An Integrated Model of the Theory of Planned Behavior and Value-Belief-Norm for Predicting Students’ Energy-Saving Behavior

Sustainable campus development has become a critical issue for higher education institutions worldwide. Motivating students to develop energy-saving behaviors is considered one of the most effective courses of action, as it ultimately leads to a sustainable campus and lower energy use. Thus, the current study developed a framework based on the Theory of planned behavior (TPB) and Value-belief norm (VBN) to examine the biospheric, altruistic, and egoistic values that encourage students to participate in energy-saving activities, contributing to the development of a sustainable campus. Structural equation modeling was utilized to evaluate the proposed framework using 411 valid responses. The results demonstrated that the proposed framework (R² = .681) outperformed both VBN (R² = .449) and TPB (R² = .498) in predicting students' intentions to engage in energy-saving behavior. Energy-saving communication was also found to be a critical moderator between the students' intention and their predictors. The results indicate that university administrations should develop a more effective approach to communicate the social and personal benefits of energy-saving behavior, thereby optimizing its advantages. The study findings contribute to the critically important and continuously expanding literature on developing sustainable campuses through pro-environmental behaviors.