The Effect of Environmental Beliefs on Farmer's Sustainable Behavior toward Using Groundwater Resources in Fars Province

Many environmental problems are rooted in human behavior and can thus be solved by understanding behavior. The purpose of this study was to investigate the causal effect of ‘general environmental beliefs’ and ‘special groundwater belief’ on ‘groundwater sustainable behavior’ among agricultural groundwater users in Fars Province. This study is a ‘descriptive and causal-correlative’ research that was conducted using survey technique as a research method by using the paradigms of environmental psychology. The units of analysis was agricultural groundwater users (owners of agricultural wells; N=1224). Based on the stratified random sampling method, 296 people were selected as a sample in three high, medium and low vulnerability range of groundwater studies limits. A researcher-structured questionnaire was used for data collection, which its validity and reliability were confirmed by using a panel of university professors and relevent experts and using Cronbach's alpha (0.61≤α≤0.82), respectively. A causal analysis was performed by using Structural Equations Modeling. The results showed special groundwater belief was strong determinant of groundwater sustainable behavior that is affected by human exception paradigm and new environmental paradigm. According to results, new human interdependence paradigm has the most direct causal effect and human exception paradigm has the most indirect causal effect on groundwater sustainable behavior.