When people are given the opportunity to avoid unpleasant information about the possible negative consequences of their self-interested behavior on others, a significant number of people tend to avoid this information. Consequently, the choice to remain ignorant to the negative implications of one's actions has been shown to substantially reduce prosocial behavior when compared to situations in which people are aware of these consequences. Recent studies question the role of deliberate ignorance in environmental contexts. Participants did not avoid information regarding the negative consequence of their choices on a pro-environmental organization. In addition, the option to remain ignorant of this information did not affect their proenvironmental behavior. We argue that the procedure that should be followed in order to remain ignorant plays a critical role in shaping this decision. We employ a binary dictator game where the recipient is a nonprofit environmental organization, and manipulate the procedure that dictators have to follow to remain ignorant of the recipient's payment. We find a significant effect of the applied procedure on both the tendency to remain ignorant and the subsequent pro-environmental behavior.

当人们有机会避免关于他们的自利行为可能对他人产生负面影响的不愉快信息时，相当多的人倾向于回避这些信息。因此，与人们意识到这些后果的情况相比，选择对自己行为的负面影响保持无知已被证明可以大大减少亲社会行为。最近的研究质疑故意无知在环境背景下的作用。参与者并没有回避有关他们选择对环保组织的负面影响的信息。此外，对这些信息保持无知的选择并不影响他们的环保行为。我们认为，为了保持无知而应遵循的程序在塑造这一决定中起着关键作用。我们采用二元独裁者博弈，收款人是非营利性环保组织，并操纵独裁者必须遵循的程序，以保持对收款人付款一无所知。我们发现应用程序对保持无知的倾向和随后的亲环境行为都有显着影响。