John Williams “A tale of two cities: Influences on cycling to high school in Dunedin and Christchurch.” Energy Cultures Conference 2016

1. A tale of two cities
Influences on adolescents’ cycling to school
in Christchurch and Dunedin
Jillian Frater
Sandra Mandic
John Williams

2. Slide 2
Overview
● Research question: what influences cycling to school (C2S)?
● Premise: the physical world influences human decisions through
perceptions, so measure beliefs and attitudes
– e.g. hilly terrain might be a barrier for you but a useful challenge for me
● Hence, we employed the most widely-used model of decision making: the
Reasoned Action Approach (RAA), latest version of the Theory of
Planned Behaviour, and a refinement of that for risky behaviours, the
Prototype Willingness Model.

3. Slide 3
Reasoned Action Approach: overview
● Premise: our behaviours are based on the strength of our (salient) beliefs, and our
evaluations (good/bad, desirable/undesirable, ...)
– e.g. you and I both believe that Dunedin is hilly, but I evaluate that fact as a good thing, whereas
you may not
● That’s the “reasoned” bit: our actions are based on our beliefs. But the theory does not
assume that our beliefs, or their evaluations, are “reasonable”, “rational” or even true!
● In predicting behaviours, most useful to examine beliefs about the (respondent
enacting the) behaviour, not the target of the behaviour
– e.g. ask people about their beliefs regarding themselves cycling, not about cycling in general, or
other people cycling

4. Slide 4
Reasoned Action Approach: details
● Behaviour (B) depends on Intention (BI), and Intention depends on:
● Attitudes (A)
– Instrumental beliefs: what will be the outcomes of the behaviour?
– Experiential beliefs: what will enacting the behaviour feel like?
● Subjective norm (SN)
– Injunctive beliefs: what do referent others say I should do?
– Descriptive beliefs: what do referent others do themselves?
● Perceived behavioural control (PBC)
– Agency beliefs: am I able to do this?
– Autonomy beliefs: is it solely my own decision?

5. Slide 5
Prototype Willingness Model
● Augmentation of the RAA/TPB
● Considers BI in a more granular fashion:
– Distinguishes between being willing to perform a behaviour, and
intending to (usually applied to “risky” behaviours, e.g. recreational
drug use, pre-marital sex, …)
● Considers SN in greater detail
– Assesses images of a prototype, i.e. an image of a “typical” person
who does (or does not) enact the behaviour in question

6. Slide 6
Methods
● Recruited in schools, students filled out self-completion questionnaire
– Dunedin: online in class; Christchurch: mostly on paper outside class, some online
● Obtained 803 responses: 373 in Christchurch, 430 in Dunedin
● Analysis restricted to students living < 4km from school
● Prevalence of C2S: 2% in Dunedin, 18% in Christchurch
– Probably attributable to terrain and weather, but what else might be influential?
● Compared beliefs about cycling between the two cities

7. Slide 7
Instrument (1)
● Behavioural Intention
– I want to regularly cycle to school
– I intend to cycle to school frequently
● Perceived Behavioural Control
– Capability
● I see myself as being capable of riding a bicycle to school
● I am confident I could cycle to school
● I believe that I have the ability to ride a cycle to school
– Autonomy
●
I have complete control over whether or not I cycle to school

8. Slide 8
Instrument (2)
● Subjective Norm
– My friends think I should cycle to school
– Out of your five friends, how many always or sometimes cycle to school
– One or both of my parents or guardians cycle frequently
– My parents or guardians think I should cycle to school
● Attitude
– For me, regularly cycling to school would be interesting
– For me, regularly cycling to school would be pleasant
– For me, regularly cycling to school would be stimulating
– For me, regularly cycling to school would be good
– For me, regularly cycling to school would be healthy
– For me, regularly cycling to school would be useful

9. Slide 9
Sample profile
Dunedin Christchurch
Age 15 ± 1.6 14 ± 1.6
Sex (males) 45 63
Driven 38 17
Drive 5 5
Walk 47 51
Bus 4 5
Cycle 2 18

10. Slide 10
RAA comparison
Proportion of agreement on a 7-point Likert scale
Dunedin Christchurch
Attitude
Instrumental 35 31
Experiential 59 62
Subjective Norm
Descriptive
Parents 10 18
Friends 2 29
Injunctive
Parents 24 41
Friends 21 32
Perceived behavioural control
Capability 57 76
Autonomy 68 79
Intention 4 24

11. Slide 11
Results
● Dunedin students scored lower on:
– All injunctive and descriptive norm items (SN)
– All autonomy and capability items (PBC)
– Intention
● But no difference on attitudes!
● Suggests that an information-deficit approach to promoting CTS on
instrumental grounds (e.g. health outcomes) would not be effective,
rather a social norm and capability based approach is needed

12. Slide 12
Limitations
● All the usual limitations of self-reports, 5-point rating scales, etc.
● Possible alternative explanation of results: descriptive and injunctive
norms, and PBC are the result of prevalence (not the cause), and
prevalence is the result of terrain and weather
– Can not be addressed by cross-sectional, non-experimental research design
– But where is the harm in trying a social/capability approach? Existing
information-deficit approaches have not worked (and very often do not work in
many public health contexts), so why not try something else?
● Other possible causes, e.g. school zoning and cycling policies, have not
been investigated yet

13. Slide 13
Acknowledgements
The BEATS study is a collaboration between the Dunedin
Secondary Schools’ Partnership, Dunedin City Council and
University of Otago.
The authors would also like to acknowledge the members of the
BEATS Advisory Board and research personnel. We also
appreciate the contributions of the school boards, teachers, school
principals, and students who assisted with this research in both
cities.

14. Slide 14
Questions, comments, provocations?
● Research design and data collection in Christchurch was part of
Jillian Frater’s PhD thesis
● Research design and data collection in Dunedin was part of the
BEATS project (Built Environment and Active Transport to
School), led by Sandra Mandic
● Analysis presented here done by Sandra Mandic, partly advised
by me