Lecture 6 Sustainability & Charity

Question 1

reducing climate change

Answer 1

the most recommended things to reduce emission are the least effective.
the 3 most effective are
- have one fewer child
- live car free
- avoid one transatlantic flight

Question 2

income and emission

Answer 2

the top 1% holds 50% of the emission. income is a huge predictor of carbon footprint and consumption.
if you can spend more you will

Question 3

BUCkET model by Brick et al., (2021)

Answer 3

• Belonging (social norms)
• Understanding (change beliefs)
• Controlling (sense of efficacy)
• self-Enhancement (image concenrs; sustainable identity)
• Trust (trust for collective action)

human behavior is driven by core motives, so if you act on those you can change behavior.

Question 4

SHIFT model by Habib et al., (2021)

Answer 4

• Social influence (social norms is biggest factor)
• Habit
• Individual self (leverage image concerns)
• Feelings and cognition
• Tangibility (make it concrete and easy)

Question 5

BUCkET and SHIFT in other categories

Answer 5

• social norms
• self-image
• ease of action
• information

Question 6

social norms

Answer 6

• belonging
• social influence
• trust

Question 7

self-image

Answer 7

• self-enhancement
• individual self

Question 8

ease of action

Answer 8

• control
• tangibility
• habit

Question 9

information

Answer 9

• understanding
• feelings & cognition

Question 10

3 types of social norms

Answer 10

• injunctive
• descriptive
• dynamic

Question 11

injunctive social norms

Answer 11

what is the right thing to do.
for example: reusable cups

Question 12

descriptive

Answer 12

what most others actually do

Question 13

dynamic

Answer 13

what is becoming more prevalent (trend)

Question 14

boomerang effect

Answer 14

occurs when you are better than the descriptive norm. reactance, you eventually become worse.

Question 15

injunctive + descriptive norm

Answer 15

through comparing people we can minimize the boomerang effect.
- people that use the most reduce the most and people that use the least aren’t reducing as much, but not using more

Question 16

Best for changing behavior

Answer 16

dynamic social norms
when focusing on the shift without giving numbers you overcome the problem that only the minority is doing something. increases self-efficacy and collective action

“more germans than ever are eating less meat” instead of “6% of germans are vegetarian”

Question 17

self-image in sustainability

Answer 17

positive self image
- accountability
- message tailored to own values (link to identity)
- conspicuous green consumption
- ownership over natural resources

challenges
- avoid difficult information
- moral licensing; good behavior licenses bad behavior.

Question 18

construal level theory

tangibility and control in ease of action

Answer 18

phenomenon vary in their psychological distance

Question 19

psychological distance

Answer 19

• geographic
• social distance
• temporal distance (far in the future)
• uncertainty/abstractness

Question 20

increasing urgengy to act

Answer 20

the percieved distance lowers the urgency to act. this can be changed by
- reducting distance can lead to more concern
- intervention: make threat more concrete
- make actions more concrete

Question 21

mismatch?

Answer 21

we have not evovled to be afraid of climate change yet. it doesn’t act on our threat response.

Question 22

habit formation

habit formation in ease of action in sustainability

Answer 22

because pro-environmental behavior can be seen as a self-control problem we should create habits that remove temptations.

Question 23

information in sustainabilty

Answer 23

to make people act more sustainable we can learn them.
for example most people underestimate the energy used to produce certain things and we can inform them with using easy labels.

however motivation is also needed

Question 24

field interventions effects?

Answer 24

when studied social comparison had the biggest effect, then financial incentive and the least effective was education.

Question 25

spillover effect

Answer 25

one pro-environmental behavior affects the likelihood of performing additional pro-environmental behaviors
- positive spillover
- negative spillover

mixed evidence

Question 26

positive spillover

Answer 26

when one pro-envirnomental behavior leads to
- habit formation
- identity reinforcement
- consistency

for attitudes/intentions

Question 27

negative spillover/crowding out

Answer 27

when one pro-environmental behavior leads to
- reduced fear
- reduced guilt
- reduced image concerns

no effect of negative spillover for behaviors.

Question 28

two types of interventions

Answer 28

• i-frame interventions: focus on individual attitudes and behaviors
• s-frame interventions: focus on the system

tend to adopt an i-frame, but s is more effective

Question 29

backfiring nudges

Answer 29

if people were nudged and told about it they were less supportive of an intervention than when they weren’t told about it.

Question 30

why do people donate to charity?

Answer 30

people say they do it to help others/make a difference etc. but this doesn’t match their behavior.
few donors pay attention to the impact of their giving by understanding differences in effectiveness and ignorance of most effective charities

Question 31

example of differences between charities

Answer 31

with $11.000 you can make one wish come true but also prevent 3 kids from dying from malaria.

only a minority of donations goes to the most cost-effective charities

make a wish versus malaria

Question 32

more realistic reason for donating to charity?

Answer 32

driven by emotional reactions to suffering
empathy as a proximate cause, but empathy is ingroup focused.

Question 33

prioritization aversion

Answer 33

skepticism of quantifiability; it is hard to choose between charities when they are quantified

therefore donating is viewed as a personal choice rather than something to optimize

Question 34

aspects of causes we care about

Answer 34

• local causes
• things that have impacted us
• our social group
• similarity
• tangibility
• scope insensitivity

Question 35

Pete Singer’s child in pond thought experiment

Answer 35

if you have new shoes and see a child drowning you would still save the child even when it ruins your shoes. But you would still buy the shoes and not donate the money.

we should treat everyone as if they are in front of us

Question 36

scope insensitivity

Answer 36

the idea that more suffering doesn’t lead to more help
- reduced emotional response
- reduced sense of responsibility or ability to help
- grouping as a unit reduces this (family instead of 4 people)

Question 37

ways to increase charitable giving

Answer 37

• identifiable victim effect
• unit matching
• social norms
• financial incentives
• preference
• solicitation

Question 38

identifiable victim effect

Answer 38

makes needs concrete, higher emotional response, higher percieved impact and less compassion fade.

Question 39

unit matching

Answer 39

ask for one and then scale up to make scope more tangible

Question 40

social norms

Answer 40

tested with donation box in museum. fixed amount of money but amount of donations varied
- with coins most people donated
- amount per donor was more when bills
- amount per visitor has no significant difference between conditions

so coins or bills lead to the same amount, but different ways in which it is donated

Question 41

financial incentives

Answer 41

tax breaks
matching

Question 42

preference

Answer 42

splitting between preffered and highly effective

Question 43

solicitation

Answer 43

more opportunities to give
(avoid donor fatique)