Zhongyong (golden mean) is a typical Oriental Confucius thought that addresses interpersonal harmony and interdependence. A moderated mediating model was used in this study to examine the relationship between Zhongyong and environmental behavior. The results of our model showed that Zhongyong was positively associated with environmental behavior. In comparison to people with lower levels of Zhongyong, respondents with higher levels of Zhongyong had a significantly higher scores for collective efficacy, personal norms, and environmental behavior. Furthermore, Zhongyong indirectly influenced environmental behavior through collective efficacy and personal norms. More importantly, we introduced two extrinsic moderator variables: environmental concerns and interpersonal communication. The reasons Zhongyong works and how to take advantage of this Oriental cultural heritage to promote an individual’s pro-environmental willingness are further discussed.

This study proposes a moderated serial mediation model to examine the paths and conditions by which authoritative media use and social media use promote public and private pro-environmental behaviours (PEBs). By employing the norm activation theory and through a nationwide survey in China, the study finds that both authoritative media use and social media use can indirectly contribute to both public and private PEBs first by increasing perceived environmental risk, and then by strengthening personal responsibility. In a parallel investigation of the role of traditional culture in influencing people’s behaviour, the study finds that Zhongyong thinking (the golden mean) can affect the effectiveness of authoritative media use and social media use on public and private PEBs. Zhongyong thinking notably enhanced the positive relationship between social media use and both types of PEBs but weakened the relationship between authoritative media use and these PEBs. The study contributes to the environmental engagement literature by confirming that different types of media use have different implications for PEBs, and Zhongyong thinking plays a vital role in the Chinese context.

Misinformation poses a significant societal challenge, yet research lacks a standardized framework for conceptualizing and operationalizing correction behaviors. This study identifies four types: verification, rejection, public, and private correction engagement. A 14-item scale was developed in Study 1 using 23 focus groups ( N = 120) and expert review ( N = 12). Study 2 ( N = 1,063) and Study 3 ( N = 467) were conducted in China using Mandarin to validate the scale’s reliability and construct validity through confirmatory factor analyses. The scale offers a robust tool for studying correction behaviors and provides theoretical and practical insights for misinformation research.

Environmental campaigns traditionally focus on environmental perspectives, which may limit their long-term persuasive effectiveness. This study introduces a sustainable persuasive system that integrates both gain-loss framing and topic framing (health, economic and environmental perspectives) to assess which message combinations most effectively encourage policy support and behavioural intentions towards indoor or household waste classification: A 2 (gain vs. loss framing) × 3 (topic framing: environment vs. economy vs. health) between-subjects. An experiment was conducted with 698 Chinese participants. The results demonstrated that gain-framed messages could significantly increase the willingness to classify waste, although they produced no notable impact on policy support. Health-framed messages emerged as more effective in encouraging participation in waste classification compared to environmental or economic frames. Furthermore, economic-framed messages outperformed environmental-framed ones. Additionally, the interaction between gain-loss framing and topic framing could significantly influence behavioural intentions. Specifically, environmental- and economic-framed messages were more persuasive under the gain frame, whereas health-framed messages were more impactful under the loss frame. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings from sustainable persuasive systems are further discussed.