Responsibility for future generations and climate change mitigation A cross-national study of predictors of pro-environmentalism in Europe

Feeling personally responsible for climate change is a key predictor of pro-environmental action. Recent U.S.-based research finds that people more strongly endorse responsibility to protect future generations (RFG) than responsibility to reduce climate change (RCC). Here, we conceptually replicated this finding across six European countries and tested whether RFG and RCC predicted climate-relevant attitudes beyond the U.S. context. Consistent with prior work, RFG was endorsed slightly more than RCC, and both types of responsibility significantly predicted support for climate policy. Additionally, RFG and RCC were positively associated with negative emotional responses to climate change and with attributions of increasing severe weather events, both past and anticipated, to climate change. These results suggest that even in less polarized political environments, responsibility to future generations is more widely endorsed than responsibility to mitigate climate change. Still, both constructs appear psychologically meaningful and help explain variation in climate concern and policy support.