Cited by 2,802Pro-Environmental Behavior and AttitudesEnergy, Environment, and Transportation PoliciesExperimental Behavioral Economics Studies

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Social norms and energy conservation

Allcott, Hunt·2011·Journal of Public Economics

DOI 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2011.03.003

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Abstract

This paper evaluates a series of programs run by a company called OPOWER to send Home Energy Report letters to residential utility customers comparing their electricity use to that of their neighbors. Using data from randomized natural field experiments at 600,000 treatment and control households across the United States, I estimate that the average program reduces energy consumption by 2.0%. The program provides additional evidence that non-price interventions can substantially and cost effectively change consumer behavior: the effect is equivalent to that of a short-run electricity price increase of 11 to 20%, and the cost effectiveness compares favorably to that of traditional energy conservation programs. Perhaps because the treatment included descriptive social norms, effects are heterogeneous: households in the highest decile of pre-treatment consumption decrease usage by 6.3%, while consumption by the lowest decile decreases by only 0.3%. A regression discontinuity design shows that different categories of “injunctive norms” played an insignificant role in encouraging relatively low users not to increase usage.

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Background
A Community-Based Program Promotes Sanitation
Alzúa, M. L., Djebbari, H., & Pickering, A. J. (2018) · Economic Development and Cultural Change · doi:10.1086/701214 · Cited by 10
“Social comparison has been shown to have a significant effect regarding other environmental problems (Goldstein et al. 2008; Allcott 2011) and may act as a behavioral incentive, if, for instance, there is a preference for conformism or if villagers learn from each other about the private costs and…”
The Creation of Social Norms under Weak Institutions
Diekert, F., Eymess, T., Luomba, J., & Waichman, I. (2022) · Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists · doi:10.1086/720287 · Cited by 9
Residential electricity conservation in response to auto-generated, multi-featured, personalized eco-feedback designed for large scale applications with utilities
Meinrenken, C. J., Abrol, S., Gite, G. B., Hidey, C., McKeown, K. R., Mehmani, A., Modi, V., Turcan, E., Xie, W., & Culligan, P. J. (2020) · Energy and Buildings · doi:10.1016/j.enbuild.2020.110652 · Cited by 10
“This conservation is in line with the high end of the 1.4–3.3% range reported for the O-Power experiments [11] (which assigned feedback recipients randomly).”
BackgroundMethodResultInfluential
Limited Attention in Residential Energy Markets: A Regression Discontinuity Approach
Keefer, Q. A. W., & Rustamov, G. (2015) · Empirical Economics · doi:10.1007/s00181-017-1314-6 · Cited by 12
“There are, however, a growing number of studies in behavioral economics and psychology that attempt to understand decision factors in energy consumption as something other than a purely rational choice (Allcott 2011; Allcott and Rogers 2014; Ferraro et al. 2011; Ferraro and Price 2013; Goldstein et al. 2008; Harding a…”
Social Norms Based Eco-Feedback for Household Water Consumption
Ramli, U. (2021) · Sustainability · doi:10.3390/su13052796 · Cited by 11
“Sustainability 2021, 13, 2796 10 of 13 Unlike that seen by Allcott and Rogers [35], these results do not show any ‘action and backsliding’ of treatment effects following the delivery of each home report.”
BackgroundMethodResultInfluential
Small Steps with Big Data: Using Machine Learning in Energy and Environmental Economics
Harding, M., & Lamarche, C. (2021) · Annual Review of Resource Economics · doi:10.1146/annurev-resource-100920-034117 · Cited by 10
Could visual cues moderate the normative influence in promoting energy conservation? A perspective from the construal level
Ye, N., Xiao, Z., Zhang, M., Atherley, J., & Hou, L. (2021) · Resources Conservation and Recycling · doi:10.1016/j.resconrec.2021.105808 · Cited by 10
Social Norms and Market Behavior – Evidence From a Large Population Sample
Riehm, T., Fugger, N., Gillen, P., Gretschko, V., & Werner, P. (2020) · Journal of Public Economics · doi:10.1016/j.jpubeco.2022.104701 · Cited by 19
Nudges and peak pricing: A common pool resource energy conservation experiment
Buckley, P., & Llerena, D. (2022) · Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics · doi:10.1016/j.socec.2022.101928 · Cited by 10
Visualising variations in household energy consumption
Goodwin, S., & Dykes, J. A. (2012) · IEEE Conference on Visual Analytics Science and Technology (VAST) · doi:10.1109/vast.2012.6400545 · Cited by 10
“Relatively recent research identifies that social norms can be used effectively in the case of energy consumption reduction [1].”
Background
Energy Consumption Feedback: Engagement by Design
Rettie, R., Burchell, K., & Harries, T. (2014) · Lecture notes in computer science · doi:10.1007/978-3-319-07635-5_57 · Cited by 10
Energy efficiency: Building labels lead to savings
Walls, M. A. (2017) · Nature Energy · doi:10.1038/nenergy.2017.55 · Cited by 10
A prototype tool for automatically generating energy-saving advice based on smart meter data
Kimura, O., Komatsu, H., Nishio, K., & Mukai, T. (2018) · Energy Efficiency · doi:10.1007/s12053-018-9639-3 · Cited by 10
Channeling environmentalism into climate policy: an experimental study of Fridays for Future participants from Germany
Soliev, I., Janssen, M. A., Theesfeld, I., Pritchard, C., Pirscher, F., & Lee, A. (2021) · Environmental Research Letters · doi:10.1088/1748-9326/ac30f7 · Cited by 11
“…by IOP Publishing Ltd of inaction (Tversky and Kahneman 1981), to creating and emphasizing various social references, for example an energy utility presenting monthly bills showing personal energy use in comparison to the use of neighbors to trigger energy conservation behavior (Allcott 2011).”
Background
A Framework for Understanding and Generating Integrated Solutions for Residential Peak Energy Demand
Buys, L. R., Vine, D., Ledwich, G. F., Bell, J. M., Mengersen, K. L., Morris, P., & Lewis, J. (2015) · PLoS ONE · doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0121195 · Cited by 10
“Energy efficiency and energy conservation are often covered together in studies, see for example, [91–95].”
Background
Reducing Electricity Demand through Smart Metering: The Role of Improved Household KnowledgePreprint
Carroll, J., Lyons, S., & Denny, E. (2013) · RePEc: Research Papers in Economics · Cited by 10
The More You Know: Information Effects on Job Application Rates by Gender in a Large Field Experiment∗Preprint
Gee, L. K. (2014) · SSRN Electronic Journal · doi:10.2139/ssrn.2612979 · Cited by 15
The Role of Occupant Behavior in Achieving Net Zero Energy: A Demonstration Project at Fort Carson
Judd, K. S., USDOE, Sanquist, T., Zalesny, M. D., & Fernandez, N. (2013) · doi:10.2172/1110475 · Cited by 10
Nudging Businesses to Pay Their Taxes: Does Timing Matter?
Gillitzer, C. (2018) · AEA Randomized Controlled Trials · doi:10.1257/rct.3059 · Cited by 10
Relative Performance Transparency: Effects on Sustainable ChoicesPreprint
Buell, R. W., Mariadassou, S., & Zheng, Y. (2019) · SSRN Electronic Journal · doi:10.2139/ssrn.3324306 · Cited by 9
“Specifically within the environmental sustainability context, this approach has been applied in energy consumption (Schultz et al. 2007, Nolan et al. 2008, Allcott 2011, Ayres et al. 2013), food waste (Nomura et al. 2011), and water conservation efforts (Ferraro and Price 2013).”
Method
Tax Morale and the Role of Social Norms and Reciprocity. Evidence from a Randomized Survey ExperimentPreprint
Doerrenberg, P., & Peichl, A. (2017) · SSRN Electronic Journal · doi:10.2139/ssrn.3065963 · Cited by 10
“We use the wording ’social norm’ in line with previous literature that (randomly) provides information about the behavior of others to manipulate ’social norms’ (e.g., Allcott 2011; Hallsworth et al. 2017).”
Reputation
Barclay, P. (2015) · Wiley eBooks · doi:10.1002/9781119125563.evpsych233 · Cited by 10

Authors: Allcott, H.
Affiliations: New York University (US)
Corresponding author: Allcott, Hunt
Venue: Journal of Public Economics
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Published: 2011-10
Volume: 95
Issue: 9-10
Pages: 1082-1095
ISSN: 0047-2727 (ISSN-L)
DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2011.03.003
OpenAlex: W2139035425
Cited by: 2,802
References: 104
Citations by year: 2026: 225 · 2025: 209 · 2024: 194 · 2023: 208 · 2022: 226 · 2021: 257 · 2020: 225 · 2019: 240 · 2018: 199 · 2017: 171 · 2016: 165 · 2015: 161 · 2014: 147 · 2013: 94 · 2012: 55
FWCI: 263.94
Type: journal article
Language: en
Open access: closed
Licence: www.elsevier.com/tdm/userlicense/1.0/ (tdm)
Locations: Journal of Public Economics (publishedVersion)
Topics: Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law › Pro-Environmental Behavior and Attitudes
Physical Sciences › Energy › Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment › Energy, Environment, and Transportation Policies
Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Experimental Behavioral Economics Studies
Keywords: social norms, energy conservation, social comparison, residential electricity consumption, cost-effectiveness, injunctive norms, descriptive norms, treatment effect heterogeneity

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