Using Carbon Footprint Calculations

As promised, here is some advice from my colleague, Amara Brook, at Santa Clara University about how best to use the carbon footprint calculators that we discussed during the sustainability workshop. Amara has conducted numerous studies where she provides students feedback on their ecological footprints (an idea similar to the carbon footprint) and looks at the effects on subsequent pro-environmental behavior. She has a manuscript based on this research that is under review right now (not attached). If anyone is interested in seeing the MS let me know and I will be happy to send it along once it is "in press."

Amara has the following advice for those of you who are thinking about using the CF calculator in your courses:

"The take home point is that negative footprint feedback (what pretty much everyone in developed countries gets) increases pro-environmental behavior only for people who are already committed to environmental protection (kind of like a hypocrisy manipulation - Aronson et al). For people who are not already committed to environmental protection, it reduces pro-environmental behavior. So, what I would suggest to your colleagues is to either only give the footprint to students who are already committed to environmentalism (e.g. probably any upper level environmental studies class), or build commitment to environmental conservation first." If anyone is interested in how to build committment let me know and I can send you some resources or check out http://cbsm.com/pages/guide/commitment. Hope this helps!

submitted by Jessica Nolan. Amara's contact info:
Amara Brook
Psychology Department
Santa Clara University
500 El Camino Real
Santa Clara, CA 95053(408) 554-4810