Environmental Responsibility Among Baby Boomers: A Comparative Study of Environmental Orientation and Knowledge in Hungary and Slovakia

This study examines environmental orientation and environmental knowledge among the Baby Boomer generation in a Central European comparative context. The study investigates whether Baby Boomer respondents in Hungary and Slovakia differ in environmental orientation and environmental knowledge. The research is based on a quantitative questionnaire survey, including 374 Baby Boomer respondents: 188 from Hungary and 186 from Slovakia. Environmental orientation was measured using items adapted from the New Ecological Paradigm tradition. In contrast, environmental knowledge was assessed as an exploratory composite knowledge index based on selected items adapted from previously published measurement scales, covering product-related environmental knowledge and familiarity with sustainability-related terminology. Descriptive statistics, country-level comparisons, K-means cluster analysis, ANOVA, and effect-size measures were applied. The results show that Baby Boomer respondents in both countries reported relatively high levels of environmental orientation, with no statistically significant difference between countries. By contrast, environmental knowledge differed significantly, although with a small effect size, in favor of the Slovak sample. The cluster analysis further showed that Baby Boomers should not be treated as a homogeneous consumer group, as lower-, moderate-, and higher-orientation–knowledge segments were identified in both countries. The study contributes to generational sustainability research by showing that older consumers should not be evaluated solely by general pro-environmental attitudes, as positive environmental orientation may not be accompanied by the same level of sustainability-related knowledge. The findings suggest that future research and practice should not assume that positive environmental orientation among older consumers is automatically accompanied by detailed sustainability-related knowledge.