Only in my backyard: The effect of flood exposure on environmental behavior

Does exposure to climate shocks make people behave more pro-environmentally? I use precise residential locations to identify people exposed to floods and analyze a decade of real-world donation records from around 90,000 donors in England, along with longitudinal surveys. I show that people become more likely to donate to environmental charities and support the Green Party, after experiencing a flood that directly affects their own postcode. I also find that they are more likely to reassess their own environmental efforts as not enough following such an experience. However, exposure to floods affecting close neighbors does not lead to similar changes, indicating an “only in my backyard” phenomenon: on average, people become more pro-environment only when personally affected. Further, I show that people with strong universalist values do increase their green donations following neighboring floods. This suggests that the lack of response is driven by those with weak universalist values, who typically care less about global challenges.