Climate change and behavior patterns of urban residents

Abstract

The aim of the study is to identify patterns of consumer’s behaviour related to climate change. Research method: sociological survey. The authors conducted sociological surveys among the architecture students of the National Research Moscow State University of Civil Engineering (NRU MGSU) concerning their attitude to the climate change and the sense of personal responsibility for the current events. The results converged with the results of the European Sociological Survey (2017-2018), and discrepancies were insignificant. Drawing on the findings the authors identified behaviour models with regard for the climate change. They concluded that consumer behaviour is influenced by numerous factors, including the system of traditional values, the attitude to nature, to its resources, the government policy in respect of the climate change, as well as the effort to promote pro-environmental behaviors. Author s expanded the scope of the research and analyzed the opinions of the architecture students about the regard for climate-related factors in architectural design. The conclusion is that the problem is not well clear to the students of the civil engineering university. Although 100% of the respondents acknowledged the need to take account of the climate-related factors in the course of urban design and construction, only 21.4% of respondents listed some elements of architecture capable of protecting the climate. The reasons for the unawareness include poor climate education, information unavailability and an overall lack of climatic culture.