Mobility, housing behaviour, and efforts to influence others to be more circular are some of the most tangible ways to observe circular behavior. Over the past two years, the CircEUlar team has collected data from over 5,000 households in five European countries – namely Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Lithuania, and the United Kingdom – to understand how circular people’s behavior currently is. Below, some of what we found.
Willingness to go without owning a car
We asked participants how many cars they currently own, and whether they would get rid of their car when viable alternatives would be available. Overall, around 10% of participants would definitely get rid of their car if viable alternatives were available. People in the UK, Germany, and the Netherlands are less likely to get rid of their car if alternatives were available than people in Italy or Lithuania.
People are more willing to live car-free when they are more aware and concerned about environmental problems and think living car-free would reduce environmental problems.
Willingness to downsize
Relatively few people in all examined countries are willing to downsize to a home smaller than the one they currently live in.
People are more willing to downsize when they feel morally obliged to do so, feel able to downsize, and think that downsizing would be effective in reducing environmental problems.
Influencing others to support circularity
Few people try to influence others, such as their friends and family, the government, or the organization they work for, to adopt more circular behaviours in all five countries. People are somewhat more likely to take action to urge governments to be more circular compared to urging businesses or citizens, especially in Italy and Lithuania.
People are engaging more in actions to influence others when they are more aware and concerned about environmental problems and think that influencing others would reduce environmental problems.
By RUG – The University of Groningen (Department of Environmental Psychology)