Drivers of Climate Change in Urban India by Lutz Meyer-Ohlendorf

Author:Lutz Meyer-Ohlendorf
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783319966700
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

4.1.3.3 Routines and Patterns of Behaviour

Environmental research that focuses on the impacts of human behaviour on the environment and climate change has been criticised to emphasising consumer choices too much and neglecting the relevance of routines, habits, and patterns of behaviour. Following Giddens, Spaargaren (1997, p. 30), for instance, argues that consumers are deeply involved in producing and reproducing structural constraints and opportunities and that as a result, domestic practices are both “actor driven and system imposed”. Similarly, Elisabeth Shove states that environment-related social science research commonly follows the “dominant paradigm of ‘ABC’ – attitude, behaviour, and choice” and challenges the assumption that behaviours are largely being motivated by beliefs, values, attitudes, and preferences (Shove 2010, p. 1273). Shove, Watson, and Ingram contend, “consumption is embedded in relatively inconspicuous routines occasioned by the characteristically mundane socio-technical systems of everyday life”.

This argument is duly relevant for an understanding of the cultural dimensions of ordinary consumption. Large shares of personal and household GHG emissions can be traced back to those areas of consumption that are – as Shove (2003, p. 9) rightly states – customary and based on everyday practices. These everyday practices are “undertaken in a world of things and sociotechnical systems that have stabilising effects on routines and habits” (2003, p. 9). The theory on social practices, however, focuses on these aspects of everyday life, while the individual level, values, attitudes, and preferences are less important or even neglected. The lifestyle concept, on the other hand, allows for an integration of both, taking into account the more conscious consumption choices (in this study framed under the concept of investive consumption ; see above) as well as behaviour, which functions more implicitly, subtly, and based on routines and habits.

Routines and patterns of behaviour are conceptualised in this study as human activities that are conducted by the same person repeatedly in very similar ways and patterns. The conduct of routines and behaviour patterns tend to take place subconsciously and largely without reflection. Reflection upon these habits and routines can be triggered, for instance, when the actor is confronted with the electricity bill (e.g. in the case of using an air-conditioner) or when any other irregularity disturbs the routinised act of doing something (cf. Spaargaren 1997, p. 28).

Lüdtke (1989, p. 40) states that lifestyles primarily evolve on the basis of private investments and consumption decisions. In fact, larger investments are not only most visible for the social environment and instrumental for social distinction, but larger investments to a great extent also provide the long-term and path-dependent infrastructure for lifestyle (e.g. car, washing machine, air-conditioner, see Sect. 4.1.4). Accordingly, operationalising the dimension of performance with a strong focus on consumption and investments is in line with Lüdtke’s observations and allows for a more targeted analysis along the lines of the most constitutive elements of lifestyle-specific practices.

These everyday patterns of behaviour and daily routines are among the most relevant aspects of lifestyle for environment-related lifestyle research. In particular, it is all those areas of everyday routines where consumption of resources and the release of GHG emissions play a role.

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