Design and validation of the perception of risk towards environmental unsustainability scale (PREUS)

Abstract

No validated scales are available to assess the perception of risk towards environmental unsustainability (PREU), which is a key construct for the adoption of sustainable behaviors. To fill this literature gap, the objective of this study was to develop and validate the PREU scale (PREUS). To this end, a total of 519 Spanish participants answered a survey composed of the PREUS and other psychosocial variables. The exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses ratify the bifactorial structure of the scale. The two factors refer to perceived risk to oneself and one’s own family (anthropocentric view of risk), and risk for the planet (ecocentric view), respectively. The structural equation modelling analyses confirmed (1) the expected relationships between both factors and other constructs of their nomological network, and (2) the mediating role of the ascription of responsibility in the relationship established between risk perception and sustainable behavior, offering empirical support for the external validity of the scale. Finally, both metric and scalar gender invariance were granted and, as expected, women showed higher PREU than men. The study provides a brief, easy-to-complete, reliable, valid, and sex-invariant instrument that can be useful for researchers and educators to assess the extent to which individuals perceive the risk that environmental unsustainability can pose.