Encouraging pro-environmental behaviours: A review of methods and approaches

Many urgent environmental problems can be mitigated with more sustainable use of resources. An acknowledgement of which is a growing interest among policy practitioners in encouraging pro-environmental behaviour change initiatives. In this contribution a review of the existing literature on behavioural change case studies is offered and a categorisation of treatments and guidelines for successful project implementation provided. While most studies relate to energy use and efficiency, the review is not restricted to energy applications to allow insights from other disciplines. The experimental designs considered are treatment-control and before-after studies. Five types of treatments have been considered: education and awareness, outreach and relationship building, social influence, nudges and behavioural insights and incentives, which have been used in experimental studies. In total, 85 primary case studies were collected, many of which tested several treatments, therefore the total number of treatments examined is 155. The analysis finds that the share of success of behaviour change projects related to energy or waste exceeds 70%, while success rate in water-related programmes is about 60%. On balance, the case studies suggest that all types of treatments are suitable but their selection should be based on specific objectives and target population. Interestingly, the choice of the behaviour to change is rarely discussed before project implementation. This analysis also highlights that little is known on whether behaviour change projects achieve sustained pro-environmental behavioural change over time.

Automated summary

This article discusses case studies and treatment categories of environmental behavior change projects, suggesting that projects related to energy or waste have a higher success rate than those related to water. All types of treatments are suitable for behavior change, but their selection should be based on specific objectives and target populations.