This brief review investigated environmentalism in families. The aim was to interpret how family functions in environmentalism and how family theories are used in the environmental field. Only papers relating to adolescents in the context of environmentalism and published since 2000 were included. Twenty-one such papers were identified. While the influence of the family on a person's life has been studied in various areas, environmentalism is one area that has not been studied frequently.
Papers included in the review discussed environmentalism in the family from two main perspectives: parents influencing children, and children influencing parents. Most of the studies considered the influence of parents on children. These studies all reported that parents' behaviors and their visibility have a greater influence on children's environmental behaviors than the norms (or rules) that parents establish. The visibility of the parents' environmental behavior seemed to have the biggest influence on the children's environmental behaviors. None of the studies reported a significant association between the sanctions that parents established and a child's environmental attitudes.
Overall findings indicated that family plays an important role in environmentalism, and that parents and children influence each other. Both culture and parenting styles proved to be factors in how and to what extent children influence their parents. “The more the parents are open, the more the children are influential.” Children in western societies seem to be more influential than children in non-western societies, likely due to differences in parenting styles in these cultures.
This study indicates that concepts and theories from family studies can be applied to the environmental field. “Understanding how family members are important in each other's environmentalism helps us find new ways of solving environmental issues.” The findings of this review suggest that in dealing with urgent environmental problems, it is better to target adults; but for long-term issues, it is better to target children.
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