Richter Isabell, Sumeldan Joel, Avillanosa Arlene, Gabe-Thomas Elizabeth, Creencia Lota, Pahl Sabine
Department of Psychology, University of Plymouth, Plymouth, United Kingdom.
Institute of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway.
Front Psychol. 2021 Nov 22;12:627972. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.627972. eCollection 2021.
Scenarios can be used to communicate potential future changes and engage and connect different audiences in exploring sustainable solutions. Communicating scenarios using creative visualisation, co-creation and a focus on local contexts are especially promising. This research is conducted on the island of Palawan in the Philippines as part of the GCRF Blue Communities project. With a quasi-experimental design, we investigate the psychological and emotional effects of the engagement with future scenarios as a tool for communicating sustainability. Together with local stakeholders and community members, three distinct, locally relevant scenario narratives (Business as Usual, Best Case, and Worst Case) have been co-created. Subsequently, a sample of = 109 local high school students was asked to creatively engage with these scenario narratives. Intentions to engage in sustainable behaviour, perceived behavioural control, ascription of responsibility, consideration of future consequences, six basic emotions and connectedness to place were assessed before and after the activity via paper-pencil administrated questionnaires. A mixed-model analysis showed significant increases in intentions to engage in sustainable behaviour, however, this increase disappeared when consideration of future consequences was added as a covariate, suggesting a mediating effect. The level of consideration of future consequences also increased significantly after engaging with any of the future scenarios, which questions the common interpretation of consideration of future consequences as a trait variable. Perceived behavioural control significantly increased following the engagement with each of the scenarios whereas ascription of responsibility and connectedness to place did not show any changes. Overall, the two most emotion-evoking scenarios, Best Case Scenario and Worst Case Scenario, turn out as superior over the Business as Usual Scenario, which points to the relevance of emotional framing for effective messaging in our sample. This is the first systematic, quantitative assessment of the effects of future scenarios as a communication tool.
情景可用于传达未来可能的变化，并让不同受众参与并共同探索可持续解决方案。运用创意可视化、共同创造并关注当地背景来传达情景尤其具有前景。本研究是作为全球挑战研究基金（GCRF）蓝色社区项目的一部分，在菲律宾巴拉望岛开展的。通过准实验设计，我们调查了将参与未来情景作为一种传达可持续性的工具所产生的心理和情感影响。与当地利益相关者和社区成员共同创造了三种不同的、与当地相关的情景叙事（照常营业、最佳情况和最坏情况）。随后，从109名当地高中生中抽取样本，要求他们以创意方式参与这些情景叙事。通过纸笔问卷调查，在活动前后评估了参与可持续行为的意图、感知行为控制、责任归属、对未来后果的考虑、六种基本情绪以及与地方的联系。混合模型分析显示，参与可持续行为的意图显著增加，然而，当将对未来后果的考虑作为协变量加入时，这种增加就消失了，这表明存在中介效应。在参与任何一个未来情景后，对未来后果的考虑水平也显著提高，这对将对未来后果的考虑视为一种特质变量的常见解释提出了质疑。在参与每个情景后，感知行为控制显著增加，而责任归属和与地方的联系则没有任何变化。总体而言，最能引发情绪的两个情景，即最佳情况情景和最坏情况情景，比照常营业情景更具优势，这表明在我们的样本中，情感框架对于有效信息传递具有相关性。这是对未来情景作为一种沟通工具的效果进行的首次系统定量评估。
