An Environmental Attitude Survey: Costa Rica.

Abstract

In Latin America, Costa Rica has been outst and ing in attending to national environmental issues. Policy decisions and conservation efforts, however, continue without the benefit of essential baseline data. This study surveys the underlying attitudes of the people of this Central American country, and develops communication recommendations for the future diffusion of information concerning the environment and natural resource issues. This research examines the flow of information and strategies for environmental communication. An interdisciplinary approach combining communication theory with a technical knowledge of natural resource issues is used to assess existing attitudes and to identify relationships between such variables as environmental concern, nationalism, environmental awareness, mass media use, political concern, and activism. The process and strategies developed in this study provide a basis for reasoning and planning that is transferable to any country attempting to improve the human and natural environment relationship. Using a structured, st and ardized questionnaire, interviewers r and omly selected 255 respondents from designated high, medium and low income areas. In all, nine neighborhoods in San Jose Province were surveyed. Major findings suggest that a general pro-environment attitude exists in Costa Rica; environmental concern is high; and , environmental awareness is high. However, environmental awareness is not necessarily related to concern for the environment. Other findings indicate that mass media have no significant effect on building environmental awareness or concern, but in Costa Rica, opinion leaders, especially government leaders, are effective sources of environmental information. The most interesting relationship uncovered was a strong, positive correlation between environmental concern and nationalism. Whereas in most countries, concern for the environment is often an alternative to the national, political, environmental agenda, in Costa Rica, environmental concern is seen as equivalent to governmental concern.