Food waste is a global environmental problem, a significant part of which is produced in households. As future consumers and decision makers, adolescents play a key role in tackling this problem. Adolescents' food waste awareness and attitudes towards reducing waste develop as they interact with different food environments in school and at home. To better understand how to support adolescents in sustainable consumption choices, this study aimed to identify adolescents’ motivational profiles in relation to food waste reduction, and to compare the profiles with respect to food waste related control beliefs, emotions, intentions, and daily food waste practices. Self-report survey data from 123 Finnish adolescents (aged 13 to 15 years; 61% female) was collected. Using latent profile analysis, three motivational profiles for reducing food waste were identified. The value-driven adolescents (26.6%) were above average in identified regulation, average in introjected and intrinsic regulation, and below average in external regulation of motivation for food waste reduction. The socially influenced adolescents (47.9%) were average in external and intrinsic regulation, but below average in introjected and identified regulation. The responsibility-boosted adolescents (25.6%) were above average in each form of motivation regulation. Compared to the socially influenced adolescents, the responsibility-boosted and value-driven adolescents reported higher concern about food waste, more positive emotions and attitude, and higher perceived control over food waste reduction. They also had higher intentions to reduce food waste in future than the socially influenced adolescents. The responsibility-boosted adolescents reported attempting to reduce their food waste in the past more than the other profiles. However, interestingly, the profiles did not differ in their self-reported daily practices regarding food proportioning. The results shed light on adolescents’ attitudes and commitment to food waste reduction, and lay foundations for understanding the development of sustainable consumer habits in adolescence.

Within the Social Cognitive Perspective (Bandura, 1986; 2001), this study explores the reciprocal relationship between Pro-environmental Behaviors (PEBs) and Pro-environmental Regulatory Self-Efficacy (PRSE) using a daily diary approach. PEBs refer to intentional and voluntary actions to protect and preserve the environment (Lange & Dewitte, 2019), while PRSE reflects individuals’ perceived capability to engage in these behaviors despite challenges (Nielsen, 2017).

While self-efficacy beliefs are widely recognized as crucial for sustaining various behaviors, research on pro-environmental behaviors remains limited. This study focused on adolescence; a period marked by declining engagement with environmental issues (Krettenauer, 2022) and adopted a daily diary approach to collect real-time reflections on adolescents’ daily actions. This method allows us to examine how reflecting on one’s own PEBs may influence PRSE over time, and vice-versa.

The study involved 72 Italian adolescents (ages 14–16; 29% female), who were part of a larger cross-cultural project and were assessed daily for 28 consecutive days. Using Dynamic Structural Equation Modeling (DSEM), our results revealed a significant positive spillover effect from PEBs to PRSE at the within-person level (B = .141, 95% CI [.055, .242]), whereas no significant effect was found from PRSE to PEBs. Specifically, on days when individuals reported higher-than-usual engagement in PEBs, they also reported higher-than-usual levels of PRSE the following day, but not vice versa. At the between-person level, findings showed a significant positive correlation between the average levels of PEBs and PRSE across four weeks.

These findings confirm a positive association between individual differences in PRSE and PEBs among adolescents. Moreover, they highlight that daily reflection on one’s own pro-environmental actions strengthens self-efficacy in overcoming obstacles that might hinder pro-environmental behaviors.

The potential implications for environmental-targeted interventions are discussed.

Pro-environmental behaviors (PEBs) are actions individuals take to benefit the environment (Kollmuss & Agyeman, 2002). These behaviors are especially important for adolescents, who play a key role in transitioning to sustainable societies (Pereira & Freire, 2021). Among the main determinants of PEBs is Environmental self-identity (E-SI), the extent to which individuals see themselves as environmentally conscious (van der Werff et al., 2013).

The relationship between PEB and E-SI has been mostly explored in terms of stable interindividual (between-person) differences, primarily employing cross-sectional designs and focusing on how E-SI influences PEB, while less attention has been paid to how performing PEBs might shape E-SI. Moreover, little is known about the intraindividual (within-person) processes underlying this association, which could shed light on their dynamic, reciprocal effects in daily life (Hamaker et al., 2018).

To address these gaps, we used daily diaries, an ecologically valid alternative to cross-sectional methods (McNeish & Hamaker, 2020). The study involved 78 Italian adolescents (Mage = 14.8, SD = 0.74, 29% female) from a broader cross-cultural project. Participants reported their PEB and E-SI daily for 28 days.

Using Dynamic Structural Equation Modeling (Hamaker et al., 2018), results revealed a significant positive spillover from PEB to E-SI (B = .257, 95% CI [.098, .406]). Adolescents who reported higher-than-usual PEBs on one day also reported higher-than-usual E-SI on subsequent days. Conversely, the reverse effect—E-SI to PEB—was non-significant (B = .052, 95% CI [-.031, .136]).

These findings highlight the importance of daily engagement in PEBs in strengthening adolescents’ sense of self as environmentally conscious individuals in everyday life. From a social-cognitive perspective (Bandura, 2001), they could inform interventions to foster a sense of responsibility toward environmental protection in youth through direct experiences, helping individuals perceive these behaviors as aligned with their core identities.

Meat production is strongly related to the deterioration of earth ecosystems, with the burden for tackling these issues disproportionately shifted to younger generations. People’s enjoyment of eating meat and their simultaneous desire to not harm animals, the meat paradox (Loughnan et al., 2010), has been linked to speciesism, the assignment of different moral worth to animals based on their species membership (Caviola et al., 2019). Recent evidence has shown that children in the UK are less speciesist than adults and see eating meat as less morally acceptable (McGuire et al., 2023). Dietary habits are strongly influenced by cultural norms, yet little work so far has explored the cross-cultural development of speciesism. We studied the development of speciesism in Hungarian children (10-11 years, n = 41), young adults (18-21 years, n = 80), and adults (30+ years, n = 123). Omnivores scored significantly higher on the speciesism scale (r = .58) and were more likely to be adults (95%, compared to young adults 81%; p = .013, V = .19; children: 85%) and men (compared to women, p = .027). Women were significantly lower in speciesism than men in young adulthood (d = 1.74); however, gender differences in children and adults were not significant. Lower speciesism was weakly associated with mental states attributed to pigs measured with rating scales (r = .13, p = .038). Moral justifications for not eating meat were more prominent in young adults (43%) than adults (14%; p < .001, V = .29; children: 34%). Practical justifications were most prominent in children (63%), followed by young adults (54%) and adults (41%) (p = .034, V = .18). These findings indicate commonalities between the UK and Hungarian samples, yet also highlight important cultural differences likely brought out through socialization, which will be further discussed in the presentation.

The effects of climate crisis are now being felt globally (IPCC, 2021) and are negatively affecting the well-being of both children (Gislason et al., 2021) and adults (Gago et al., 2024). Even those who have not directly experienced the effects of the climate crisis struggle with negative feelings about the issue (Clayton, 2021). Given these premises, the authors ask what mediators might influence the association between climate crisis stress (CCS) and well-being, particularly for children, who can be trained to face the challenges of the climate crisis in a positive way.

Future orientation (FO) serves as a protective factor against negative events, contributing to greater well-being over time (Chua et al., 2015). Similarly, resilience is recognized as a protective factor that mitigates the development of psychiatric symptoms in individuals exposed to stressful life events (Hjemdal et al., 2006). Therefore, in children, FO and resilience may mediate the negative relationship between climate crisis stress (CCS) and life satisfaction, a key indicator of overall well-being. This study aims to test this hypothesis.

Overall, 393 students (46,1% males; 1,6% other; MAge = 12 [0.3]) took part in the study. Participants were nested in 21 classes of 8 middle schools.

A linear regression model was run to test the hypothesis. Multigroup variable was added to the model to control for possible gender differences.

According to the findings, no gender differences characterize the relationships between the variables of interest. Furthermore, as expected, the negative relationship between CCS and life satisfaction is mediated by both FO and resilience, although the latter appears to be a stronger mediator.

The results of this study can inform the design of interventions to mitigate the negative effects of CCS on children's and adolescents' well-being. Specifically, they suggest that such programs should include activities focus on enhancing children's FO and resilience.