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Air Quality and Perception: Explaining Change in Toronto, Ontario

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Air Quality and Perception: Explaining Change in Toronto, Ontario AIR QUALITY AND PERCEPTION: EXPLAINING CHANGE IN TORONTO, ONTARIO J.M. Dworkin and K.D. Pijawka Working Paper EPR-9 AIR QUALITY AND PERCEPTION: EXPLAINING CHANGE IN TORONTO, ONTARIO J.M. Dworkin and K.D. Pijawka Working Paper EPR-9 Pub IIca.t ions and Information, Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada MSS lA4 February 1981 Pub. No. EPR-9 PREFACE Environmental Perception Research is a series of Working Papers on research in progress. The papers are intended to be used as working documents by an international group of scholars involved in perception research and to inform a larger circle of interested persons. Theseries serves as a means of disseminating results and ideas quickly, especially the research activities of the Working Group on Environmental Perception of the International Geographical Union, and for work relating to the UNESCO Man and the Biosphere Programme Project No. 13, Perception of Environmental Quality. The series is coordinated through the Perception and Policy Working Group of the Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Toronto and support is being provided by the UNESCO Man and the Biosphere Programme. Further information about the research programme and this series is available from: Anne Whyte, Coordinator, Ian Burton, Chairman, Environmental Perception I.G.O. Working Group on and Policy Working Group Perception of the Environment Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada M5S lA4 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Study Approach 1 The Research Experience 1 Toronto's Perception of Air Quality 3 Explanations for Change in Perceptions 8 Changes in levels of air pollution 8 Changes in societal concerns 13 Changes in media coverage 14 Conclusions 16 References 16 1 AIR QUALITY AND PERCEPTION: EXPLAINING CHANGE IN TORONTO, ONTARIO Perception is one factor used to explain decisions concerning the environment. Public awareness of, attitudes toward, and information about an issue or problem can influence government's actions. The objective of this paper is to examine public perception of air pollution in Toronto through time and to suggest reasons for the changes that are occurring. STUDY APPROACH Understanding an individual's or community's perception of air pollution at one point in time is difficult. Our objective: to attempt to document changes in a community's attitude is even more difficult. Present awareness of and concern with air pollution was el icited by means of a questionnaire. One hundred and sixty four completed responses were obtained. Individuals were randomly chosen by the interviewers in two major shopping centers, centers that attract customers from the entire Metropol itan Toronto region. An examination of the respondents' residences showed that the sample was drawn from a broad geographical area including the major Toronto neighbourhoods. In order to assess change in the publ ic's perception of air pollution, the results of this survey were compared with two previous independent surveys completed inToronto in 1967 and 1969. Peter Barnes' (1967) study included a house to house survey with a carefully selected sample (200 households) stratified on the basis of various pollution levels in the city. The 1969 pol I was carried out by Pollution Probe (an environmental interest group at the University of Toronto) and included 214 telephone interviews that were randomly selected. The findings of these surveys are reported in an article by Auliciems and Burton (1971) "Per-ception of air pollution in Toron to'", In addition, an unpubl ished dissertation by John Hewings examined public perception of air pollution in a number of southern Ontario cities, and the impact of the Air Quality Index of 1970 on attitudinal change and awareness of air pollution, specifically. The questionnaire used in the 1978 survey was designed to facilitate a comparison with the previous studies. Questions were repl icated exactly in many cases and changes in questions or additions were included in order to assist in explaining potential changes. It is acknowledged, however, that some of the differences in findings between the earl ier surveys and the present one may be related to the differently selected sample populations as well as more general methodological problems associated with the study of perception. THE RESEARCH EXPERIENCE A major incentive to the study of environmental perception has been the recognition that to understand human behaviour one must understand the individual's subjective image (Boulding 1956). Perception research has not 2. produced a coherent body of knowledge that significantly augments our under- standing of man·environment interrelationships (Bunting and Guelke 1979). In a critical essay OJRiordan (1976) argues that perception studies of environmental qual ity should be viewed with skepticism as they suffer methodological weaknesses. He offers the following reasons: 1. Attitude surveys sol icit views from individuals that may not be deeply held or even thought about. but are given because an answer is required. 2. Inconsistencies in publ ic concern over pollution may reflect questionnaire design. the objectives of the researcher, or an occurrence just prior to the interview, all of which may have nothing to do with publ ic concern. 3. Much of the information from such studies results from the use of hypothetical questions which may not conform to behavioural real ity. Saarinen (1979) rebuts these arguments by arguing that if the subjective image is important in understand ing behav iour, then the inaccurac ies and failures in measurement do not refute the need for, or value of these studies. Specific research concerning perception of air pollution as summarized by Hewings (1975) elucidates this view. His analysis is based upon 30 such studies completed in the last 15 years. While Hewings also concedes that comparisons of these studies are difficult because of differences in methodological design, air pollution problems, and study objectives, he does develop some useful themes (Hewings 1975). 1. CONCERN WITH AIR POLLUTION INCREASED CONSISTENTLY DURING THE 1960' 5 AND PEAKED BY 197 0• Publ ic opinion data show that concern with the qual ity of air increased during the 1960's in many cities and became the number one consideration in some areas ahead of other pressing social problems. Aul iciems and Burton (1971) found that air pollution in the late 1960's was a dominant public concern in their comparison of a number of North American cities. O'Riordan, basing his evidence on the work of Munton and Brady who reviewed publ ic opinion polls, observed that from 1965 to 1970 concern with pollution control in the U~S. jumped from ninth of the ten most serious problems to second. II. AWARENESS AND CONCERN OVER AIR POLLUTION VARIES DIRECTLY WITH ACTUAL AIR POLLUTION LEVELS. Some studies have shown that this is not the case. Kirkby (1972), for example, found that many people residing in areas of very high air pollution levels were not concerned about these levels, and adopted rational izing and denial responses, that their neighbourhood, for example, was "not really that bad. that there were places where air pollution is worse" (O'Riordan 1976). But many studies have shown that awareness of air pollution is significantly correlated with smoke pollution and sulfation levels in a number of communities, that there are differences between rural and urban areas, and that there is a distance decay of concern outward from the centre of a large community (Hewings 1975). 3 III. CONCERN WITH AIR POLLUTION FLUCTUATES AND MAY BE INVERSELY RELATED TO CONCERN WITH OTHER sac IF.TALPROBLEMS. It has been shown that media reporting on air pollution in Canada d ec l ined significantly during the 1968 Quebec crisis in Canada (Burton et ale 1977). In a study on air pollution in Detroit, although air pollution was accurately perceived by residents from both high and low pollution neighbour- hoods, other items were ranked ahead of pollution more frequently by respondents I iving in high air pollution neighbourhoods. Concern with environ- mental qual ity may be considered as most important until other societal concerns surface, and be ing new, become more important. IV. SOCIO-ECONOMIC FACTORS ARE RELATED TO PERCEPTION OF AIR POLLUTION BUT SIGNIFICANT VARIATIONS EXIST AMONG THE COMMUNITY STUDIES TO PRECLUDE ANY DEFINITIVE FINDING. In fifteen case studies where age was correlated with perception of air pollution, significancy was identified in all but five of the cases (Hewings 1975). The direction of the relationship was not consistent, however. In some of the studies age was inversely related to awareness, yet in other studies age was directly related to awareness. There is some indication that other socio- economic factors, such as occupation and length of residency, may be related to perception. Females, for example, seem to be more concerned about air pollution as a hazard than are males. Or, as D'Riordan (1976) points out, individuals of high socio-economic status may be more concerned and more knowledgeable about environmental problems than others of lower social status. V. THE COMMUNICATIONS MEDIA MAY INFLUENCE ATTITUDES AND AWARENESS OF AIR POLLUTION. Studies I inking awareness of air pollution to information from the media are rare, although Swan (1972) has shown that the major source of information on air pollution is from the communications media. Aul iciems and Burton (1971) found that in Toronto concern and awareness of air pollution was very high despite the lack of major visible components of air pol lution (smog, smoke) in the city, and the inabil ity to detect the more hazardous pollutants. They attributed this publ ic concern to media coverage of air pollution which was considerable at that time. TORONTO'S PERCEPTION OF AIR QUALITY Comparison of the three surveys shows that while some factors were consistent over time, there are notable changes since the late 1960's. The publ ic has become markedly more satisfied with air pollution levels as compared with their dissatisfaction with other local problems.
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