Sierra Club Communications Manual

Sierra Club literature which cites various survey data regarding public environmental attitudes.

This club literature reviews public attitudes toward the environment and conservation. Suburban sprawl is the fastest emerging threat to the environment. Issues such as increased traffic, water and air pollution, longer commutes, loss of forests, lost of wetlands and habitat destruction are related to overdevelopment. People believe that developers, big business and industry are responsible for pollution and for suburban sprawl. Americans generally believe that existing laws must be more rigorously enforced before new laws or regulations should be imposed. In general, statistics show that people want more information about their environment than they are getting, according to various surveys.

The most receptive audiences for environmental awareness are:

• Women (especially mothers) because they care about their families and children and are thoughtful of their futures
• 18 to 30 year olds because they care about the environment and are cynical about government and big business
• Hunters and anglers because they are first hand witnesses of environmental policy and experience the effects of habitat destruction for animals