Driving Sustainable Behavior in the Office at Arizona State

The purpose of this project was to drive and enhance the sustainability behavior of office workers at Arizona State University. Sustainability behavior is understood to mean behavior that is not solely pro-environmental in nature, but also that which provides clear economic and human benefits to ASU and its employees. Pro-environmental interventions and outcomes, while critical, are just one third of the holistic sustainability sought by ASU. This project focuses on pro-environmental behavior (PEB), as a driver of overall sustainability. As defined by Kollmuss and Agyeman, PEB is “behavior that consciously seeks to minimize the negative impact of one’s actions on the natural and built world” (2002).

The problem for this project is that participation with the ASU Sustainability Certification for Offices is low, and to date, the certification has not enhanced the sustainability of offices at ASU. 

University Sustainability Practices, who administer the office certification and much of ASU sustainability efforts, is looking for ways to drive greater participation and engagement in the certification process. Three actions have been taken in the projecti n an attempt to improve participation and engagement. Surveys, focus groups, and interviews have collected data from ASU's office worker  to ascertain the attitudes of workers surrounding office culture and sustainability, and to identify barriers to their greater participation in PEB.

The conclusions drawn from this phase of the project inform a robust set of recommendations that will help overcome key barriers revealed by the research, such as a knowledge gap among ASU office staff about the existence of the office certification. Conclusions and solution sets were provided to USP in a set of documents that will allow them to easily implement the recommendations, and provide a path for next steps.