From Religious Beliefs to Environmental Engagement: Using an Integrative VBN‐TPB Model to Inform a Conceptual Framework of Religious Environmentalism

ABSTRACT

Religious environmentalism represents a growing field of inquiry at the intersection of faith and ecology. Despite growing scholarly interest in this area of study, a comprehensive synthesis of the psychological determinants and potential pathways that underlie religiously motivated environmental engagement remains noticeably lacking. Applying an integration of the Values‐Beliefs‐Norms (VBN) model and the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) from environmental psychology literature as a conceptual lens, we illustrate how religious and spiritual elements map onto, influence or otherwise associate with key constructs of the VBN‐TPB causal chain. This effort represents the first systematic attempt to integrate religious and spiritual variables into a unified VBN‐TPB framework, moving beyond the fragmented, approaches that have characterized prior work in this domain. In doing so, we identify specific mechanisms through which religious belief systems facilitate or constrain pro‐environmental behavior, and demonstrate how constructs such as consequence awareness, responsibility attribution, perceived behavioral control, and emotion must converge to activate the personal moral norms that drive environmental action in religious contexts. We offer a conceptual framework to guide scholars across religious studies, environmental psychology, and sustainability science in systematically examining how religious factors psychologically mediate and moderate pro‐environmental behavior.