Behaviour Change towards Sustainable Mobility triggered by Nudging Initiatives

Klementschitz, Roman and Batiajew, Valerie and Roider, Oliver (2020) Behaviour Change towards Sustainable Mobility triggered by Nudging Initiatives. SHAPING URBAN CHANGE – Livable City Regions for the 21st Century. Proceedings of REAL CORP 2020, 25th International Conference on Urban Development, Regional Planning and Information Society. pp. 75-85. ISSN 2521-3938

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Abstract

This paper presents a comprehensive overview about methods and practice cases regarding behavioural change initiatives towards sustainable mobility triggered by nudging techniques. “Nudges refer to purposeful changes in the choice architecture that influence peoples' behaviour by making changes in the environment that guide and enable individuals to make choices almost automatically. This can be done by simplifying the information provided or by offering default choices in a way that facilitates socially desirable decisions. Thus, nudges do not try to change one's value system or increase information provision. Instead they focus on enabling behaviours and private decisions that are beneficial for society and usually in the individual's long-term interests, as well.” Lehner et al. (2016). Four types of tools are part of nudging: 1) simplification and framing of information, 2) changes to the physical environment, 3) changes to the default policy, and 4) the use of social norms. The objective of nudging originally is to promote certain behaviour, which isbeneficial for individuals as well as the society and increases the effectiveness of policy. All these techniques are well known, successful and applied in many areas such as for super markets selling their products or in politics campaigning for the next elections. Surprisingly, such techniques are less known in the field of mobility aiming at leading people towards a more sustainable behaviour. Nevertheless, isolated activities were successfully applied already as pilot actions.Regarding 1): Simplification and framing mean that information is made more straightforward. It fits the information processing capabilities and decision-making processes of the target group because not only the amount or accessibility of provided information matters, but also how the information is presented. Therefore, it matters how the situation/nudge is presented or with what words. E.g. people in a rush will try to reduce complexity regarding the information they use to make a decision. As examples in the area ofsustainable mobility information about public transport such as time tables need to be visible and easily understandable, e.g. not only at the bus stops, but at public places, restaurants, hotels, working places as well, ideally online screens with departures. Nudging through changes in physical environment is well known, for example in placement of preferred products in shelves in supermarkets. Good examples are to place sustainable mobility options with a higher priorisation on a homepage and leaflet, or to put the bus stop area closer at a destination as the car park. Defaults are set standards, which determine the result as long as the addressed person does not take action and insist in making changes, e.g.: “print double sided copy” asstandard instead of “print single pages” at a printer. An example in the area of sustainable mobility can be the strategy, if one asks in a tourism office or at the hotel reception, how to reach a specific destination, he/she get explained how to reach by means of public transport or bicycle and not by car instead of. Social norms are a strong force that influence human behaviour. However, social norms can influence human behaviour if they are salient and visible for the target group. Examples are announcements such as “in our company already xx km were cycled this month for commuting with the bicycle already, saving xx CO2 emissions at the same time” which are send out to the employees in the course of an active mobility campaign in a company.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Intervention, Behaviour change , Sustainable Mobility, Nudging, Tools
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HD Industries. Land use. Labor H Social Sciences > HE Transportation and Communications H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
Depositing User:	REAL CORP Administrator
Date Deposited:	01 Feb 2021 11:09
Last Modified:	01 Feb 2021 11:09
URI:	http://repository.corp.at/id/eprint/635

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