Five effective behaviour change techniques

Encouraging people to change everyday habits to benefit the environment and wider society has been at the heart of my working life. It is complex and fraught with potential missteps. A delicate line is needed to avoid accusations that you represent the nanny state intent on restricting freedom of choice.

What I have learned is that there is a science behind behaviour change campaigns. Simply giving people information doesn’t work and can lead to the ‘value-action gap’ where people know what they should do but don’t act on that knowledge. Instead, behaviour change initiatives require using a range of proven techniques selecting those that are most appropriate backed with compelling communications. Here are five examples that can be considered.

Nudge

This is a simple technique designed to encourage people to change their behaviour at the point they are about to act or make a decision. A frequently mentioned example is the etching of the image of a housefly into the men’s urinals at Amsterdam’s Schiphol airport which sought to ‘improve the aim’.

At Hubbub, we used the concept of nudge with the ballot bin using funny or relevant questions to encourage people to vote with their cigarette butts rather than chuck them on the floor.

The beauty of nudge technique is that it can be cheap and quick to implement, it provides huge scope for playfulness and results are easy to track. The downside is that, unless implemented at a large scale, it doesn’t win hearts and minds. The person using the voting bin at one location might resort to dropping their cigarette butt on the floor at another if there is no prompt to act differently.

Social Norms

For complex issues, such as climate change, which require a range of inter-connected changes of habit, more sophisticated approaches are required. Research has shown that people are more likely to change their habits if they see their friends, peers, colleagues and families following these behaviours. These habits then become the norm and acceptable.

Shifting social norms requires authentic and respected leaders who can persuade others of the desirability or appropriateness of certain actions. These actions then need to cascade to obtain broad acceptance before becoming taken for granted and internalised.

Many organisations seek to shift social norms through the creation of ‘green teams’. Whilst theoretically a strong approach, I have seen many instances where this hasn’t worked for two reasons. Firstly, it is incredibly difficult to find leaders who are genuinely respected and influential as the catalysts for change. Too often a green team can consist of ‘the usual suspects’ and quickly become marginalised. Secondly, organisations need to ensure that they are clear on the scope for the green team. Frequently these teams can become demoralised if they try to drive through a shift in habits only to hit organisational blocks.

Choice Editing and Incentives

Sometimes the easiest ways to change behaviour are either to take away choice or to provide incentives leading to a long-term change of habits. Choice editing is most frequently driven by changes of legislation, but it can be at the discretion of a company or a group of companies. This can be controversial leading to questions such as who decides and on what evidence.

Incentives are a less controversial route. At Hubbub we partnered with Starbucks to introduce a 5p charge on disposable cups which immediately almost doubled the take-up of reusables and generated income for a wide range of sustainability initiatives. There is significant scope for this type of incentive scheme and I am surprised that more aren’t being created.

Fun Theory and Visualisation

Several organisations have tried playful techniques to change behaviour. One initiative transformed a plain staircase into a piano which made using the stairs more fun. As a result, 66% of people were persuaded to use the stairs rather than the escalator.  

At Hubbub we experimented with fun theory with a talking bin which commented every time it was used by people. Although massively successful on social media, it wasn’t a long-term success as the delicate electronics were repeatedly damaged during emptying resulting in the bin randomly wolf-whistling at passers-by.

More effective have been installations demonstrating the cumulative impact of many small actions. Visual displays are a great way for people to see how a daily routine can have a wider impact. At Hubbub, the most successful realisation of this approach was a litter shop in the Forest of Dean that displayed all the litter that had been collected from the forest in a day. People were shocked to see that packaging dropped over 20 years previously was still lying on the ground.

Systemic Change

The above approaches can prove highly effective but are only likely to reach some people some of the time. If we are to truly shift to a more sustainable society, we need to create systemic change making it easy for people to do the right thing by offering them products and services that are readily available, effective and affordable.

This change requires radical collaboration across all sectors, is time-consuming and complex. With my new organisation, I have started to explore how to deliver this deep level change starting with the horticulture sector. This work involves building a partnership of organisations willing to work together seeking to change legislation, educate citizens and create new products. The experiment is being independently evaluated and lessons will be openly shared. To stay in touch please subscribe to our free monthly bulletin.