Goals for Good: Testing an intervention to reduce materialism in three European countries
Creators: name: Parker, Natasha Zoe
Publisher: name: University of Surrey
Year: 2023

description: <b>Background</b><br>
description: Contrary to messages espoused in consumerist cultures, a substantial body of research now
description: demonstrates that materialism is associated with a broad range of negative outcomes for personal
description: wellbeing, while low consumption, sustainable lifestyles are consistently associated with higher
description: wellbeing. This thesis aims to explore how individuals can be supported to shift away from
description: materialistic values and goals and to deepen understanding of the benefits of living sustainably.<br>
description: <br>
description: <b>Research questions and methodology</b><br>
description: We ask two main over-arching questions 1) can materialism be reduced? and 2) can
description: individuals lead meaningful and pleasurable lives while living sustainably? To answer these
description: questions, we experimentally tested whether a three-session intervention encouraging intrinsic goals
description: and activating self-transcendence values could cause sustained reductions in materialism. Employed
description: young adults (aged 18-30) in three European countries (UK, Italy, Hungary) were supported to set
description: intrinsic goals and reflect on self-transcendence values. Changes in materialistic value and goal
description: orientations were measured, and, as an additional indicator of materialism, participants described their
description: perceptions of success in their own words. We compared changes in materialism to an active control
description: group and followed up both groups two months after completing of the intervention. We also
description: conducted correlational analysis to explore whether pro-environmental behaviours had a stronger
description: relationship with pleasure-based, hedonic well-being or with virtue-based, eudemonic well-being. We
description: investigated whether materialism, which has consistently been linked to lower wellbeing and fewer
description: pro-environmental behaviours, might explain the co-occurrence of these variables.<br>
description: <br>
description: <b>Main findings</b><br>
description: Participants who had undertaken the experimental intervention experienced a significant
description: decrease in materialistic goal orientation which was maintained two months later. No significant
description: changes in their materialistic value orientation were found and no changes in materialistic goal or
description: value orientations were found among the active control group. Reductions in materialistic goal
description: orientation were found to be independent of the cultures studied, of commitment to, self-concordance
description: with, and progress made on chosen goals, and of their engagement in the intervention.<br>
description: <br>
description: We identified four intrinsically oriented themes of perceptions of success: “personal
description: development and achievement”, “positive wellbeing”, “positive relationships”, and “freedom and
description: experiences”, and three extrinsically oriented themes of perceptions of success: “financial security”,
description: “external validation”, and “wealth and power”. We found a distinction between status-driven and
description: security-driven words used to describe financial perceptions of success which could have implications
description: for measures of materialism.<br>
description: <br>
description: Pro-environmental behaviours were positively associated with wellbeing in all three countries
description: studied, which included two nations (Italy and Hungary) where this relationship had not previously
description: been tested. Pro-environmental behaviours were positively associated with hedonic wellbeing in all
description: three countries and with eudemonic well-being in Italy only. There was no difference in the strengths
description: of the associations. We found no evidence that materialism explained the relationship between proenvironmental behaviours and wellbeing.<br>
description: <br>
description: <b>Conclusions and implications</b><br>
description: We demonstrate that the encouragement of self-transcendence values and intrinsic goals to be
description: an effective strategy to reduce a materialistic goal orientation. The lack of moderating factors suggest
description: that this intervention could be widely useful to reduce a materialistic goal orientation in many
description: contexts. We discuss implications for measures of materialism from our distinction between statusdriven and security-driven words used to describe financial perceptions of success.<br>
description: <br>
description: We provide new evidence demonstrating that pro-environmental behaviours to be associated
description: with pleasure-based (hedonic) wellbeing even when they are not associated with virtue-based
description: (eudemonic) wellbeing. This finding provides tentative evidence that pro-environmental behaviours
description: are not only compatible with wellbeing due to a virtuous sense of “doing good,” but they may be
description: inherently pleasurable. <br>