Why It Matters: Framing Environmentally Sustainable Change

This chapter introduces the core challenge addressed in the book, that is, the persistent gap between consumers’ environmental concern and meaningful behavioural change required for the well-being of future generations. While most individuals express strong pro-environmental attitudes, they often struggle to adopt behaviours with the greatest mitigation potential. Drawing on prior research and policy reports, this introductory chapter reframes sustainable consumption as a behavioural and systemic challenge for all mankind. It highlights the imbalance between low-impact symbolic actions and high-impact transformative behaviours, introducing the notion that sustainability-related decisions are shaped by perceived feasibility, sacrifice, and contextual constraints. By situating sustainable consumption within everyday life, this chapter sets the foundation for the empirical analyses that follow and clarifies why understanding perceptions, rather than intentions alone, is fundamental for driving change.