based on these arguments, then, we view this modern sense of self, which is object-like, separate from, and above the rest of the natural world, as problematic: this manifestation of the object self makes it easier for people to harm nature without feeling the distress that a sense of connectedness with nature would potentially create (Roszak, 1995). Theory and research on helping behavior are consistent with the reasoning that establishing a sense of relatedness is important for helping to occur. Models of helping (Duval, Duval, & Neely, 1979; Hornstein, 1982; Latane & Darley, 1970; Piliavin, Dovidio, Gaertner, & Clark, 1981) characteristically emphasize that a connection between a person and the target of the helping request must exist in order for personal distress and helping to occur. Hornstein (1982) describes this as a feeling of ‘‘we-ness,’’ based upon similarity, group identification, or a sense of interdependence. Recent research on the role of self-other overlap in helping behavior and empathy also supports this line of reasoning. That is, the extent to which one includes another person as part of the self is a core operationalization of relationship closeness (Aron, Aron, Tudor, & Nelson, 1991). As relationship closeness increases, so does empathy and willingness to help (Cialdini, Brown, Lewis, Luce, & Neuberg, 1997). Similarly, acts that lead to a greater selfother overlap, such as perspective taking (Davis, Conklin, Smith, & Luce, 1996; Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000), also increase willingness to help (Coke, Batson, & McDavis, 1978). Does this pattern hold for humans’ relationship to the natural world as well? Shultz (2000) demonstrates that it does. Shultz asked college students to take the perspective of an animal being harmed by human actions, such as an oil spill. In comparison to a control group of students who were not asked to take the perspective of an animal, perspective taking students expressed greater concern for the well being of the animal. Clayton’s (2003) work on environmental identity also points out that when people extend their self-definitions to include the natural world, they are more likely to act in an eco-friendly manner towards the environment.

Mayer and Frantz show a similar link between connection to the environment and eco-friendly behavior, using the newly developed Connectedness to Nature Scale (CNS, Mayer & Frantz, 2004). The CNS is a 14-item scale intended to operationalize Leopold’s vision of relatedness to the natural world. The scale has been shown to have only one factor, to possess high internal consistency (a ¼ :84), test–retest reliability (r ¼ :79), and has also been demonstrated to correlate with biospheric values (r ¼ :49) (Schultz, 2000), and the New Environmental Paradigm (NEP, Stern & Dietz, 1994) (r ¼ :35), a scale that measures attitudes about environmental protection. Given the link between feeling connected to nature and pro-environmental actions, investigating factors that either promote or inhibit this sense of feeling connected to nature is critical, as it may shed light on why people do and do not engage in eco-friendly acts. The aim of the present study is to extend this work on the CNS to objective self-awareness (OSA) theory. As originally presented by Duval and Wicklund (1972) and extended and refined (Wicklund, 1975; Duval & Hensley, 1976; Mayer, Duval, Holtz, & Bowman, 1985; Duval, Duval, & Mulilis, 1992; Duval & Lalwani, 1999; Duval, Silvia, & Lalwani, 2001; Silvia & Duval, 2001; Silvia & Duval, 2004), OSA theory distinguishes between two states of consciousness: OSA and subjective self-awareness (SSA). Although alternative revisions of OSA theory have been presented since Duval and Wicklund’s (1972) original presentation (e.g. Hull & Levy, 1979; Carver & Scheier, 1981, 1998; Gibbons, 1990), the original OSA approach continues to provide the most parsimonious explanation for a variety of findings in this research domain (cf. Silvia & Gendolla, 2001; Silvia & Duval, 2004). The ‘‘objective’’ in OSA does not refer to individuals becoming more objective in the sense of accurate. Instead, based on the Gestalt concept of figure/ground, it refers to individuals’ self becoming the figure of their own attention, with the rest of the perceptual field constituting the ground (Duval et al., 2001; Duval & Wicklund, 1972). In other words, when objectively self aware, the person’s self is thought to ‘‘stand out’’ and detach itself from its surroundings. As Duval et al. (2001) state when introducing this concept, ‘‘Object self y is the internal representation a person refers to as ‘me.’ It is separate and distinct from representations of social others and, indeed, from the world of trees, cats, cars, and other things’’ (p. 17). From this theoretical perspective, attention is viewed as a limited capacity system (Posner & Peterson, 1990; Posner & Digirolamo, 1998): We are not able to focus on everything at once, but instead are capable of only focusing on discrete units in a perceptual field. In this view, focus of attention is something akin to a spotlight (Triesman & Gormian, 1988). Self-directed attention is thought to ‘‘illuminate’’ the self, while the rest of the perceptual field remains in relative ‘‘darkness.’’ In contrast, SSA refers to the state of consciousness when a person is focused away from self, ‘‘experiences himself as the source of perception

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and action’’ (Duval & Wicklund, 1972, p. 3), and ‘‘feels active and agentic, experiential, and unified with the environment through the medium of activity’’ (Silvia & Gendolla, 2001, p. 243). Under conditions of SSA, the boundaries between self and environment are thought to be blurred (Silvia, 2002). Extending this theory, we reason that heightening individuals’ focus on their self as a separate and discrete object in the world should lead them to become more detached from their surroundings and less connected to nature. It is important to note that from this perspective the object self that has emerged in the modern Western world is not always salient in a person’s mind (although modern people may experience OSA more frequently than people with a different conception of self). Consequently, the modern self may not always lead people to experience a sense of feeling disconnected from nature. Thus under some conditions the modern conception of self as object should decrease feelings of connection to nature, but under other conditions (i.e. low OSA conditions) it will not have these effects. However, a second line of research in the area of OSA theory suggests that the effects of increasing OSA are unlikely to be that simple. Multiple studies have demonstrated that increases in OSA increase individuals’ tendencies to seek standards to judge their behavior against (Wicklund & Ickes, 1972; Scheier & Carver, 1983) and to engage in behavior to maximize the similarity between their acts and standards, attitudes, or personality characteristics that have been made salient to them. For instance, early research by Carver (1975) demonstrated that heightened OSA dramatically increased participants’ tendency to act in a manner consistent with their attitudes towards punishment, while Pryor, Gibbons, Wicklund, Fazio, and Hood (1977) demonstrated that trait/behavior consistency was only present under conditions of heightened OSA. More recently, heightened OSA has been shown to increase participants likelihood of adhering to standards regarding stereotyping (Macrae, Bodenhausen,& Milne,1998), consumption of fatty foods (Sentyrz & Bushman, 1998), moral treatment of others (Batson, Thompson, Seuferling, Whitney, & Strongman, 1999), and emotional experiences (Silvia, 2002). Extending these findings, heightened OSA should lead individuals with pro-environmental characteristics to become more aware of these aspects of self, and seek to be consistent with them. Given a relationship between these pro-environmental characteristics and a sense of feeling connected to nature, the increased consistency pressures associated with heightened OSA should lead these individuals to actually express closer feelings to nature. In contrast, increasing the OSA of individuals who lack these pro-environmental characteristics would not. Thus, we hypothesize two forces: (1) that heightening individuals’ focus on their self as a separate and discrete object in the world should lead them to become more cognitively detached from their surroundings

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and less connected to nature, and (2) that heightening individuals’ focus on their self will increase their consistency motivation, which will differentially impact their expressed sense of feeling connected to nature depending upon whether they possess standards, attitudes, or personality characteristics that are either positively or negatively associated with connection to nature. Thus, depending on the internal standards an individual possesses, at times these forces are in opposition to one another and at times they are not. That is, we hypothesize that increasing OSA for individuals with more pro-environmental attitudes or a more pro-environmental personality characteristic pits these two forces against one another. Under these conditions, we hypothesize that the positive effects on CNS scores that should result from the more proenvironmental attitudes or personality characteristic will mitigate the negative effects on CNS scores that should result from making individuals more aware of their object self. Consequently, under these conditions, we do not expect OSA manipulation to differentially impact their expressed feelings of connectedness to nature. On the other hand, for individuals with more anti-environmental attitudes or a more anti-environmental personality characteristic, we expect the OSA manipulation to have a pronounced impact on their expressed feelings of being connected to nature, since in this instance both forces would be operating to decrease individuals’ sense of feeling connected from nature. 2. Study 1 In order to test our hypothesis, we initially concentrated on individuals’ environmental attitudes, which were pretested in an introductory psychology course. Subsequently, as part of a course requirement, participants entered a laboratory setting, where we manipulated the state of OSA in the standard manner of having participants being seated facing either the reflective (high OSA) or nonreflective (low OSA) side of a mirror (cf. Duval et al., 2001). We then measured participants’ connectedness to nature scores. We predicted an interaction effect, such that objectively selfaware individuals with more pro-environmental attitudes were not expected to differ in CNS scores from individuals in the control group, while objectively self-aware individuals with less pro-environmental attitudes were expected to have CNS scores that were significantly lower than the CNS scores of the control group. 2.1. Method 2.1.1. Participants Participants signed up for a study that involved a ‘‘tracing activity.’’ The final sample included 60 (29 female) undergraduate students taking introductory psychology; they received course credit for their participation. Eleven participants failed to complete pretest

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data collected in class, and are not included in the analyses. One participant was eliminated due to outlying scores on several variables.

2.1.2. Procedure Partway through the semester during class time (but before laboratory data collection) participants completed two scales. They completed the CNS, which contains items such as ‘‘I often feel a sense of oneness with the natural world around me,’’ ‘‘I think of the natural world as a community to which I belong,’’ ‘‘I often feel a kinship with animals and plants,’’ ‘‘I feel as though I belong to the Earth as equally as it belongs to me, and ‘‘When I think of my place on Earth, I consider myself to be a top member of a hierarchy that exist in nature’’ (reverse scored). The scale was scored on a 5 point scale (1 ¼ ‘‘strongly disagree,’’ and 5 ¼ ‘‘strongly agree’’) and was reliable (a ¼ :84). Participants also completed two items used in previous research (Mayer & Frantz, 2004) designed to measure their pro-environmental attitudes (a ¼ :74). The items, which participants rated on the same 5-point scale used for the CNS, were ‘‘Environmental concerns outweigh all other concerns in my life’’ and ‘‘I would call myself an environmentalist.’’ Later in the semester, participants were invited to complete the second part of the study. However, no connection was made between the classroom and laboratory parts of the study. Participants arrived in groups of 2–6 and were greeted by a female experimenter. They were randomly assigned to cubicles. In each cubicle there was a blank sheet of paper for the tracing task and a mirror with either the reflective or nonreflective side facing out. The cubicles with the mirror facing out also contained a ‘‘tracing device,’’ a cardboard box into which participants would insert their hands to do the tracing activity. The end of the box facing the mirror was cut out to allow the participants to see the reflections of their hands. The faceout mirror served as our manipulation of self-awareness, and has been used successfully in numerous studies (cf. Gibbons, 1990). The tracing device provided a cover story for the presence of the mirror. Once seated in cubicles, participants were asked to complete several pre-measures before doing the tracing task. After completing two filler questionnaires, they completed the state version of the CNS. The state version contains 13 of the same 14 items as the trait version, simply reworded. For example, the item ‘‘I often feel a sense of oneness with the natural world around me’’ was instead ‘‘Right now I feel a sense of oneness with the natural world around me.’’ The scale was scored on a 5 point scale (1 ¼ ‘‘strongly disagree,’’ and 5 ¼ ‘‘strongly agree’’) and was reliable (a ¼ :82). After completing the state CNS participants were informed that they would not actually complete the tracing activity, and were fully debriefed.

2.2. Results and discussion Before conducting our main analyses, we first examined the correlations between our dependent measure and covariates. The trait and state measures correlated highly with each other, r ¼ :75, po:001. The environmental attitudes measure correlated significantly with the state measure (r ¼ :54, po:01) and the trait measure (r ¼ :47, po:01). There were no pre-existing differences between the experimental groups on trait CNS scores or environmental attitudes (p’s4:18). The test of our main hypothesis is an interaction between a categorical independent variable (self-awareness) and a continuous independent variable (environmental attitudes). Regression analyses are typically used to test such an effect. However, when interaction terms are included in regression equations, problems with collinearity (excessive correlations between the dependent variables) often arise. Centering the variables (subtracting the mean from each variable in the interaction term, then computing the interaction term by multiplying the centered variables) usually eliminates this problem. However, in this data set collinearity remained a problem (tolerance o.4) even after the variables were cenetered. Because collinearity biases regression estimates and inflates error terms (Fox, 1991), a different analytic strategy was adapted. We tested changes in CNS scores using a 2 (gender)
2 (self-awareness) ANCOVA, with environmental attitudes included as a continuous variable. We specified the model to include all possible interaction terms, including the selfawareness by environmental attitudes interaction, the selfawareness by sex interaction, and the self-awareness by sex by environmental attitudes interaction. Trait CNS scores were included as a control.2 Thus all effects indicate the extent to which participants’ state level of connectedness to nature differ from the baseline trait level. Effect sizes were calculated using Z2, a measure of the percent of total variance accounted for by the effect. Not surprisingly, trait CNS scores significantly predicted state CNS scores, F ð1; 40Þ ¼ 55:8, po:001, Z2 ¼ :58. Environmental attitudes also significantly predicted state CNS scores, F ð1; 40Þ ¼ 4:46, po:05, Z2 ¼ :10. The main effect of OSA was marginal, F ð1; 49Þ ¼ 3:82, p ¼ :06, Z2 ¼ :09. Those in the high OSA condition were slightly less connected to nature (M ¼ 3:18, s.d. ¼ :56) than those in the low OSA condition (M ¼ 3:4, s.d. ¼ :60). Gender effects were nonsignificant. As predicted, there was a marginally significant interaction effect between OSA and environmental attitudes, F ð1; 40Þ ¼ 3:06, po:10, Z2 ¼ :07. 2 Trait CNS was included as a covariate, and not as a repeated measures factor for two reasons. First, the scales used at each time are not identical; one includes 13 items and measures CNS state, while the other contains 14, slightly differently worded items, and measures trait levels. Second, using a premeasure as a repeated measures factor assumes a regression weight between the pre and postmeasure of 1. This is not always the case; including the premeasure as a covariate allows the computer to calculate a more precise regression weight.

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3.6 High Self Aware Low Self Aware Connectedness to Nature

3.4

3.2

3

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2.4 Anti-Envi Pro-Envi Environmental Attitudes Fig. 1. Study 1: Connectedness to nature as a function of self-awareness and environmental attitudes.

For ease of interpretation, the predicted interaction between OSA and environmental attitudes is depicted in Fig. 1 by using a median split on the attitude measure. Participants with more pro-environmental attitudes showed equally high levels of connectedness to nature when they were made objectively self aware (M ¼ 3:56, s.d. ¼ :51) as when they were not (M ¼ 3:69, s.d. ¼ :44). Participants with the less pro-environmental attitudes were less connected to nature when objectively self-aware (M ¼ 2:95, s.d. ¼ :51) than when they were not (M ¼ 3:22, s.d. ¼ :55). Our findings are consistent with the idea that OSA decreases connectedness to nature. Those who lacked proenvironmental attitudes showed a decrease in CNS scores, and those with pro-environmental attitudes showed no change in CNS scores, despite the fact that OSA should have highlighted their internal values and attitudes and enhanced their consistency motivation. Looked at another way, pro-environmental attitudes seem to mitigate the effect of OSA on connectedness to nature. It could be argued that participants with pro-environmental attitudes do not increase in connectedness to nature because of a ceiling effect; however this explanation seems unlikely because their mean of 3.4 is well below the maximum possible score of 5. 3. Study 2 Study 2 provides a simple replication of Study 1, and also extends our hypotheses to a personality characteristic, narcissism, which has been linked with environmental

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issues. The narcissistic personality is defined as an overinflated sense of self-worth. It is comprised of feelings of entitlement, exploitativeness, a grandiose sense of selfimportance, fantasies of success, power, brilliance, and a lack of empathy (DSM-III; American Psychiatric Association, 1980). We decided to focus on this personality characteristic because from Leopold’s perspective this trait epitomizes the type of personality characteristic that should lead people to view themselves as being superior and not equal to the natural world. Consequently, from this perspective, the narcissistic personality can be viewed as a major barrier to resolving environmental problems. Underlining the importance of this trait, ecopsychologists (Kanner & Gomes, 1995) argue that narcissism has become more prevalent during modern times, especially with the rise of cultures of consumption. They also link this personality characteristic to unsustainable consumption patterns and environmental damage. However, although from both Leopold’s and the ecopsychological perspective the argument can be made that heightened narcissism should be associated with individuals feeling less connected to nature, empirically this hypothesis has not been tested. Personality researchers treat narcissism as an individual difference characteristic and they have become increasingly interested in this characteristic since the late 1970s (Raskin & Hall, 1979; Raskin & Terry, 1988; Raskin & Novacek, 1989; Gabriel, Critelli, & Ee, 1994). Moreover, although Kanner and Gomes (1995) discuss the characteristic of narcissism as if it were a unitary construct, personality researchers have found it to be a multidimensional construct, comprised of four general components: exploitativeness/entitlement, authority/leadership, superiority/arrogance, and self-admiration/self-absorption. Of the four components that comprise this characteristic, one component in particular, exploitativeness/entitlement, has been associated with the greatest degree of negativity and dysfunction (Raskin & Terry, 1988; Raskin & Novacek, 1989). For instance, Raskin and Terry (1988) have empirically demonstrated its relationship to dominance, power, hostility towards others, lack of tolerance, lack of self-control, and irresponsibility, while the other aspects of narcissism were shown to be associated with less negative characteristics, like self-dramatizing, sociability, assertiveness, self-satisfaction, self-confidence, achievement-orientation, and feeling pleased with one’s own physical appearance. Thus on the basis of this research, there is reason to expect that narcissism as a whole is not as problematic for the environment as the more specific exploitativeness/entitlement component. For this reason we expected that this component would exhibit the strongest negative relationship to feelings of connectedness to nature. To examine the role of narcissism in connectedness to nature, introductory psychology students completed a narcissism measure and were subsequently led into another room to complete a ‘‘tracing task,’’ as in Study 1. Once again, we predicted an interaction effect. Objectively self-

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aware individuals with more pro-environmental attitudes or a more pro-environmental personality characteristic (individuals scoring lower on exploitativeness/entitlement) were expected to show no increase in CNS scores in comparison to individuals in the control group, while objectively self-aware individuals with less pro-environmental attitudes or an anti-environmental personality characteristic (individuals scoring higher on exploitativeness/entitlement) were expected to have CNS scores that were significantly lower than the CNS scores from the control group. 3.1. Method 3.1.1. Participants Participants included 66 (39 female) undergraduate students taking introductory psychology; they received course credit for their participation. Twelve participants failed to complete data collected in class, and are not included in the analyses. 3.1.2. Procedure At the beginning of the semester during class time participants completed the trait version of the CNS (a ¼ :84) and the two environmental attitudes items from Study 1 (a ¼ :67). Later in the semester they were recruited to take part in two ostensibly unrelated studies scheduled together for their convenience. The first was described as a study of personality, and the second one was described as a ‘‘tracing activity.’’ No connection was made between the laboratory and classroom parts of the study. Participants arrived in groups of 2–6 and were greeted by a female experimenter. They were seated around a large table, and asked to complete the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (NPI, Raskin & Hall, 1981). The NPI contains 54 items and 4 subscales: authority, superiority, selfabsorption, and exploitativeness/entitlement. The exploitativeness/entitlement subscale is made up of 8 pairs of items, from which participants choose the one that describes them best. Sample pairs include ‘‘I find it easy to manipulate people/I don’t like it when I find myself manipulating people’’ and ‘‘I insist upon getting the respect that is due me/I usually get the respect that I deserve.’’ The subscale was acceptably reliable (a ¼ :67). After completing the NPI, participants were led across the hall to another room where a second experimenter greeted them. Procedures were identical to those used in Study 1: Participants were seated in individual cubbies with the mirror either facing towards them or away from them. The reliability of the state CNS for this study was high (a ¼ :85). 3.2. Results and discussion Before conducting our main analyses, we first examined the correlations between our dependent measure and covariates. The trait and state measures again correlated

highly with each other, r ¼ :68, po:001. The pro-environmental attitudes measure correlated significantly with the state measure (r ¼ :44, po:01) and the trait measure (r ¼ :41, po:01). Exploitativeness/entitlement correlated negatively with trait CNS (r ¼ :38, po:01) and with state CNS (r ¼ :28, po:05). As predicted, exploitativeness/ entitlement was the only narcissism subscale that correlated significantly with either CNS scale, the other subscales average r ¼ :05, p’s4:10. There were no pre-existing differences between the experimental groups on CNS trait, exploitativeness/entitlement, or environmental attitudes (p’s4:40). Using the same analysis strategy as Study 1, we tested changes in CNS using a 2 (gender)
2 (self-awareness) ANCOVA, with environmental attitudes and exploitativeness/entitlement included as continuous variables. As in Study 1, we specified the model to include all possible interaction terms. Trait CNS scores were again included as a control. Thus all effects indicate the extent to which participants’ state level of connectedness to nature differ from the baseline trait level. Effect sizes were calculated using Z2. Trait CNS scores significantly predicted state CNS scores, F ð1; 46Þ ¼ 34:14, po:001, Z2 ¼ :43. Environmental attitudes predicted state CNS scores only marginally, F ð1; 46Þ ¼ 3:44, p ¼ :07, Z2 ¼ :07. Exploitativeness/entitlement did not predict state CNS scores, F ð1; 46Þ ¼ :76, n.s. The main effect of OSA was not significant, F ð1; 46Þ ¼ 1:81, p ¼ :19, Z2 ¼ :04, although those in the high OSA condition were slightly less connected to nature (M ¼ 3:09, s.d. ¼ :62) than those in the low 3.6

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3

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2.4 Anti-Envi Pro-Envi Environmental Attitudes Fig. 2. Study 2: Connectedness to nature as a function of self-awareness and environmental attitudes.

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OSA condition (M ¼ 3:25, s.d. ¼ :55.) Gender effects were also nonsignificant. As predicted, however, and replicating our findings from Study 1, there was a significant OSA
environmental attitudes interaction, F ð1; 46Þ ¼ 5:20, po:05, Z2 ¼ :10. This interaction is graphically depicted in Fig. 2 using a median split on environmental attitudes. As in Study 1, participants with pro-environmental attitudes showed equally high levels of connectedness to nature when they were made objectively self-aware (M ¼ 3:47, s.d. ¼ :63) as when they were not (M ¼ 3:46, s.d. ¼ :71). Participants with less positive environmental attitudes were less connected to nature when objectively self-aware (M ¼ 2:80, s.d. ¼ :45) than when they were not (M ¼ 3:07, s.d. ¼ :30). Fig. 3 depicts the significant interaction between OSA and exploitativeness/entitlement, F ð1; 46Þ ¼ 6:7, po:05, Z2 ¼ :13. As predicted, participants who lacked an antienvironmental personality characteristic (individuals scoring relatively low on exploitativeness/entitlement) were equally connected to nature when they were made objectively self-aware (M ¼ 3:42, s.d. ¼ :62) as when they were not (M ¼ 3:32, s.d. ¼ :68). In contrast, participants with an anti-environmental personality characteristic (participants scoring higher in exploitativeness/entitlement) were less connected to nature when objectively self-aware (M ¼ 2:90, s.d. ¼ :48) than when they were not (M ¼ 3:28, s.d. ¼ :38). The three-way interaction between exploita-

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tiveness/entitlement, environmental attitudes, and OSA was not significant, p4:50. This study provides a simple replication of the environmental attitudes findings from Study 1, and a conceptual replication of these findings by extending this research to the exploitativeness/entitlement component of narcissism. In the high objectively self-aware condition, participants with pro-environmental attitudes did not show a decrease in CNS scores, presumably because their internal standards had been made salient. In contrast, participants in this condition with high exploitativeness/entitlement scores did show a decrease in CNS scores, presumably because their sense of ‘‘dominion over the earth’’ had been made salient. In each case, the salience of internal characteristics created a change in connectedness to nature; the direction of this change, however, depended upon the nature of the internal characteristic. Additionally, it is important to note that the high objectively self-aware participants with pro-environmental attitudes or a pro-environmental personality characteristic did not experience a greater sense of feeling connected to nature than similar participants in the less self-aware condition, suggesting that the heightened awareness of one’s internal standards is counteracted by the disconnecting effects of seeing self as object. Again, a ceiling effect seems an unlikely explanation for their lack of increase in CNS scores, because the mean of 3.47 is well below the maximum value of 5. 4. General discussion

3.6 High Self Aware Low Self Aware 3.4

Connectedness to Nature

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Environment-Relevant Trait Fig. 3. Study 2: Connectedness to nature as a function of self-awareness and exploitativeness.

Across both studies, the combination of a lack of proenvironment attitudes and heightened OSA led to decreases in connectedness to nature. In contrast, those who held pro-environment attitudes showed no overall change in connectedness to nature. This is consistent with the idea that two opposing forces are at work: heightened OSA decreases connectedness to nature, but also highlights and activates internal attitudes and traits. In Study 2, a similar pattern emerged for the trait exploitativeness/entitlement. Under conditions of OSA, those high in exploitativeness/ entitlement showed a decrease in connectedness to nature, while those low in exploitativeness/entitlement did not. These findings are consistent with the argument that the modern development of the individual as the basic unit or object of attention does pose a problem for the environment. However, these findings also point out the specific situational contexts in which this modern sense of self poses the greatest threat to the environment: namely, when individuals are focused on themselves as an object in the world and they lack pro-environmental attitudes or possess an anti-environmental personality characteristic. In the presence of pro-environmental internal characteristics, the negative effects of OSA were minimized. Thus, the findings suggest that the rise of the separate and distinct self in modern culture does have implications for environmental issues, but that these implications are of concern primarily

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when the focus on the object self is coupled with less favorable environmental internal characteristics. One weakness of the current studies is that we do not directly demonstrate the simultaneous forces of OSA and pro-environmental characteristics; instead we measure only their logical symptoms. We do not see this as a fatal flaw of the studies, however, for two reasons. First, numerous studies (cited in the introduction) support the relationship between heightened OSA and consistency motivation; there is no compelling reason to believe the effects would be different here. Second, the idea that heightened OSA causes one to see self as figure of one’s own attention is a definitional assumption of OSA theory. Additionally, multiple studies have demonstrated that heightened OSA leads to increased salience and use of first-person pronouns, such as ‘‘I’’ (cf. Eichstaedt & Silvia, 2003). Nevertheless, in the current paradigm we did not measure these forces, for we feared that trying to measure each of these forces would be too obtrusive, and introduce too many demand characteristics into the study. A goal of future research, however, should be to identify ways to measure these simultaneous forces and their relative strength. They may differentially impact CNS scores as a function of different person/setting characteristics, such as whether attitude or personality characteristic is more or less central to a person and the relative intensity of the selffocused state. Despite this weakness, these studies contribute to a relatively new body of empirical research demonstrating that humans’ relationship to nature is critical to addressing our modern environmental problems (Kals et al., 1999; Schultz, 2002; Clayton, 2003; Mayer & Frantz, 2004). The present studies add to this discussion by operationalizing Leopold’s ideas about the modern self and narcissism, and testing them empirically. For instance, to address Leopold’s argument that the barrier to positive environmental change rests in our separation of self from nature, the present studies employ a scale, the CNS, which empirically taps into this experience. The scale provides a powerful tool for this and enables future researchers to investigate in a very concrete manner factors that increase and decrease Leopold’s sense of connectedness to nature that seems critical for improving environmental conditions. Additionally, the theory of OSA provides a research base and operational definition that adds further clarity to the discussion of modern individuality and the self/nonself distinction. This theory also generates more questions, for the sense of ‘‘object’’ self presented in this theory maps onto the sense of self associated with more industrialized, individualistic cultures. In this type of culture self is thought of as being an autonomous entity that is decontextualized or independent from its surroundings (Fiske et al., 1998). Our studies suggest that focal attention directed at this particular type of socially constructed self, which corresponds to developments in our modern world, is partially responsible for the

outcomes we obtained. This argument does not contradict the discussion of individuality presented by Kidner, Leopold, Roszak, and others in the introduction, but adds depth to it. Moreover, taking the ecopsychologists’ discussion of narcissism and demonstrating that it is not narcissism per se, but a specific component of narcissism, exploitativeness/entitlement, further pinpoints the aspect of narcissism that may have the most negative environmental impact. The findings of the present studies also extend traditional social psychological theories to nature. The ecopsychologists’ challenge to mainstream psychological theory and research is to make it less anthropocentric and, as Roszak (1995) states, to extend it past the city limits. To date, OSA theory has solely examined the impact of heightened selfawareness on different aspect of social functioning. Similarly, research on helping behavior and empathy has focused on responses to other humans in need. With these studies we clearly show that these theories have important implications for how we relate to the environment as well. From an environmentalist’s point of view, extending people’s sense of self to the natural world is important. Our findings suggest that if people were made to feel less selfaware that they might come to feel more connected to nature, regardless of their environment-relevant internal characteristics. For example, Fig. 3 illustrates that high and low exploitative/entitled participants did not differ in connectedness to nature under low OSA conditions. Generally speaking, then, making people less self-absorbed might promote their sense of feeling more connected to nature, even when they possess an anti-environmental characteristic. On the other hand, these findings also suggest that by promoting pro-environmental attitudes or by nurturing pro-environmental personality characteristics, regardless of whether or not a person is self-aware, people may come to experience a greater sense of connectedness to nature. Our findings partially support the statement made by the ecopsychologist Walter Christie, that ‘‘The illusion of separateness we create in order to utter the words ‘I am’ is part of our problem in the modern world.’’ Yet they also suggest that this problem can be overcome by a concerted effort to identify and nurture a more complete sphere of pro-environmental attitudes and personality characteristics, for these characteristics seem to mitigate the negative effects of heightened OSA. Although we have employed a specific environmental attitude measure and a measure of a personality characteristic that has been highlighted within the ecopsychology literature, there is reason to believe that other environmental measures and measures of personality characteristics related to power and mastery motivation might also be of interest. Additionally, measures related to egalitarianism, hierarchy, and material consumption might be investigated. After all, at the heart of Leopold’s vision is a sense of a person becoming a ‘‘plain and simple member’’ of a natural community, and measures related to less

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exploitativeness and/or less separation of self from others might extend to less separation of self from nature. Lastly, uniting previously unrelated areas of work in the empirical realm is of value because research questions beget more questions and new directions of inquiry. For instance, how might one enable people to control their attentional processes so that they might feel a greater sense of feeling connected to nature? Would self-awareness manipulations in more collectivistic cultures, where self is thought to be more permeable, result in similar outcomes? What are other pro-environmental attitudes and personality characteristics that might impact CNS scores? Might measures related to power and mastery motivation, egalitarianism, hierarchy, and material consumption impact these scores? How do we nurture pro-environmental characteristics in ourselves and others? The link between our measure of feeling connected to nature and engaging in pro-environmental actions also needs to be elaborated upon. Although CNS scores have been shown to predict eco-friendly behavior, will an increased sense of interdependence with the natural world always promote eco-friendly acts? These are all good questions and need more than discussion. Research needs to inform our answers and help to guide us in trying to address these pressing issues.

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