Self-Reporting Conservation Behaviour: Involvement, Engagement, and Social Desirability Bias

Having reliable information on the main influences on the conservation behaviour of individuals is crucial to the evaluation of policy measures intended to promote sustainability. Knowing the potential for survey respondents to overstate the frequency with which they engage in behaviours that are thought desirable and understate the frequency with which they engage in behaviours that are thought undesirable is a matter of practical importance. This potential depends in part on the importance to them of appearing to be socially responsible with respect to conservation behaviours. We used crosswise questioning to investigate the influence of social desirability bias on self-reporting of conservation behaviour by members of the public in New Zealand. We also investigated the extent to which the importance of conservation influences the extent of apparent bias in respondents’ reporting of their behaviour. We found that the effect of social desirability bias on self-reports of conservation behaviour by members of the public in New Zealand may be substantial, being of the order of 20%, but also, counter-intuitively, that this bias may lead to under-reporting of conservation behaviours as well as over-reporting. We also found that the incidence of social desirability bias was associated with the personal importance of conservation to respondents.