Overview | EcoTypes | 2023-24 DATA | COMPLEMENTARITY
Overview
What is your EcoType?

Your EcoType is your environmental framework: your broad approach to environmental issues. Just like builders construct a house starting with its frame, you build your environmental knowledge, concern, and action upon a framework—your EcoType.
Different people have different environmental frameworks—differing ways they approach environmental issues. EcoTypes gives you a systematic way to think about these different frameworks, so you can understand your approach better, and you can engage in fuller, richer conversation across difference.
The EcoTypes you are assigned from the survey have gone through several changes over time. EcoTypes have always been derived from your Place, Knowledge, and Action theme scores, which themselves are derived from your twelve axis scores. Your EcoType thus summarizes all of these scores in a concise way. As of 2024-25, your EcoType includes a phrase summarizing your Place and Action scores, and a suffix summarizing your Knowledge scores; here is a background and rationale.
EcoTypes are, in effect, our differing answers to the key theme questions:
- (Place) What is the place of nonhumans and humans on Earth?
- (Action) What action at small and big scales will help us build this place?
- (Knowledge) What old and new ways of knowing will help us build this place?
Here is a sample EcoType you might receive on your EcoTypes survey report, including an EcoTypes Place/Action phrase and Knowledge suffix.

This sample EcoType above would be assigned to those whose survey responses to the twelve EcoTypes axes tended toward human Place, small Action, and old Knowledge. More information on what this all means is below!
EcoTypes around the world

What might be the environmental frameworks of people around the world? Some have claimed to answer this huge question, using surveys or religious texts, but the aim of EcoTypes is more humble: to explore patterns of Place, Knowledge, and Action among many different kinds of people. It is possible that many care, just differently. We approach environmental frameworks—Ecotypes—of many people from the same non-judgmental perspective.
This global approach to EcoTypes is guided by major cross-national studies of values, including the World Values Survey and the Schwartz values research program. Both of these studies suggest two fundamental dimensions of values, such as the World Values Survey dimensions visualized on the cross-cultural diagram at right. These fundamental dimensions are similar to the three EcoTypes themes in summarizing a much greater array of difference.
Four EcoTypes
Small Green Steps | Earth Action | Social Justice | Land Stewardship | (O) / (I) / (N)
Your EcoTypes phrase and suffix
The Place and Action characteristics of the four EcoTypes phrases are summarized in the table below.
EcoTypes Phrase | Place | Action |
---|---|---|
Small Green Steps | Nonhuman | Small |
Earth Action | Nonhuman | Big |
Social Justice | Human | Big |
Land Stewardship | Human | Small |
Another way to compare the Place and Action characteristics of the four EcoTypes phrases is how they might respond to the respective questions pertaining to those two themes: “What is the place of nonhumans and humans on Earth?” and “What action at small and big scales will help us build this place?” Simple answers are on the table below.
EcoTypes Phrase | Place/Action Answers |
---|---|
Small Green Steps | Let’s do the little things we can to care for all life on Earth. |
Earth Action | We must dismantle global systems that threaten all life on Earth. |
Social Justice | Let us fight structures of oppression that harm marginalized people. |
Land Stewardship | We can each care for natural resources to benefit everyone. |
The three possible Knowledge suffixes are (O) for old Knowledge, (N) for new Knowledge, and (I) for integral Knowledge, representing both old and new Knowledge as summarized below.
Do remember: in the spirit of “Many Care, Just Differently,” there is nothing inherently better or worse about any of the four EcoTypes Place-Action phrases, or the three Knowledge subtypes. They are just different ways of addressing the key Place, Knowledge, and Action questions above. If you wish to better understand your own EcoType, or have a conversation with someone with a differing EcoType, do keep this in mind, at least as a good point of departure.
Below is an overview of the four Place/Action EcoTypes phrases and Knowledge subtypes. As another resource for each, feel free to have a look at the EcoTypes personae, including an idealized person representing each EcoType and the two contrasting (O) and (N) Knowledge subtype attractors.
Small Green Steps
If your EcoType were Small Green Steps, you may offer this answer to the first two questions above:
Let’s do the little things we can to care for all life on Earth.
And a Sustainable Development Goal you may find important as a global priority might be Responsible Consumption and Production.
Would you like to meet Sage and Latisha, the two Small Green Steps personae?
In comparison to other EcoTypes, Small Green Steps primarily embraces nonhuman Place and small Action; this EcoType is thus in the lower left sector below. Its complementary EcoType is Social Justice .

Nonhuman Place and small Action are idealized theme attractors, each summarizing four statistically related EcoTypes axis poles. Feel free to study these poles via the axis links below: if you are Small Green steps, which represent you?
Nonhuman Place | Small Action |
---|---|
Wild Aesthetics | Incremental Change |
Stable Ecosystems | Market Economies |
Biocentric Ethics | Individual Social Scale |
Pure Nature | Consensus Society |
Earth Action
If your EcoType were Earth Action, you may offer this answer to the first two questions above:
We must dismantle global systems that threaten all life on Earth.
And a Sustainable Development Goal you may find important as a global priority might be Climate Action.
Would you like to meet Morgan and Nathan, the two Earth Action personae?
In comparison to other EcoTypes, Earth Action primarily embraces nonhuman Place and big Action; this EcoType is thus in the upper left sector below. Its complementary EcoType is Land Stewardship.

Nonhuman Place and big Action are idealized theme attractors, each summarizing four statistically related EcoTypes axis poles. Feel free to study these poles via the axis links below: if you are Earth Action, which represent you?
Nonhuman Place | Big Action |
---|---|
Wild Aesthetics | Radical Change |
Stable Ecosystems | Planned Economies |
Biocentric Ethics | Institutional Social Scale |
Pure Nature | Conflict Society |
Social Justice
If your EcoType were Social Justice, you may offer this answer to the first two questions above:
Let us fight structures of oppression that harm marginalized people.
And a Sustainable Development Goal you may find important as a global priority might be Reduced Inequalities.
Would you like to meet Isabella and Joaquin, the two Social Justice personae?
In comparison to other EcoTypes, Social Justice primarily embraces human Place and big Action; this EcoType is thus in the upper right sector below. Its complementary EcoType is Small Green Steps.

Human Place and big Action are idealized theme attractors, each summarizing four statistically related EcoTypes axis poles. Feel free to study these poles via the axis links below: if you are Social Justice, which represent you?
Human Place | Big Action |
---|---|
Crafted Aesthetics | Radical Change |
Dynamic Ecosystems | Planned Economies |
Anthropocentric Ethics | Institutional Social Scale |
Hybrid Nature | Conflict Society |
Land Stewardship
If your EcoType were Land Stewardship you may offer this answer to the first two questions above:
We can each care for natural resources to benefit everyone.
And a Sustainable Development Goal you may find important as a global priority might be Zero Hunger.
Would you like to meet Isaiah and Aisha, the two Land Stewardship personae?
Land Stewardship primarily embraces human Place and small Action; this EcoType is thus in the lower right sector below. Its complementary EcoType is Earth Action.

Human Place and small Action are idealized theme attractors, each summarizing four statistically related EcoTypes axis poles. Feel free to study these poles via the axis links below: if you are Land Stewardship, which represent you?
Human Place | Small Action |
---|---|
Crafted Aesthetics | Incremental Change |
Dynamic Ecosystems | Market Economies |
Anthropocentric Ethics | Individual Social Scale |
Hybrid Nature | Consensus Society |
Old/Integral/New Knowledge
These four EcoTypes offer various answers to the first two big questions above. But what about the third question?:
What old and new ways of knowing will help us build this place?
This is the question underlying the Knowledge theme, for which there are two attractors, old and new Knowledge. For these Knowledge subtypes, you would have an (O) or a (N) suffix appended to your EcoType, as summarized below.
(O)ld Knowledge | (N)ew Knowledge |
---|---|
Heterodox Science | Orthodox Science |
Sacred Spirituality | Secular Spirituality |
Phobic Technology | Philic Technology |
Past Time | Future Time |
Yet analysis of over 3000 responses in 2023-24 suggest a third Knowledge subtype, which we will call (I) for integral Knowledge, alongside the old and new Knowledge attractors. What is integral Knowledge? Some responses indeed embraced old or new Knowledge, as defined by their axis poles above; tet others seemed to embrace a different approach. Overall, looking at 2023-24 Knowledge axis responses, there seem to be two statistical clusters:

As the diagram suggests, all four are correlated and thus part of the common Knowledge theme, but Spirituality and Time, and Science and Technology, are more closely correlated. And fully three of five 2023-24 respondents, followed this pattern, scoring toward old Knowledge (–) on Spirituality and Time, and toward new Knowledge (+) on Science and Technology.
We might call this pattern “integral” vs. old or new Knowledge, following an integral ecology philosophy in which both religion and science—both old and new Knowledge—offer important environmental guidance. In many ways, the three Knowledge subtypes resonate with longstanding discussions and debates over the role of religion and spirituality (old) vs. science (new) in providing guidance to our lives. As noted above, none of these are inherently better or worse!; they are just different ways of addressing the big Knowledge theme question above.
2023-24 Data Patterns
How does your EcoType compare with others who have taken the survey? We can start to answer this question via analysis of 2023-24 survey responses (n > 3000). What you’ll see below are some interesting patterns in the overall proportion of the EcoTypes Place/Action phrase and Knowledge subtype, and the demographic characteristics of survey respondents for each.
Place/Action phrase
Here is a chart of the four EcoTypes phrases,. You can readily see that Earth Action and Small Green Steps, the two EcoTypes tending toward nonhuman Place, were far more prevalent among respondents (generally environmental college students). Yet even among these respondents, an important difference is evident in the key Action question noted above (see here for further details). And as we extend the EcoTypes survey to other communities in the spirit of “Many Care, Just Differently,” we can expect some to place greater emphasis on human Place.

Demographic patterns among these four main EcoType phrases offer interesting clues as to who might lean toward which and why. As with the above chart, variables with ANOVA significance at p = .001 are asterisked. We see in some cases (Location, Economic ID, Environmental Solutions) the differences are not great enough to be statistically significant, but in all others they are. The following are particularly noteworthy:
- Gender (cf. cross-national Gen Z data). Earth Action and Small Green Steps, both nonhuman Place EcoTypes, are more common among female/nonbinary respondents, while Land Stewardship is more common among those who identify as male, with Social Justice in between. Indeed, mean Place scores (-1 nonhuman to +1 human) for male are -0.16 vs. -0.24 for female/nonbinary (p < .001); though this difference seems small, remember that theme scores are averages of averages (see above), so there is an important difference between male and non-male gender identification in Place, and thus in Place-Action EcoTypes.
- Politics, Religion. Another highly significant difference involves respondent political identification, with Earth Action respondents far to the political left relative to others, and Land Stewardship slightly to the political right. This pattern is reproduced in religious identification as well, here focusing on those who called themselves “spiritual” vs. “religious,” with Earth Action respondents far more likely to call themselves spiritual than others, and Land Stewardship far more likely to call themselves religious. One intentional reason, in fact, for this EcoType name is that stewardship has a long theological tradition in land management, and thus can be expected to be somewhat associated with those who call themselves religious.
- Environmental self-IDs. Earth Action respondents are most comfortable calling themselves environmentalists, and worry the most about environmental problems, while Land Stewardship respondents are the least so for both, with Social Justice and Small Green Steps in between.
Knowledge suffix
A chart re-analyzing 2023-24 survey data according to the three Knowledge subtypes suggests the strength of integral Knowledge (I), a support for old Knowledge in the context of Spirituality and Time, and new Knowledge regarding Science and Technology. Other respondents, though, showed roughly equal support old or new Knowledge, as applied to all four Knowledge axes.
As noted above, this pattern of 2023-24 responses is what has resulted in a different way to characterize your Knowledge suffix vs. your Place/Action phrase: your phrase simply summarizes the Place and Action attractors to which your axis responses tended, but your suffix might be one of the two Knowledge attractors, or the integral Knowledge combination of the two.

The demographics of 2023-24 respondents can be compared via ANOVA with these three Knowledge types to yield interesting patterns as well, as shown on the figure at right. In this figure, all demographic variables significant at p = .001 are asterisked. In some cases (e.g., ethnicity) differences are relatively, minor, but in others they are larger, including:
- Gender [again!]—perhaps the biggest demographic difference. Those who identify as male lean much more toward new Knowledge, whereas those who identify as female or nonbinary (grouped given other similarities in EcoTypes data) lean much more toward old or integral Knowledge.
- Location. Though the majority of respondents reside in the US, others from non-US locations completed the survey too, and they tend to lean more toward new Knowledge than US respondents.
- Politics, Religion, Environmental self-IDs. Those who lean toward new Knowledge are unique among a number of other variables as well: they are less left-leaning politically, less likely to self-identify as “religious” or “spiritual,” and are less likely to identify as “environmentalist” or say they worry about environmental issues.
Complementarity
What is complementarity?

Complementarity is a principle derived from physics, in which two opposing descriptions of reality are each true, yet a fuller truth arises from considering them both. A classic example is light, which can be understood either as photon particles, or in terms of propagating waves—though these two approaches contradict each other! Somehow a fuller understanding of light requires both. Niels Bohr, the Nobel Prize-winning physicist who championed this principle, even designed his coat of arms based on the well-known yin-yang (taijitu) symbol of interacting opposites; the Latin motto translates as “Opposites are complementary.”
How might this apply to EcoTypes? The differences embedded in EcoTypes arise from our differing interactions with reality and can be a strength, if we are willing to engage with people whose EcoTypes differ from—indeed, may be the opposite of—ours. Engagement across difference is not easy! But it may be one of the most rewarding practical things you can do with EcoTypes; see the Going Deeper page (“What are some practical next steps I can take?”) for starter guidance.
What is my complementary EcoType?
Your complementary EcoType is the environmental framework that differs from yours the most. It’s easy to identify your complementary EcoType: just go to your EcoTypes Place/Action chart and look for the sector opposite your dot. Complementary EcoTypes are also given for the four main EcoTypes phrases above. Then, for your complementary Knowledge suffix, you can switch (O) for (N) and vice versa; if yours is (I), feel free to choose one of the other Knowledge subtypes you feel might be different from yours.
As an example, go the Overview section of the EcoTypes page, where you’ll see Land Stewardship (O). If this were your EcoType, your dot would be in the lower right of the Place/Action chart, thus the opposite sector is Earth Action in upper left, and the complementary Knowledge suffix would be (N). So, your complementary EcoType would be Earth Action (N). (Sounds abstract?: go to the Personae page and read about your complementary EcoType!)
What can I do to better appreciate complementarity?
If you’ve taken the EcoTypes survey and would like to better appreciate complementarity, the followup MCJD form gives you an opportunity to compare your EcoType and your complementary EcoType. In addition, the forthcoming EcoTypes book will offer a much fuller treatment of complementarity.
And starting in 2025, we are piloting a new, AI-based activity below!…please give it a try, and help us out by filling out our response form to tell us how it went.
In this activity you will engage in dialogue with an AI chatbot you have trained to converse as if it were your complementary EcoType. We will use ChatGPT for this pilot activity, but feel free to use other AI platforms and let us know how they worked.
Here are the steps:
- Determine the Place, Action, and Knowledge theme characteristics of your complementary EcoType, following “What is my complementary EcoType?” above.
- In the example above, the complementary EcoType (Earth Action (N)) includes nonhuman Place, big Action, and new Knowledge.
- The EcoTypes themes page calls these characteristics “attractors,” as they represent compelling, idealized, statistically derived features. You and your complementary EcoType are basically attracted to opposite things.
- Next, remind yourself which four EcoTypes axes correspond to each EcoTypes theme.
- (Remember, the three EcoTypes themes statistically summarize differences found in responses to all twelve EcoTypes axes; each theme gathers four axes into one summary measure.)
- On the themes page you’ll read a summary narrative of each attractor, with links to all four related axes. For instance, the Place theme narratives include links to Aesthetics, Ecosystems, Ethics, and Nature.
- Now, go back to your survey results, and look for one or two axes for each theme in which you expressed the strongest position (close to +1 or –1). Now, go to those axes and copy the statements that represent the position opposite yours.
- For instance, if your complementary EcoType is Earth Action (N), you are interested in the Place theme, and your survey score on Ethics was +1, aligning with the right pole (“Since we are people, it’s justifiable to value nature for how it serves human needs”), you would copy the opposing statement, “It is shortsighted for people to manage nature with only human interests in mind.”
- When you are done you will have a list of 3-6 EcoTypes statements with which you most strongly disagree! You will use these in the next step to train your chatbot. It’s easiest to copy/paste them into a single document (including quotation marks to clarify), then you’ll paste all statements at once into ChatGPT as detailed below.
- You are almost ready to chat with an AI companion representing your complementary EcoType! First, we recommend you sign up (free) for ChatGPT.
- Click the Sign Up button on the above link, where you can enter an email/password, or sign up immediately via Google, Microsoft, or Apple services.
- This step is not required for the below, but will help you readily save and retrieve your conversations…handy for educational uses.
- OK, login to ChatGPT and get started! You’ll first inform the chatbot of your desired conversation, then train it to take on the role of your complementary EcoType via the statements you copied. Here are some recommendations:
- Start with an overview statement like this (feel free to modify): “I need to practice an environmental conversation with someone who disagrees with me on basically everything. Can you help me prepare for it by role-playing with me? I will train you by sharing some statements they strongly agree with. Then you and I can have a pretend conversation. The goal of the conversation is to understand each other, not necessarily to agree on anything.”
- ChatGPT will respond accordingly, and give you the opportunity to enter the statements representing your complementary EcoType. It is recommended that you tell ChatGPT you’ll enter each in quotes, so that ChatGPT knows clearly that they represent positions with which you do not personally agree.
- If you have copied/pasted the complementary EcoTypes statements into a single document, you can paste all of them into ChatGPT at once (remember the quotes!), or you can enter a statement into ChatGPT and then add a line break (shift-return) to enter multiple statements at once.
- Now you will engage in dialogue with your chatbot! Feel free to try out multiple conversations, or multiple sessions; here are some ideas for starters.
- Once you have trained the chatbot, they will say something like this: “Got it! I’ll take on the perspective of someone who strongly agrees with these statements. Let me know when you’re ready to start the role-play conversation, and feel free to set the scene or context for our discussion.”
- You can then follow their recommendation; here is one example: “Let’s say we are discussing our priority environmental policies for 2025 in the realm of climate change. Feel free to begin!” It may be best to focus on a particular environmental issue or policy, to bring out your differences more clearly.
- ChatGPT may initially say something that’s pretty close to one or more of the complementary EcoTypes statements with which they were trained. You can then probe what they say more deeply, perhaps by sharing how you feel differently, or by offering a summary of what you hear. Give this time!: see if you can more clearly understand, perhaps even appreciate, your differences. See where ChatGPT goes with expressing their own position, or how well they seem to understand yours.
- Important!: make sure to explore all Place, Action, and Knowledge dimensions of your complementary EcoType. Say, if they start by discussing Action dimensions of your topic, you can move the conversation toward Place and Knowledge dimensions. For instance, ask them a question connecting one of your chosen Place or Knowledge axes to your topic. Or, you could make a general statement you agree with that connects Place or Knowledge with your topic, then see how they respond.
- Remember that the actual names of EcoTypes axes (e.g., Nature) and themes (e.g., Place) may not be fully understood by ChatGPT in the way they are used in EcoTypes, so be concrete in your wording.
- When you have fully explored your differing Place, Action, and Knowledge dimensions of the topic you discussed, you are done! If you have logged in to ChatGPT, your transcript will be saved, and you can study or copy it for future use.
- Do you wish to initiate another conversation, perhaps on another environmental issue you care about? Then you can compare your conversations.
- Make sure to give yourself time at the end to reflect on your conversation(s).
- How did it feel to chat with an AI bot? How well did they express positions that differ from yours? How well did they seem to understand you?
- What dimensions of the environmental issue or policy you discussed were significant in your conversation? Can you imagine how these dimensions may be significant in the real world?
- What might be challenging for you, personally, in engaging in such conversations across huge difference? Did chatting with a chatbot make you feel more confident in actually having such conversations with a real person?
- Go back to the theme of complementarity introduced above: what did you learn about opposing Place, Knowledge, and Action attractors, and how, in Bohr’s words, “opposites are complementary”?
- If you are doing this exercise in a class, your instructor may give you other prompts to reflect and write on.
- Remember also to complete the question form with any thoughts you have on this pilot activity!…thank you.