Exploring the association between compassion, pro-environmental behaviour and nature connectedness in daily life

Acting pro-environmentally is important to address current global environmental problems, that were caused but can also be addressed through human activities. The intention to act pro-environmental might be based on how compassion a person is, so how much a person recognises the suffering of nature or other humans and the motivation to act on it. Nature connectedness seems to explain the association between compassion and pro-environmental behaviour, but the mediation effect was not investigated yet. The study aims to explore the link between compassion and pro-environmental behaviour. Moreover, it is expected that if someone is compassionate, it is more likely to behave pro-environmentally if they feel connected to nature. A mediation analysis was conducted by using Linear mixed model analyses for the between-person scores as well as for the within-person scores. Differences between participants in levels of state compassion and state pro-environmental behaviour were found. Although the relationship between compassion and pro-environmental behaviour was not found to be mediated by nature connectedness, it was found that nature connectedness has an influence on the pro-environmental behaviour in daily variations. It can be concluded that compassion and nature connectedness are independent factors that increase pro-environmental behaviour.