WAKE-UP CALL
Welcome to the July 2010 Wake-Up Call, Awake’s monthly
newsletter for research and news about behaviour change for sustainability.
To view this newsletter as a webpage, click here
In this edition of Wake-up Call…
·
Feature Article – Making Green Convenient
·
Upcoming Workshops – Cultivating Sustainability in Australia
and New Zealand
·
Upcoming Workshop - Behaviour Change Techniques to
Encourage Green Purchasing
·
60 seconds with… Claire Vanderplank, Cycling for
Cohesion
·
Interesting Article of the Month – Bickering Over Green
·
Exercise of the Month – Re-thinking Convenience
Feature
Article – Making
Green Convenient
A convenient choice is most commonly
defined as one which saves us time and effort.
It could be argued that adopting
environmentally friendly behaviours requires forgoing some convenience. Just
looking at some of these behaviours, versus their less sustainable alternatives.
Cycling versus driving. Composting versus putting everything in the rubbish
bin. Turning off appliances at the wall versus leaving them on standby. Each of
these greener options quite clearly require more investment of time and effort,
however small the difference. In a society where we are increasingly “time-poor”
(or are increasingly told so anyway), the task for those promoting sustainability
requires overcoming the barrier of perceived inconvenience.
How important is convenience? Reviewing research
related to “cognitive effort”, Garbarino
and Edell report that “a consistent finding is that humans have limited
cognitive resources and allocate them judiciously”. In order to avoid being
overwhelmed by the sheer volume of decisions we are required to make every day,
and the myriad choices available, we are attracted to things which reduce the
amount of mental effort required. This is one reason why we develop habits, as
a shortcut to having to make a new decision every time we encounter the same
need. Garbarino and Edell also found that “it is clear that people are willing
to forgo some benefits to conserve cognitive effort”. This explains, for
instance, why we are willing to buy convenience snacks which we know are less
healthy for us.
The effort required to make the decision
itself also has an effect on the perceived desirability of our choices. The
study by Garbarino and Edell found that, when faced with a choice between two
products, the effort required to evaluate a product created a negative emotion
towards that choice, even though the attributes of the choices were the same.
People were also willing to pay more for the product which was easier to
evaluate. This has important implications for many aspects of promoting sustainable
choices, such as labeling. When we are asking people to buy the most
environmentally friendly product, if it is hard work for them to identify its
environmental benefits they are not going to view it positively.
Another demonstration of the importance
of convenience is the effect of the “default option”. Studies have found that
we will often accept the choice which is presented as the standard option,
rather than make the effort to consider the alternatives. Among the most
interesting of these was a study of a German town
where green energy was offered as the default option, resulting in 94% of
people continuing to purchase it, in contrast with single-digit uptake in towns
where non-renewable energy was the standard offer.
The stiff competition which convenience
provides for sustainability promoters raises an interesting question. Are we best
to attempt to convince people to reduce the emphasis they place on convenience,
or should we direct our efforts to making green options more convenient? The
former option would require a re-framing of the value which we place on certain
behaviours. Cycling, for instance, would struggle to compete with driving on
the convenience stakes for many people (although traffic congestion in many
cities is fast tipping this balance). However, the benefits in terms of
wellbeing, cost and environmental impact offer an opportunity to put a strong
case for cycling – a case so strong that the trade-off in terms of convenience
may seem worth it. On the other hand, some people are likely to drive a harder
bargain when it comes to giving up convenience. So making cycling more
convenient is also effort well spent. Better cycling tracks, facilities and information
would all reduce the perceived trade-off of time and effort.
Therefore, the answer to the question of
whether to attempt to influence the importance people place on convenience, or
simply to match the convenience of less eco-friendly options appears to be “both”.
Although the addiction to convenience has arguably caused us to become
disengaged from the realities of production, there is strong evidence that
humans are pre-disposed to seek options which minimise our time and effort. In
other words, a need for convenience is here to stay, so we can either fight it,
or meet it.
The quest to make sustainable options
more convenient would benefit from an awareness of the key elements of
convenience. Interestingly, nearly all discussions of convenience are centred
around marketing to consumers. However, it is possible to apply many of the
principles to other types of behaviour which are not necessarily related to
purchasing. One useful model which outlines the elements of convenience is presented
in Understanding
Service Convenience. The model describes 5 types of convenience:
·
Decision convenience – how easy it is to
make a decision about the product or service.
·
Access convenience – the perceived time
and effort required to initiate service delivery
·
Transaction convenience - perceived time
and effort to secure the right to use the service
·
Benefit convenience - perceived time and
effort expenditures to experience the service's core benefits (such as the
travel time required to experience the convenience benefit)
·
Post-benefit convenience - the time and
effort to re-contact the seller after the initial purchase (e.g. for returns or
repairs)
Understanding and incorporating these
elements of convenience may go some way towards making eco-friendly options a
more convenient choice, and reducing yet another barrier to the uptake of a
more sustainable lifestyle.
WANT TO USE THIS
ARTICLE IN YOUR E-ZINE OR WEB SITE?
You can, as long as you include this complete blurb with
it:
Awake provides psychology-based
services to support the development of sustainable behaviour in individuals,
groups and organisations. Visit www.awake.com.au
for more info
Upcoming Workshops – Cultivating Sustainability in Australia and New Zealand
Dates for Australian workshops over the next few months
are as follows.
Brisbane, August
24
Dates for NZ
workshops are as follows.
Christchurch,
August 2
Nelson,
August 3
Wellington,
August 5
Auckland,
August 11
More information, including online registration details,
is available at www.awake.com.au/cultivating.html
About the Workshop
Cultivating Sustainability is a 1-day workshop which provides
sustainability advocates with insights, models and practical tools to support
their behaviour change efforts. Anybody
who has taken on the challenge of influencing others to live and work more
sustainably will find this workshop a valuable addition to their skills.
Cost: For-profits $250pp
Not-for-profit/Government
$200pp
Individuals/Community
Groups $120pp
Feedback from attendees of recent Cultivating
Sustainability workshops included…
“Great framework for encouraging behavioural change within
organisations”
“Provided me with tools and insights to challenge me to review how
I am approaching my sustainability project”
”This workshop has given me good insight into the motivating
factors in people’s behaviour and ways to get lasting change”
“I found the workshop useful to help me learn practical and
positive/inspirational ways to change peoples attitudes and behaviours towards
sustainability”
For more
information about the Cultivating Sustainability workshop, see www.awake.com.au/cultivating.html
Upcoming
Workshop - Behaviour Change Techniques to Encourage Green Purchasing
Awake will be
partnering with ECO-Buy to present a
half-day workshop on behaviour change techniques to encourage green purchasing.
By attending this workshop you will gain valuable insights and skills for
• Understanding the psychological drivers of
green behaviour
• Recognising what people need in order to
engage in behaviour change
• Identifying the biggest barriers to making
green factors a priority
• Changing old habits and creating new ones
• How to influence people and gain their buy-in
• How to appeal to values and use them to
engage people in change
This workshop
will benefit anybody who is involved with promoting green purchasing through
their organisation, and trying to embed a culture of sustainable
purchasing.
Date:
Wednesday, August 18th, 2010. 8.30am - 12.30pm
Location: 60L Green Building, 60 Leicester St, Carlton,
Melbourne.
Registrations: Please go to the ECO-Buy website
to register for the workshop or call ECO-Buy on 9349 0400 for further
details.
60 Seconds with….. Claire Vanderplank, Cycling for Cohesion
What first got
you focused on sustainability?
I suspect it was due to my inherent sense of justice and responsibility
combined with long-term thinking. I don’t really know what triggered it, but I
do remember standing up at show ‘n’ tell in grade 2 and informing my classmates
that dolphins were more intelligent than humans because they don’t destroy
their environment! I background is in health, but found myself thinking “what’s
the point in making changes in individual people’s lives when were heading down
a path that will affect everyone extremely adversely in the not-too-distant
future?”
What is the
sustainable choice you have recently made of which you are most proud?
Decided that I really can do without a car – even in winter. Active
transport can be done. I’m moving a little bit closer to the action in part so
I’m not tempted to get a car.
What is a less
sustainable choice that you are not so proud of?
Into my
shopping basket on the weekend went smoked salmon from Denmark, cheese from
Holland and figs from Turkey – the taste and cost combo won me over. But I know
I should buy local.
Interesting Article of the Month – Bickering Over Green
Where?
Therapists Report
Increase in Green Disputes
By Leslie Kaufman
What is it about?
This article discusses
the increasing reports of couples falling out over environmentally-related
behaviours.
What did they
find?
As awareness of
environmental concerns has grown, therapists say they are seeing a rise in
bickering between couples and family members over the extent to which they
should change their lives to save the planet.
What can we take
from this?
Growing awareness
of environmental issues often results in big changes involving values, lifestyle
choices and priorities. We can’t expect people to move in the same direction at
the same speed, so it is no surprise that people are hitting a few bumps in the
road. Perhaps environmental education needs to include support for people to
handle the effects that flow from changes in lifestyle. Although we probably also
have to accept that these things will happen – that’s just life.
Exercise of the Month –
Re-thinking Convenience
Following on from
the feature article above, this month’s exercise looks at what it would take to
adopt behaviours which we currently view as less convenient.
1. Identify
some behaviours you would consider “unsustainable”, which you continue to
undertake because they are more convenient than the more sustainable
alternative.
2. What
would you consider to be the trade-off in terms of time and effort if you were
to switch to the more sustainable option?
3. Is
there some other benefit you would gain from the more sustainable behaviour
which would make the trade-off more acceptable?
4. What
could you do to increase the convenience of the currently less convenient
behaviour?
By examining the perceived
convenience gap between our current and desired behaviours, it may be possible
to see a way forward which is acceptable and beneficial to us.
The exercise of the month provides
a tool to help you get engaged, inspired, aware and in action around
sustainability. Feel free to use it on your own, with a friend, or in
your work. If you do use it with others, please tell them where you got
it!
About Awake
Awake provides
psychology-based services to support the development of sustainable behaviour
in individuals, groups and organisations. Visit www.awake.com.au for more info
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© Awake 2010