Interesting re "viral marketing": The power of social norms to help with climate change
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Bruce England
Sep 17, 2008, 4:50:55 PM9/17/08
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-----Forwarded Message-----
>From: "Weiss, Julie" <Julie...@cityofpaloalto.org>
>Sent: Sep 17, 2008 3:53 PM
>To: PA_...@yahoogroups.com, BASust...@yahoo.com
>
>
>This is an email summary of the attached article about using the power of social norms to influence change in people. Essentially "positive peer pressure." I recommend scanning the full article. To this article, I would also add leveraging the influence that our organizational leaders offer to set the tone for what the social norm will be.
>
>........................
>
>Hello,
>
>Every week several things arrive in my in-box that could help make my work
>more effective. Occasionally an insight or research article sticks-because
>it is more perceptive, more innovative or more challenging to my current
>thinking.
>
>This summer I've been talking about a paper on the power of social norms.
>Many of us know that social norms can be useful tools in encouraging
>behavior change. The authors of the attached paper found that not only were
>norms powerful in their effect on people's behavior, but people also did
>not recognize that norms were affecting them. Here are a few examples:
>
>Charitable donations
>People were eight times more likely to give money to a street musician when
>they saw someone else toss a few coins in the hat. But when asked why they
>donated, not one attributed the decision to the fact that they had seen
>someone else give money.
>
>Energy conservation
>In a large-scale survey, people ranked the importance of several reasons to
>conserve energy. The results, from most to least important: (1) It will
>help the environment; (2) It will benefit society; (3) It will save me
>money; (4) Other people are doing it. However, researchers found that the
>belief that others were conserving correlated twice as highly with reported
>energy saving efforts as any of the other reasons. A follow-up marketing
>experiment confirmed the survey findings.
>
>The influence of negative norms
>The Petrified National Forest in Arizona loses more than a ton of wood each
>month because of theft. An experiment alternated a pair of signs in high
>theft areas. Both signs urged visitors not to take wood. One sign depicted
>several thieves in action; the second depicted a lone thief. Visitors who
>passed the first sign were more than twice as likely to steal as those who
>passed the second sign.
>
>Using social norms to promote pro-environmental behaviors:
>
>1. Use the power of positive social norms.
>Hotel rooms often have cards asking guests to reuse their towels. An
>experiment tried three different cards. One card used social norms ("Join
>your fellow guests in helping to save the environment") along with
>information that most hotel guests reuse their towels. The result: towel
>reuse increased by 34 percent.
>
>2. Social norms will have an especially strong impact when things are
>uncertain or unfamiliar.
>When conditions have recently changed, such as introduction of a new green
>product or a new law related to pro-environmental action, people are
>confused and tend to look to others for evidence of how to act.
>
>3. People are especially influenced by those who are similar to them.
>For example, the decision to conserve energy was most powerfully influenced
>when related to members of their own community. The hotel guest sign worked
>best when it said that the majority of guests who have stayed in this room
>had reused their towels.
>
>You can find more details in the attached paper. I hope you find this food
>for thought in planning your next efforts to change environmental behavior.
>
>Annette
>
>(Embedded image moved to file: pic29201.jpg)
>Annette Frahm, Principal
>Sage Enviro
>206-789-7001
>www.sageenviro.com
> (See attached file: Social norms & climate change.pdf)
>
>------------------------------------
>
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>From: "Weiss, Julie" <Julie...@cityofpaloalto.org>
>Sent: Sep 17, 2008 3:53 PM
>To: PA_...@yahoogroups.com, BASust...@yahoo.com
>
>
>This is an email summary of the attached article about using the power of social norms to influence change in people. Essentially "positive peer pressure." I recommend scanning the full article. To this article, I would also add leveraging the influence that our organizational leaders offer to set the tone for what the social norm will be.
>
>........................
>
>Hello,
>
>Every week several things arrive in my in-box that could help make my work
>more effective. Occasionally an insight or research article sticks-because
>it is more perceptive, more innovative or more challenging to my current
>thinking.
>
>This summer I've been talking about a paper on the power of social norms.
>Many of us know that social norms can be useful tools in encouraging
>behavior change. The authors of the attached paper found that not only were
>norms powerful in their effect on people's behavior, but people also did
>not recognize that norms were affecting them. Here are a few examples:
>
>Charitable donations
>People were eight times more likely to give money to a street musician when
>they saw someone else toss a few coins in the hat. But when asked why they
>donated, not one attributed the decision to the fact that they had seen
>someone else give money.
>
>Energy conservation
>In a large-scale survey, people ranked the importance of several reasons to
>conserve energy. The results, from most to least important: (1) It will
>help the environment; (2) It will benefit society; (3) It will save me
>money; (4) Other people are doing it. However, researchers found that the
>belief that others were conserving correlated twice as highly with reported
>energy saving efforts as any of the other reasons. A follow-up marketing
>experiment confirmed the survey findings.
>
>The influence of negative norms
>The Petrified National Forest in Arizona loses more than a ton of wood each
>month because of theft. An experiment alternated a pair of signs in high
>theft areas. Both signs urged visitors not to take wood. One sign depicted
>several thieves in action; the second depicted a lone thief. Visitors who
>passed the first sign were more than twice as likely to steal as those who
>passed the second sign.
>
>Using social norms to promote pro-environmental behaviors:
>
>1. Use the power of positive social norms.
>Hotel rooms often have cards asking guests to reuse their towels. An
>experiment tried three different cards. One card used social norms ("Join
>your fellow guests in helping to save the environment") along with
>information that most hotel guests reuse their towels. The result: towel
>reuse increased by 34 percent.
>
>2. Social norms will have an especially strong impact when things are
>uncertain or unfamiliar.
>When conditions have recently changed, such as introduction of a new green
>product or a new law related to pro-environmental action, people are
>confused and tend to look to others for evidence of how to act.
>
>3. People are especially influenced by those who are similar to them.
>For example, the decision to conserve energy was most powerfully influenced
>when related to members of their own community. The hotel guest sign worked
>best when it said that the majority of guests who have stayed in this room
>had reused their towels.
>
>You can find more details in the attached paper. I hope you find this food
>for thought in planning your next efforts to change environmental behavior.
>
>Annette
>
>(Embedded image moved to file: pic29201.jpg)
>Annette Frahm, Principal
>Sage Enviro
>206-789-7001
>www.sageenviro.com
> (See attached file: Social norms & climate change.pdf)
>
>------------------------------------
>
>Yahoo! Groups Links
>
><*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PA_CEAP/
>
><*> Your email settings:
> Individual Email | Traditional
>
><*> To change settings online go to:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PA_CEAP/join
> (Yahoo! ID required)
>
><*> To change settings via email:
> mailto:PA_CEAP...@yahoogroups.com
> mailto:PA_CEAP-fu...@yahoogroups.com
>
><*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
> PA_CEAP-u...@yahoogroups.com
>
><*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
> http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
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