sustain

From Save the Earth. Everybody’s doing it. – On selecting the right persuasive hook:

Have you ever noticed the “reuse your towels” cards in your hotel room? They typically show a beautiful vista with copy describing how reusing your towel will save energy, water, and, by extension, the environment. Are you convinced? Do you reuse your towels? Most people don’t.

The hotel industry seemed to think that “some do” was good enough, though. Perhaps hotel executives thought they’d hit a compliance ceiling? So they continue (today!) to print the same cards with the same pictures and the same largely unpersuasive message.

Researchers Goldstein, Cialdini, and Griskevicius, however, felt that it was hook (”Do this to save the earth.”) not the sentiment (”save the earth”) that was weak. They hypothesized that knowing that other people had done it would evoke greater compliance than just saving the earth.

To test their hypothesis, Goldstein and team created two sets of request cards that contrasted the original conservationist message with a new social proof motivator message. The gist of the messages (although not the actual messages) were:

– Original conservationist message: Reuse your towels. It will save the earth.
– Social proof message: Reuse your towels. Everybody’s doing it.

Then they worked with hotel staff to distribute the cards throughout the rooms. And then waited to see who reused their towels and who didn’t.

The result was impressive. Hotel guests who saw the “Everybody’s doing it” message reused their towels 26% more than those who saw the “Save the earth” message. That represents a 26% increase over the accepted industry standard.

The researchers wondered if a shared social proof appeal could be even more persuasive through similarity. So they ran the study again. This time they included a third treatment variation, which essentially conveyed, “People in exactly your situation — who stayed in the same hotel room — have reused their towels.” Their hunch was that knowing that people who had stayed in the room had participated in the desired behavior would add even more social pressure to comply.

Again they were correct. Individuals exposed to the same-room-social-proof motivator message were 33% more likely to reuse their towels than individuals in the conservationist message rooms.

It seems that the closer to home (away-from-home) the social comparison is, the more effective it is.

From the original research paper, Goldstein, N.J., Cialdini, R.B., Griskevicius, R.B. (2008), A Room with a Viewpoint: Using Social Norms to Motivate Environmental Conservation in Hotels, Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 35.:

Social Norms
When consumers learn that seven out of 10 people choose one brand of automobile over another, that teeth-whitening toothpaste has become more popular than its less functional counterpart, and that nearly everyone at the local cafeteria steers clear of the “spamburger surprise” entree, they are getting information about social norms. Specifically, they are getting information about descriptive norms, which refer to how most people behave in a situation. Descriptive norms motivate both private and public actions by informing individuals of what is likely to be effective or adaptive behavior in that situation (Cialdini, Kallgren, and Reno 1991). A wide variety of research shows that the behavior of others in the social environment shapes individuals’ interpretations of, and responses to, the situation (Bearden and Etzel 1982), especially in novel, ambiguous, or uncertain situations (Griskevicius et al. 2006; Hochbaum 1954; Park and Lessig 1977; Shapiro and Neuberg, forthcoming).

Norm Adherence
Several factors are known to influence the extent to which individuals will adhere to the descriptive norms of a given reference group (Cialdini and Goldstein 2004; Goldstein and Cialdini, forthcoming). One important variable affecting the likelihood of norm adherence is the level of perceived similarity among others and a given individual (Burnkrant and Cousineau 1975; Moschis 1976). According to Festinger’s (1954) social comparison theory, people often evaluate themselves by comparing themselves to others especially to others with whom they share similar personal characteristics. In line with this supposition, people are indeed more likely to follow the behaviors of others with similar features, including age (Murray et al. 1984), personality attributes (Carli, Ganley, and Pierce-Otay 1991), gender (White, Hogg, and Terry 2002), and attitudes (Suedfeld, Bochner, and Matas
1971).

Experiment One
Participants
Over an 80-day span, we collected data on 1,058 instances of potential towel reuse in 190 rooms in a midsized, midpriced hotel in the Southwest that was part of a national hotel chain. The guests were not aware that they were participants in the study.

Materials
Materials. Two different messages urging guests’ participation in the towel reuse program were printed on signs positioned on washroom towel racks:
The standard environmental message focused guests’ attention on the importance of environmental protection but did not provide any descriptive normative information:

“HELP SAVE THE ENVIRONMENT. You can show your respect for nature and help save the environment by reusing your towels during your stay.”

The descriptive norm message informed guests that a majority of other guests participate in the towel reuse program:

“JOIN YOUR FELLOW GUESTS IN HELPING TO SAVE THE ENVIRONMENT. Almost 75% of guests who are asked to participate in our new resource savings program do help by using their towels more than once. You can join your fellow guests in this program to help save the environment by reusing your towels during your stay.”

Results
Consistent with our hypothesis, a chi-square test revealed that the descriptive norm condition yielded a significantly higher towel reuse rate (44.1%) than the environmental protection condition (35.1%). The results of experiment 1 showed that the normative sign, which we have never observed employed by any hotel, yielded a towel reuse rate that was significantly higher than the industry standard.

The results of this study most certainly have implications for the design of feedback technologies to inform consumers not just about how much energy they are expending but how closely it aligns with their community at large. When I’ve discussed this before with others, one argument against allowing consumers to compare themselves to an “average consumer” is that there are studies showing that a person will actually compensate (e.g., use more energy) if they find that they are a better than average consumer. This raises two points: (1) one might want to create tiers of communities based on performance such that you are always being compared with a group that is slightly better at performing than you are; (2) what morality must a feedback technology subscribe to? It is OK to exaggerate (or outright lie) to shift a person’s behavior in a positive manner?

Also, it would seem that this most certainly could impact the design of social networking applications (such as Facebook plugins) that attempt to motivate positive behavior change through social awareness and influence.