The Influencing Factors of Haze Tolerance in China

Abstract

Haze pollution has become the most serious environmental risk in China and generated a large amount of public concerns. Influencing almost all the citizens in the polluted area, it is necessary and important to take public perception as an essential element in haze abatement. From the perspective of social psychology, this paper explores haze tolerance in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, also the key influential factors on haze tolerance from four dimensions: political trust, perceived risk, cost perception, and haze knowledge. Based on the sample of 517 respondents, the results show that compared with Shanghai and Guangzhou, Beijing residents had the lowest tolerance level of haze pollution but have the highest levels of trust in the government’s capacity to control haze and self-evaluation of their own haze knowledge. People in Shanghai had the lowest cost perception and the strongest willingness to acquire haze knowledge. Meanwhile, the empirical analysis revealed that political trust and cost perception could enhance the public’s haze tolerance while perceived risk and haze knowledge had negative impacts on tolerance. Also, our research could provide some suggestions to government officials when making policies for abating haze pollution from the perspective of social risk control. Policy makers are supposed to launch various policy instruments to control haze effectively and engage the citizens in the decision-making process to improve their political trust, and publicize the knowledge of haze pollution to help the public to acquire objective and scientific knowledge and diminish unnecessary worries.

Exploring the relationship between life quality and the perceptions of living-environment crises

“…With the rapid growth of its economy, the living environment in China has been seriously damaged [30,31]. However, in the absence of direct harm to the wellbeing of the individual, different groups have different perceptions of the environmental crisis [32][33][34]. Our principal finding is that there is a negative correlation between subjective well-being/ social status and the perceptions of living-environment crises.…”

Public Concern about Haze and Ozone in the Era of Their Coordinated Control in China

“…Another study [44] also suggests engaging citizens in the decision-making process to improve their political trust and publicizing knowledge of haze pollution to help the public acquire objective and scientific knowledge.…”

Penilaian Persepsi Risiko Keselamatan Kerja pada Proyek Konstruksi menggunakan Adaptasi Kuesioner Municipal Public Health Rotterdam-Rijnmond

“…Contoh lain dalam penelitian mengenai pengaruh tingkat pendidikan terhadap persepsi risiko lingkungan disimpulkan bahwa 70% dari keseluruhan mahasiswa yang diteliti sangat sensitif dan peka terhadap masalah yang muncul (Zhou dan Dai, 2019). Hal ini diperkuat melalui penelitian tentang analisa faktor yang mempengaruhi toleransi polusi lingkungan, didapatkan kesimpulan bahwa seseorang yang memiliki pengetahuan yang lebih baik atau sedang menempuh pendidikan tinggi cenderung kurang mentoleransi kerusakan lingkungan (Zhou dan Dai, 2019).…”