The Environmental Psychology of Pro-Sustainability Virtues: Victor Corral-Verdugo, Martha Frías-Armenta, and Anais Ortiz-Valdez

This chapter analyzes variables that may enhance or constrain the development of pro-sustainability virtues, and it discusses how certain changes in environmental conditions may lead virtuous people to produce either pro-sustainable or anti-sustainable behaviors. In our analysis, virtues are conceived as traits serving adaptive purposes and subject to environmental influences, which can moderate the virtues–sustainable behavior relationship. We introduce a framework to investigate environment–behavior interactions that include pro-sustainability virtues. This framework is based on the idea that “positive environments,” settings that are able to meet human needs, simultaneously incite the development of virtuous tendencies and behaviors aimed at protecting the socio-physical environment.