e-Digest Statistics about: Public Attitudes and Behaviours toward the Environment

2009 Survey of Public Attitudes and Behaviours towards the Environment

The 2009 survey gives a representative picture of what people in England think, and how they behave, across a range of issues relevant to the environment including:

  • Knowledge of and attitudes towards the environment
  • Energy and water use in the home
  • Purchasing behaviours
  • Recycling, composting and reusing waste
  • Food and food waste
  • Travel behaviours and attitudes
  • Carbon offsetting
  • Biodiversity and green space
  • Volunteering behaviours
  • Wellbeing

The survey follows from previous environmental surveys run by Defra and its predecessors in 1986, 1989, 1993, 1996-7, 2001 and 2007. The 2009 survey was commissioned jointly by Defra and the Energy Saving Trust and consisted of 2,009 face to face interviews in people’s homes during the Spring. Additional questions were included in an omnibus survey consisting of 1,772 face to face interviews. Both the main survey and omnibus survey were administered under contract by TNS Global Market Research.

2007 survey

Headline results from a selection of the 2007 survey questions were released on 27th July 2007 (covering wellbeing) and 14th August 2007 (covering attitudes, behaviour and wellbeing):

2007 Headline statistical report on attitudes, behaviour and wellbeing (PDF 550kb)
2007 Headline data tables on attitudes and behaviour (Excel workbook 150kb)

Some selected results are comparable with the previous surveys and provide trends in certain behaviours and attitudes such as the proportion of people who say they regularly recycle various materials. However, the majority of questions are new for the 2007 survey which has been improved and re-focused so that it is relevant to today's policy agenda.

2007 survey: Full report

A full report containing all the results from the 2007 survey was completed by BMRB in conjunction with Defra statisticians, and was released on 2nd November 2007. The full report can be seen here:

Full report (PDF 560kb over 200 pages)
Questionnaire (PDF 280kb, 39 pages)
Data tables (PDF 2200kb, 852 pages)

The data tables have been divided into sections:

List of contents (PDF, 17 pages)
Section A: Household and respondent characteristics
Wellbeing and TGI Life Values (for Fusion) (PDF, 89 pages)
Section B: Travel behaviour (PDF, 162 pages)
Section C: Energy and water efficiency in the home (PDF, 172 pages)
Section E: Recycling, composting and reducing waste (PDF, 24 pages)
Section F: Purchasing (PDF, 86 pages)
Section G: Awareness and attitudes in relation to the environment/climate change (PDF, 218 pages)
Section H: Further household and respondent characteristics (PDF, 84 pages)

Omnibus Survey Questionnaire (PDF 70kb)
Omnibus tables of responses (PDF 350kb, 93 pages) (covering Green spaces, Animal welfare, Biodiversity, Wellbeing)

Anonymised raw data has been placed in the UK Data Archive under reference SN5741

References, further reading and links to other resources:

2001 survey
A PDF version is available from this link (785kb) The PDF version includes all text, graphics, annexes and data. Colour, A4 format, 154 pages.
Download summarised data in Archive (ZIP 410kb)

1996/7 survey
For reference the summary from the 1996/7 survey is provided in PDF format. Survey of Public Attitudes to the Environment for England & Wales: 1996/97 (130kb)
The summary data for 1996/7 survey is available in MS Excel files from this zip archive (96kb).

UK Data Archive (UKDA) holds the data collected during the surveys:

The UK Data Archive (UKDA) provides resource discovery and support for secondary use of quantitative and qualitative data in research, teaching and learning as a lead partner of the Economic and Social Data Service (ESDS).

Your questions and comments about information presented on this page are welcome. Contact information and Email . Copyright of data and/or information presented or attached in this document may not reside solely with this Department. Please see guidance on Copyright.

Page last modified: 16 October 2009
Page published: 2 November 2007