Does enjoyment focus prevent proenvironmental behaviour?

Abstract

Pro-environmental behaviour occurs less frequently on vacation, but it is not clear why. We hypothesise that people have an enjoyment-focus-related threshold for displaying pro-environmental behaviours. According to this hypothesis, people display pro-environmental behaviour in low-enjoyment-focus contexts (e.g., at home), but not in high-enjoyment-focus contexts (e.g., on vacation). We test whether a threshold exists after which enjoyment focus overrides the willingness to act with the environment in mind. Results show that this is not the case. Contrary to the currently dominant paradigm, enjoyment focus does not prevent pro-environmental tourist behaviour. Additional – currently neglected – theoretical constructs, such as habit and effort, drive such behaviours. The practical implication is that behaviour change interventions may target different constructs, such as habit and effort.