How Nudges Encourage People to Act Environmentally Friendly
A conversation with professor Dr Lucia Reisch
In a world where global warming, biodiversity loss and other environmental challenges are becoming more urgent, how do we encourage individuals to make the right choices? In the second episode of the German edition of the Next Visions podcast by Porsche, our host Christopher Golombek speaks with Lucia Reisch, professor of consumer behaviour and consumer policy at Copenhagen Business School, about the concept of nudging and how it can help to behave and live more sustainably.
How can people be motivated to adopt a more sustainable, eco-friendly lifestyle? What are the issues that prevent them from doing more in their daily lives? Which policy instruments are effective and useful in promoting sustainable consumption? These are the sort of questions that motivate Lucia Reisch’s research.
She is a professor of consumer behaviour and consumer policy in the Department of Management, Society and Communication at the Copenhagen Business School, and also holds a permanent guest professorship at the Zeppelin University of Friedrichshafen. She is an expert on sustainable consumption, behavioural public policy, and nudging with twenty years’ experience advising governments and private sector entities on sustainable development issues. She also has been a long-standing member of the Sustainability Advisory Council of the state of Baden-Württemberg, where Porsche is headquartered.
In 2016, the Zuffenhausen-based sports car manufacturer set up the Porsche Sustainability Council as an initiating body for economic, ecological, and social issues. Professor Lucia Reisch is the chairwoman of the five-person committee. Porsche calls on the Council for independent expertise and advice, for example regarding the circular economy, decarbonization or the Porsche Strategy 2030.
Nudging: Steering people’s behaviour
The second episode of the Porsche Next Visions podcast is hosted by Christopher Golombek. Christopher welcomes Lucia Reisch to the podcast to talk with her about nudges in the context of sustainable consumption.
Nudging is a concept in behavioural economics that offers a way to effectively address the biases that drive our behaviour and decisions. Underpinning this approach is the notion that we don’t always make rational decisions. With nudges, we can guide individual choices in a cheap and effective way, without limiting people’s freedom to choose otherwise. Nudges aren’t mandates or incentives but rather subtle encouragements that can take many forms.
“Nudges are basically little pushes. They’re supposed to get people to do what they want to do, but for some reason can’t get done.” — Dr Lucia Reisch
The concept was developed by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein in 2008 in their groundbreaking book Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness. Here the authors popularized the term “nudge”, which they define as a choice “that alters people’s behaviour in a predictable way without forbidding any options or significantly changing their economic incentives. To count as a mere nudge, the intervention must be easy and cheap to avoid […] Putting fruit at eye level counts as a nudge. Banning junk food does not.” This concept was well-received and even helped US-economist Thaler to get the Nobel Prize for Economics in 2017.
How nudges help people to act responsibly
The nudging approach has been used to clean up public toilets, combat obesity, and increase organ donor registrations. Today, both governments and businesses apply this approach to push people in one direction or another.
„If you look around Copenhagen, the whole inner city is actually full of nudges that encourage people to use environmental-friendly transport.” — Dr Lucia Reisch
Nudging can also be used to protect the planet. And indeed, policymakers are increasingly applying behavioural insights to promote environmentally friendly behaviour. To take one of many examples, Copenhagen has appointed a dedicated team that tests behavioural nudges to increase cycling and public transport usage. The city has installed footrests and railings at intersections as well as so-called green wave LED lights in the asphalt that help cyclists avoid red traffic lights.
If you would like to learn more about nudging, listen to the full episode of the podcast now available on all common platforms like Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Spotify and Deezer. Please note that this podcast is in German.
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