Environmental values are increasingly important to Americans and, at the abstract level, most are widely shared. Pure water is better than polluted water. An unspoiled beach is more attractive than one littered with trash. Arriving at consensus in an abstract sense on these and other environmental issues is possible. In A Theory of Human Motivation , psychologist Abraham Maslow described a hierarchy of human values.
Basic needs come first - for example, a hungry person seeks food above all else.
Then there are still other desires - what public opinion expert Robert Worcester describes as the search for relations and meanings. These spiritual and aesthetic values take a variety of forms, and people rank them quite differently. For some, funding art projects may be especially important. For others, promoting music may be important. For still others, protecting wildlife may be most important.