The role of environmental systems knowledge attributes and moderating effect of religiosity toward pro-environmental attitudes and households’ food waste prevention behaviour / Muhammad ‘Arif Aizat Bashir

Like many other countries, Malaysia is facing the household food waste issue, and it is expected to exacerbate in years to come continuously. The efforts to improve the quality of environmental situations, coupled with detrimental impacts of food waste that worsen from time to time, demand new ways of thinking about the antecedents of food waste prevention behaviour. Therefore, this study aimed to examine the role of environmental systems knowledge attributes on households’ food waste prevention behaviour, with pro-environmental attitudes as a mediator and religiosity as a moderator between the linkages. In answering and validating the research objectives, questions, and hypotheses, a quantitative approach with descriptive analyses and hypotheses testing was employed as the methodology. A survey questionnaire among Malaysian households from several states was undertaken with a total of 935 respondents, with 918 data found usable. The findings demonstrated that environmental systems knowledge attributes with its underlying dimensions of human-environmental system knowledge and geography-environmental system knowledge not only influence the proenvironmental attitudes, but it acts as a precursor or predictor of the households’ food waste prevention behaviour. Additionally, pro-environmental attitudes played a significant mediating role in the intended relationship between environmental systems knowledge attributes and Malaysian households’ food waste prevention behaviour, whereas religiosity played a moderating role in the relationship between environmental systems knowledge attributes and households’ pro-environmental attitudes. The findings also proved a convergence between Environmentally Responsible Behaviour Theory and Behavioural Learning Theory (Operant Conditioning) that is applicable to provide a viable and useful theoretical framework for examining households’ food waste prevention behaviour. To summarize, this study certainly offers fresh insight into the current works of literature on food waste prevention behaviour. It specifically provides consumers, non-governmental organizations, and relevant authorities with an in-depth understanding of Malaysian households in terms of what types of information or knowledge should be imparted to motivate them to act environmentally responsible and, most importantly, the formation of food waste prevention behaviour.