Psychological research has revealed a whole host of phenomena that affect how and whether laws can effectively regulate in any area—environmental or not. Before leaping into the psychologically-distinctive aspects of environmental law, she will provide an overview of these basic psychological phenomena, and describe their applications to law generally and environmental law in particular.
Very generally speaking, the law is concerned with shaping both attitudes and behaviors. Attitudes are made up of, and shaped by, thoughts (“cognitions”) and emotions. Behaviors are influenced by many things, including attitudes, but also by incentives, motives, and by social norms. Interestingly, just as people’s attitudes can affect their behaviors, a person’s own behavior can feed back into and affect their attitudes. The whole process is socially contingent, sensitive to how things are framed, and often more influenced by subtle mechanisms than by strong or obvious ones. Nevertheless, the effects are often predictable.
In her presentation, she focus on what psychology can tell us about getting people to change their attitudes and their behaviors. This is not the only thing that law can do, of course. Law can also allocate goods and bads; resolve disputes; serve as a coordinating focal point for individuals, institutions, and markets; supply security and safety to its members (and even to outsiders); put moral parameters on activities via rights and duties; and so on. But while the law is not only about changing attitudes and behaviors, it is importantly about doing so. Even limiting ourselves to this feature of the law, there are a number of ways to divide up the landscape, and any parceling will be imperfect.
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