Enhancing innovation through behavioral stimulation: The use of behavioral determinants of innovation in the implementation of eco-innovation processes in industrial sectors and companies

Abstract The existence of a more sustainable chemical and petrochemical industry has been a long-standing aspiration and demand of modern industrial societies. In this respect, sociotechnical transition processes that hold the principles of green chemistry and green engineering as their main design frameworks represent a promising approach to progress the Brazilian petrochemical sector toward advanced states of sustainability. This raises a number of challenges that are related to the understanding of how such processes could be effected, how sectoral agents' willingness to embrace such trajectories could be stimulated and enhanced and how the main agents, mechanisms and actions, which are integral to the implementation of these processes, could be identified. Drawing on behavioral and innovation theories it was possible to develop a testable and generalizable multilevel conceptual framework that made it possible to learn, document and explain the extent to which companies were willing to engage in such eco-innovation processes and to identify its significant determinants. Thereby, more efficient and effective transition policies could be developed for helping to overcome the dissonance between intention and behavior. The results provided evidence of the central importance of a host of stakeholders and partnerships for developing the conditions and stimuli for the implementation of technical and non-technical changes at the company and sectoral levels.

[1]  I. Ajzen,et al.  Attitudes and the Attitude-Behavior Relation: Reasoned and Automatic Processes , 2000 .

[2]  S. Schwartz.  Normative Influences on Altruism , 1977 .

[3]  P. Anastas,et al.  Green Chemistry , 2018, Environmental Science.

[4]  Frank Beckenbach,et al.  Behavioural foundations of innovation surveys , 2008 .

[5]  I. Ajzen,et al.  Attitude-behavior relations: A theoretical analysis and review of empirical research. , 1977 .

[6]  Paul L. Gardner,et al.  Measuring attitudes to science: Unidimensionality and internal consistency revisited , 1995 .

[7]  Paul Kline,et al.  A Handbook of Test Construction : Introduction to Psychometric Design , 1987 .

[8]  Klaas Sijtsma,et al.  Invited discussion of Cronbach (1951). Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests. Psychometrika, 16, 297-334 (26,889 citations in Google Scholar as of 1/1/2016) , 2016 .

[9]  I. Ajzen.  The theory of planned behavior , 1991 .

[10]  Garrette Clark,et al.  Evolution of the global sustainable consumption and production policy and the United Nations Environment Programme's (UNEP) supporting activities , 2007 .

[11]  Alfred Korzybski,et al.  Science and sanity : an introduction to non-aristotelian systems and general semantics / Alfred Korzybski , 1942 .

[12]  F. Malerba.  Sectoral systems: concepts and issues , 2004 .

[13]  Carlos Montalvo Corral.  Environmental Policy and Technological Innovation: Why Do Firms Adopt or Reject New Technologies? , 2002 .

[14]  I. Ajzen,et al.  The Influence of Attitudes on Behavior , 2005 .

[15]  C. Montalvo,et al.  What Triggers Change and Innovation , 2006 .

[16]  Julie Zimmerman,et al.  Design Through the 12 Principles of Green Engineering , 2003, IEEE Engineering Management Review.

[17]  Louis Guttman,et al.  Introduction to facet design and analysis , 1959 .

[18]  Eric Bonabeau,et al.  Agent-based modeling: Methods and techniques for simulating human systems , 2002, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[19]  I. Ajzen.  Attitudes, Personality and Behavior , 1988 .

[20]  L. Cronbach,et al.  Construct validity in psychological tests. , 1955, Psychological bulletin.

[21]  L. Cronbach.  Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests , 1951 .

[22]  Arthur P.J. Mol,et al.  The Refinement of Production: Ecological Modernization Theory and the Chemical Industry , 1996 .

[23]  F. Malerba.  Sectoral systems of innovation and production , 2002 .

[24]  I. Ajzen,et al.  Belief, Attitude, Intention, and Behavior: An Introduction to Theory and Research , 1977 .

[25]  Icek Ajzen,et al.  The social psychology of decision making. , 1996 .

[26]  J. Christ.  Varieties of systems of innovation: A survey of their evolution in growth theory and economic geography , 2007 .

[27]  Merrill Carlsmith.  Methods of research in social psychology , 1976 .