Natural Disasters and Preferences for the Environment: Evidence from the Impressionable Years

Abstract

Do generations affected by natural disasters form different preferences toward the environment? In line with the theories of social psychology, we show that natural shocks experienced during early adulthood help shape pro-environmental attitudes. We support our findings by exploiting yearly natural disaster variation both within the US and across a sample of 102 countries whose citizens experience disasters at different points in time.

Keywords: beliefs formation, natural disasters, environmental policy, impressionable years