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Given the endowment effect, the role of attention in decision‐making, and the framing effect, most behavioural economists agree that it would be a mistake to accept the satisfaction of revealed preferences as the normative criterion of choice. Some have suggested that what makes agents better off is not the satisfaction of revealed preferences, but 'true' preferences, which may not always be observed through choice. While such preferences may appear to be an improvement over revealed preferences, some philosophers of economics have argued that they face insurmountable epistemological, normative, and methodological challenges. This article introduces a new kind of true preference – values‐based preferences – that blunts these challenges. Agents express values‐based preferences when they choose in a manner that is compatible with a consumption plan grounded in a value commitment that is normative, affective, and stable for the agent who has one. Agents who choose according to their plans are resolute choosers. My claim is that while values‐based preferences do not apply to every choice situation, this kind of preference provides a rigorous way for thinking about classic choice situations that have long interested behavioural economists and philosophers of economics, such as 'Joe‐in‐the‐cafeteria.' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ecological economics is an interdisciplinary science that is primarily concerned with developing interventions to achieve sustainable ecological and economic systems. While ecological economists have, over the last few decades, made various empirical, theoretical, and conceptual advancements, there is one concept in particular that remains subject to confusion: critical natural capital. While critical natural capital denotes parts of the environment that are essential for the continued existence of our species, the meaning of terms commonly associated with this concept, such as 'non-substitutable' and 'impossible to substitute,' require a clearer formulation then they tend to receive. With the help of equations and graphs, this article develops new definite account of critical natural capital that makes explicit what it means for objective environmental conditions to be essential for continued existence. The second main part of this article turns to the question of formally modelling the priority of conserving critical natural capital. While some ecological economists have maintained that, beyond a certain threshold, critical natural capital possesses absolute infinite value, absolute infinite utility models encounter significant problems. This article shows that a relative infinite utility model provides a better way to model the priority of conserving critical natural capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Science is often described as a set of discipline-specific paradigms that share common concepts, theories, and practices. However, during the Anthropocene, this image of science has become inapplicable and is potentially damaging. Today, many natural and social scientists confront problems and systems that transgress traditional disciplinary boundaries--we focus on ecologists and economists. We claim that these changes justify rethinking the prevailing image of science, along with the relation between life scientists and social scientists. The time is ripe to recognize the new normal in Anthropocene science and spell out what transdisciplinary problems entail for research practice. We suggest three central issues should be recognized by any adequate characterization of the new normal. First, given the preponderance of natural-social systems in the Anthropocene, we claim that there are circumstances when analyzing such systems requires new methodological standards. Second, Anthropocene science will increasingly involve discussions that link the normative and the scientific, where questions of how and what we should study imply questions of value. Finally, because the vast majority of Anthropocene science will be interdisciplinary, we identify some of the mechanisms that allow researchers to engage with social scientists and scholars in the humanities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People who are engaged in Transformative Phenomenology develop rich descriptions of lived experiences on various topics and produce reflective commentaries, both of which serve as inputs into the research published in this volume. This edited volume will surely be of interest to phenomenologists who focus on environmental problems and perhaps some environmental philosophers who wish to take a different angle on addressing environmental problems. Students and strangers primarily wrote about what the editors of this volume refer to as "Lifeworlds" and "Deathworlds.". [Extracted from the article]

This paper has three main objectives: (i) to investigate whether the four-quadrant approach introduced by J.S. Maini reveals a useful typology for grouping countries by gross domestic product (GDP) and forest cover per capita, (ii) to determine if the framework can enhance our understanding of the relationship between forest cover and GDP per capita, and (iii) to investigate why countries in the four-quadrant world occupy different quadrants and to determine the principal factors affecting country movement across and within the individual quadrants. The examination reveals that countries can be classified into four broad categories and that GDP and forest cover per capita have a low but consistent level of negative association. After regressing economic, institutional, social capital, and other variables on a country’s occupancy and movement in the four-quadrant world, the results suggest that countries in each quadrant share different characteristics and that factors underlying country movement vary according to the quadrant being observed. Overall, countries with less corruption and higher education are likely to experience increases in both forest cover and GDP per capita, while countries exporting a significant proportion of forest products have a reduced probability of increasing both variables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While no one denies that science depends on epistemic values, many philosophers of science have wrestled with the appropriate role of non-epistemic values, such as social, ethical, and political values. Recently, philosophers of science have overwhelmingly accepted that non-epistemic values should play a legitimate role in science. The recent philosophical debate has shifted from the value-free ideal in science to questions about how science should incorporate non-epistemic values. This article engages with such questions through an exploration of the environmental sciences. These sciences are a mosaic of diverse fields characterized by interdisciplinarity, problem-orientation, policy-directedness, and ubiquitous non-epistemic values. This article addresses a frequently voiced concern about many environmental science practices: that they 'crowd out' or displace significant non-epistemic values by either (1) entailing some non-epistemic values, rather than others, or by (2) obscuring discussion of non-epistemic values altogether. With three detailed case studies – monetizing nature, nature-society dualism, and ecosystem health – we show that the alleged problem of crowding out emerges from active debates within the environmental sciences. In each case, critics charge that the scientific practice in question displaces non-epistemic values in at least one of the two senses distinguished above. We show that crowding out is neither necessary nor always harmful when it occurs. However, we do see these putative objections to the application of environmental science as teaching valuable lessons about what matters for successful environmental science, all things considered. Given the significant role that many environmental scientists see for non-epistemic values in their fields, we argue that these cases motivate lessons about the importance of value-flexibility (that practices can accommodate a plurality of non-epistemic values), transparency about value-based decisions that inform practice, and environmental pragmatism. • This article addresses a concern that the environmental sciences 'crowd out' or displace significant non-epistemic values. • We analyze three active debates (monetizing nature, nature-society dualism, ecosystem health) where this concern emerges. • We argue that crowding out is neither necessary nor always harmful when it occurs. • However, this concern does illuminate lessons about what matters for successful environmental science, all things considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Screen time among adults represents a continuing and growing problem in relation to health behaviors and health outcomes. However, no instrument currently exists in the literature that quantifies the use of modern screen-based devices. The primary purpose of this study was to develop and assess the reliability of a new screen time questionnaire, an instrument designed to quantify use of multiple popular screen-based devices among the US population.Methods: An 18-item screen-time questionnaire was created to quantify use of commonly used screen devices (e.g. television, smartphone, tablet) across different time points during the week (e.g. weekday, weeknight, weekend). Test-retest reliability was assessed through intra-class correlation coefficients (ICCs) and standard error of measurement (SEM). The questionnaire was delivered online using Qualtrics and administered through Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk).Results: Eighty MTurk workers completed full study participation and were included in the final analyses. All items in the screen time questionnaire showed fair to excellent relative reliability (ICCs = 0.50-0.90; all < 0.000), except for the item inquiring about the use of smartphone during an average weekend day (ICC = 0.16, p = 0.069). The SEM values were large for all screen types across the different periods under study.Conclusions: Results from this study suggest this self-administered questionnaire may be used to successfully classify individuals into different categories of screen time use (e.g. high vs. low); however, it is likely that objective measures are needed to increase precision of screen time assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Communication plays an important role in promoting sustainable consumption. Yet how the academic literature conceptualizes and relates communication and sustainable consumption remains poorly understood, despite growing research on communication in the context of sustainable consumption. This article presents the first comprehensive review of sustainable consumption communication (SCC) research as a young and evolving field of scholarly work. Through a systematic review and narrative synthesis of N = 67 peer-reviewed journal articles, we consolidated the research conducted in this field into four distinct types: communication as an approach to (1) behavior change, (2) self-empowerment, (3) systems change, and (4) reflection on current discourses and practices around sustainable consumption. Our findings reveal that most journal articles focus on incremental changes in individual consumer behavior ("weak" sustainable consumption) and employ communication as an intervention tool with little reference to communication science and theory. They also reveal integration challenges arising from the disciplinary diversity and fragmentation characteristic of the research field. Future research should develop shared frameworks and terminology, diversify its foci, synthesize relevant evidence, and innovate critical perspectives that go beyond one-way business-to-consumer communication. The results of our review can serve researchers engaged in sustainable consumption communication to better systematize their efforts and contribute more effectively to changing systems of consumption in the future. [Display omitted] • Sustainable consumption communication related to SDG 12 is a young field. • Review reveals 4 types of sustainable consumption communication research. • Instrumental focus on individual behavior change dominates current literature. • Need to expand the use of communication for deliberation and systemic change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]