Fostering Sustainable Behavior

Think of the last book that you read, restaurant you ate at, or movie that you watched. What do each of these seemingly unrelated events have in common? All three were likely influenced by friends, family members, or colleagues. More important decisions, such as what neighborhood to live in, what school to send our children to, or who to have as a family doctor, are all similarly influenced.

Both the mundane and important decisions of our lives are strongly affected by a process known as social diffusion or diffusion of innovations.1 In contrast with what nonpersonal sources of information, such as brochures or advertising, conversations that we have with others, and particularly with those whom we trust and perceive as similar to ourselves, have an inordinate influence.2 While social diffusion has been studied and applied extensively in fields such as public health, it has received surprisingly little attention regarding sustainable behavior. This lack of application is striking as many sustainable behaviors, such as carpooling or installing a grassed waterway on a farm, involve adopting a new innovation.3 The relevance of social diffusion to the adoption of sustainable behaviors has been commented on by Aronson and Gonzales. They note that social diffusion can be easily observed by walking through California neighborhoods, where the homes that have installed solar collectors tend to . . . cluster throughout the neighborhood reflecting the social networks of residents who purchase and install solar heating devices (p. 318).4 I ve witnessed this same process in the Pacific Northwest of the United States, where similar clusters of homes have replaced the grass in their front yard with drought-tolerant plants.

social diffusion and Sustainable Behavior

Below are several examples of sustainable behaviors that have been influenced by social diffusion.

• During the 1930s, both American and Canadian farmers were losing dramatic amounts of topsoil from their fields. In response to this crisis, the U.S. government distributed brochures which detailed the problem and suggested actions, such as planting trees as wind screens, that could be taken to slow the loss of topsoil. Like the information campaigns discussed in the first chapter, this attempt to influence the behavior of farmers was a dismal failure. When it was clear that farmers were not changing their agricultural practices, the government tried a new approach that involved working directly with a small number of farmers. These farmers received direct assistance in adopting practices that would slow erosion. It was reasoned that farmers might be more apt to adopt new approaches if they were first modelled by a farmer in their area. Modelling a new technique, such as installing wind screens or alternative methods of tillage, it was believed, would be far more compelling than dryly describing the technique in a pamphlet. Further, it would encourage farmers to discuss the new technique and, if they observed that it was working successfully on a local farm, increase the likelihood that they would adopt it themselves. Unlike the campaign that involved distributing brochures, this approach was far more successful. Neighboring farmers observed the changes that the early adopters were making, discussed them with them, and adopted similar practices once they saw the results. As a consequence, these new agricultural practices diffused quickly.5

• Those who install programmable thermostats have been found to influence the likelihood of friends, family and coworkers installing them, but not their neighbors. This finding suggests the importance of social networks, over geographical proximity, in determining social diffusion.6

• Those who intend to install solar panels have been found to have friends and colleagues who had already installed them.7

• In a survey that investigated curbside recycling participation, recycling by friends and neighbors predicted recycling by the respondent.8

Learning more

To learn more about social diffusion, simply search the Fostering Sustainable Behavior forums using social diffusion as the search term.

Whether a new sustainable behavior, or innovation, is likely to be adopted has been found to depend upon the following factors,which have been found to be highly predictive of social diffusion. 9,10,11,12

• Relative Advantage: Is the behavior perceived to be clearly superior to the behavior it replaces?

• Perceived Risk: Will adopting the behavior increase the probability of financial loss or social disapproval?

• Complexity: Is the new behavior challenging?

• Compatibility: Is the behavior compatible with the values of the target audience?

• Trialability: Can the behavior be trialed, before making a long-term commitment?

• Observability: Is the behavior visible to others?

Using social diffusion effectively

The media often plays an important role in beginning the diffusion process by facilitating the adoption of the new behavior by a small minority of people. Research suggests, however, that once a minority of people have adopted a new sustainable behavior that personal conversations play the pivotal role in the behavior being adopted more broadly.13

Commitments can be combined with social diffusion to influence the rapid adoption of a new behavior. In an important study, residents who had been previously identified as putting their grass clippings at the curbside for disposal, were assigned into two groups.14 The first group was approached and asked to make a commitment to leave their clippings on their lawn. The second was asked to make a commitment to grass cycle and to ask their neighbors to do the same. The commitment only request had no effect on grass cycling. However, those who were asked to speak to their neighbors, as well as make a personal commitment to grass cycle, increased not only their own grass cycling, but also that of their neighbors. Importantly, these findings were still observable 12 months later.

Case Study (Hide)

Protecting Watersheds

The Redwood River Clean Water Project is a wonderful example of social diffusion in action.15 This program s goals were to reduce sediment and nutrients in the watershed, increase game fish habitat, fishing, reduce peak flows, and increase watershed awareness. While this project targeted watershed protection, aspects of the initiative can be applied to other sustainable behavioral change programs.

The Redwood River watershed covers an area of 703 square miles. Rather than deliver programs that encompassed the whole watershed, the watershed was divided into five sub-watersheds, which varied in size from 41.5 to 120 square miles, and the Redwood River corridor, which is 295 square miles in size. This division allowed the behavior change to be tackled at a scale that would encourage community involvement.

© Guy J. Sagi, Shutterstock

Farmers were encouraged to engage in best management practices (BMPs) through one-on-one conversations. These BMPs included, among others, grassed waterways, conservation tillage, riparian buffer strips, and nutrient management. These practices limit soil erosion and pollution run-off. Design and financial assistance was available to assist with the implementation of these BMPs.

Farmers were engaged via personal one-on-one visits, but also by hearing of BMPs that were utilized by other farmers. This information was disseminated through newsletters, handouts, and public meetings and events. Social diffusion was facilitated through the one-on-one meetings, the dissemination of information about the program, but also through a uniquely designed booklet.

The booklet included a map of the sub-watersheds along with information on BMPs and what actions farmers had taken to protect the watershed. Information on the actions of farmers was accompanied by a photo of the farmer(s), description of what actions they had taken and the results, along with a map providing driving instructions to their farm! The handbook was distributed to both participating and non-participating farmers. It normalized the use of the BMPs and encouraged discussions between farmers regarding these practices. Its distribution also increased the likelihood that farmers who adopted repetitive BMPs, like nutrient management, would continue with these practices.

Over the first five years of its existence, the Redwood River Clean Water Project enlisted 159 participants who collectively engaged in 350 BMPs and other conservation practices. By its fifth year of existence, this project was resulting in soil and phosphorous reductions of over 158 tons a year.

Note that the booklet used in this project could be tailored for a wide variety of other initiatives, such as energy efficiency in office buildings or a program to increase the use of soy-based inks by printers. As indicated above, the booklet serves two important purposes. First, it assists in the diffusion of the targeted behavior. Second, it increases the probability that those that have elected to adopt these alternative practices will stay with them.

Social diffusion is hampered when the behavior to be fostered is invisible. Unlike curbside recycling, in which engagement in the behavior is visible every time someone puts their container at the curbside, composting, like many other sustainable behaviors, occurs out of view. How can composting, and other residential behaviors, be made more visible? Attaching stickers that proclaim We Compost Too to the side of the recycling or garbage container can help to create and maintain community visibility for this behavior.

Whenever possible, seek commitments that are both public and durable. The sticker below was used in a program to encourage backyard composting in Nova Scotia, Canada. Households were called and asked if they composted. If they did, they were asked to place the sticker on their curbside recycling container. Placing stickers, such as the one below, on a curbside container has several positive benefits. First, each time the recycling container is taken to the curb it profiles that the household is engaged in backyard composting. Due to the importance of behaving consistently, which was discussed in the chapter on commitment, the likelihood that the household will continue to engage in composting has been increased. Second, a behavior that would otherwise be invisible in the community has been made visible. By making the behavior visible, we increase the likelihood of fostering both social diffusion and descriptive social norms. Behaviors that remain invisible will diffuse slowly and are unlikely to become normative.

© Valley Region, Nova Scotia, Canada

Here are some guidelines for using these stickers:

1. Lamination: Use a heavily laminated sticker with good adhesive so that the sticker will last for several years.
2. Permission: Ask the household for permission to place the sticker on their recycling container as compared to asking them to place the sticker on themselves. While engagement in an activity has been found to enhance commitment, asking for permission dramatically increases the number of stickers that show up in a community. In a project that I worked on in California, over 80% agreed to place stickers on their recycling containers, but only 26% did. In contrast, when permission to place stickers on containers was obtained, and households were simply asked to place their recycling containers at the curbside in a community in Massachusetts, the number of stickers that were affixed more than doubled.
3. Visibility: Ensure that the sticker and the text on it is visible from a distance. To ensure visibility, the sticker on the opposite page was the size of a car bumper sticker.

A Checklist for Using social diffusion

Follow these guidelines in implementing social diffusion in your programs.

• As just noted, ensure that the behavior you are promoting is visible.
• Gain commitments from early adopters to speak to others about the behavior.
• Carefully identify who to target. For example, geographic infor-mation systems (GIS) are now being used along with satellite imagery to determine not only vulnerable areas of a watershed, but also what actions have already been taken by landowners. Because these systems are able to detect geographic features, such as grassed waterways, they can be used to identify early adopters who might be targeted as part of a campaign to foster social diffusion. Ben Tyson and his colleagues are already supplementing GIS systems with information regarding landowners receptivity to engaging in best management practices.16

Below are a variety of examples of how social diffusion can be used to foster sustainable behavior.

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