ABSTRACT
Now the question remains whether there is a link between environmental attitudes and environmental behavior. Substantial research on the relationship between attitudes and behavior in psychological and sociological journals dates back to the 1930s and even further (for example, LaPiere 1934). However, economists have not really contributed to the area, perhaps due to the fact that many are still reluctant to work with attitudinal questions. This literature has already generated many papers establishing that attitudes predispose individuals to behave in a certain manner. According to Ajzen and Fishbein (1980) and Lewis (1982), behavior can be predicted from behavioral intentions which may be attributed to attitudes and subjective norms, which in turn can be predicted from beliefs. However, after reviewing the literature concerning the direct path from attitudes to behavior, Bagozzi et al. (1989) state that the existing findings give a mixed picture, with some studies finding a significant direct effect and others not. Ajzen and Fishbein (1977) reviewed 109 investigations and discovered that 84 displayed either low (mostly non-significant), partial (inconsistent or low but statistically significant), or high correspondence (statistically significant, considerable magnitude) between attitudinal and behavioral entities. The authors stress that “inappropriate measures tend to reduce the obtained relations between attitude and behavior, but appropriate measures invariably produce strong relationships” (Ajzen and Fishbein 1977: 913). Our justifiability of littering variable is closely linked to the compliance literature that has focused on tax morale proxied by the justifiability of paying taxes (Torgler 2007) or the justifiability of corruption (Torgler and Valev 2006, 2009). A recent study on tax compliance uses field, survey, and experimental data (Torgler et al. 2007) and finds strong evidence that attitudes affect behavior.
