The Drivers of the Life Satisfaction of Pro-environment and Non-pro-environment People

Happiness or life satisfaction tends to be the ultimate goal of human beings. It is the intention of this study to investigate the factors influencing the life satisfaction of pro-environment and non-pro-environment people. The data were collected from interviews with 320 adults, who were equally divided into pro-environment and non-pro-environment adults of at least 18 years of age and that had come to the randomly-selected shopping centers in Bangkok. The life satisfaction of the people, regardless of their environmentally-friendly attitude, was assumed to be driven by the personal characteristics of optimism and internal locus of control, and the domains of life of family, personal health, self-actualization, and material possessions, as well as the altruistic and biospheric values of being nature lovers. The results from the t-test suggested that pro-environment people are likely to be more satisfied with their lives than non-pro-environment people. Moreover, the multiple regression analysis indicated that the life satisfaction of the pro-environment people was positively influenced by the biospheric value of being a nature lover, self-actualization, and age, and was negatively influenced by education. The pro-environment people that were never married were more satisfied with their lives than those that were married. Finally, the life satisfaction of the non-pro-environment people was positively triggered by the personal characteristics of optimism and having an internal locus of control, as well as the domain of life of personal health and age.