Background A clear picture of people’s adoption of protective behaviours, and a thorough understanding of psychosocial correlates in the context of contagious diseases such as COVID‐19, is essential for the development of communication strategies, and can contribute to the fight against epidemics. Methods In this paper, we report a survey on the adoption of the recommended protective behaviours before and during the epidemic. We also assessed demographic correlates, and beliefs (towards COVID‐19 and protective behaviours, towards SARS‐CoV‐2 transmission, social dilemma variables, and perceived external cues) of a representative sample of British residents. Data were collected during the early stage of the COVID‐19 epidemic that spread worldwide in 2020. Results Results showed a marked increase in the adoption of protective behaviour. We also identified targets for intervention in variables related to transmission of the virus and social dilemma‐related beliefs. Sex differences in the adoption of protective measures, as well as differences associated with the frequency of social contacts, were associated with differences in beliefs. Conclusions These findings suggest changeable determinants, which could be targeted in global communication about COVID‐19, or in interventions targeting specific sub‐groups not following the protective measures.

The extant literature has focused either on personal variables or on situational factors to explain pro-environmental behavior despite several calls to integrate both. The present research addresses this integration call by testing the interaction between environmental attitudes and situational prompts on pro-environmental behavior. Three experimental studies manipulate the presence/absence of pro-environmental prompts, measure environmental attitudes, and investigate the effect of both variables on behavior. Study 1 showed a simple effect: participants with higher levels of pro-environmental attitudes (compared to those with lower levels) performed more energy saving behavior in the presence of prompts. However, in the absence of prompt, none of the participants performed the behavior, which prevented us from statistically testing the interaction. Studies 2 and 3 were conducted with a similar design: main effects of attitude and prompts were obtained, but the interaction was not found. A Bayesian analysis of the data suggested more evidence toward the null hypothesis of no interaction between environmental attitudes and situational prompts.

Descriptive norm effect has been explained in terms of either normative or informative social influence. This research investigates another possible mechanism in the case of collective goals. Because changing one's behavioure.g., to protect the environmentwill be effective only if other people also change their behaviour, their number will influence the outcome expectancy for that behaviour. Hence, we postulated that the effect of descriptive norm on adoption of a pro-environmental behaviour is mediated by outcome expectancy. Two studies showed that outcome expectancy mediated the effect of descriptive norm on intention to buy an energy-efficient refrigerator only in the case of a collective goal (vs. an individual goal) (Study 1, N = 787), and that the effect of descriptive norm on intention (with respect to a collective goal) can be reversed if an optimal uptake rate is mentioned, this interaction being mediated by outcome expectancy (Study 2, N = 400). These results suggest that the effect of descriptive norm, classically found in studies of pro-environmental behaviours, occurs because it gives people a sense that their action will have an impact.

Objectives. -Many communication campaigns to encourage people to give blood rely on "save lives" messages, even though there is no experimental evidence as to the effectiveness of this kind of argument with respect to blood donation. The objective of this study is to test experimentally if it is indeed an effective way to prompt people to give blood, in order for communication campaigns to be evidenced-based. Methods. -One thousand and twenty-two lapsed blood donors were sent, at random, either a standard letter or the same letter containing an additional "save lives" message. The blood donation center measured intention to donate and actual donor return rate (3%) after 10 months.Results. -Although fewer people in the "save lives" condition said they had no intention to give blood again, the "save lives" letter did not lead to more donor returns than the standard letter. Conclusions. -Our results suggest that contrary to intuition, campaigns to promote blood donation should not rely blindly on "save lives" arguments. © 2016 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved. Keywords: Blood donation; Communication campaigns; Lapsed donors RésuméObjectifs. -Beaucoup de campagnes de communication visant à encourager les gens à donner leur sang utilisent des messages du type « Sauvez des vies », malgré le fait qu'il n'y ait pas d'évidence expérimentale confirmant l'efficacité de ce type d'argument par rapport au don du sang. L'objectif de cette étude est de tester expérimentalement s'il s'agit effectivement d'une manière efficace d'encourager les gens à donner leur sang, afin que les campagnes de communication soient fondées sur des données probantes. Méthodes. -Mille vingt-deux donneurs inactifs ont reçu de manière aléatoire soit une lettre standard, soit la même lettre contenant en plus une phrase faisant appel à l'argument « sauvez des vies ». Le centre de transfusion sanguine a mesuré l'intention des donneurs à revenir, et le taux de retour réel (3 %) après 10 mois. Résultats. -Bien que moins de gens dans la condition « sauvez des vies » aient répondu qu'ils n'avaient pas l'intention de donner leur sang à nouveau, le courrier contenant le message « sauvez des vies » n'a pas entraîné un nombre plus important de dons que le courrier standard ne contenant pas ce message. Conclusions. -Nos résultats suggèrent que contrairement à ce que l'on pourrait penser de manière intuitive, les campagnes de promotion du don du sang ne devraient pas se reposer en toute confiance sur des arguments du type « sauvez des vies ».

Growing awareness of humanity's impact on the environment raises the question of how best to encourage pro-environmental actions. Numerous campaigns have been created to convince people to adopt environmentally friendly everyday behaviors, with varying success. The difficulty may be due, at least in part, to the huge gap between these small individual actions and the high-level goals, such as "saving the planet," often used as incentives. We tested this hypothesis via four experiments. Studies 1 and 2 showed that high-level goals were less effective than low-level goals in promoting paper-and energy-saving behaviors. Study 3 showed that high-level goals engender lower perceived outcome expectancy and higher perception of cumulative effort. Study 4 showed that outcome expectancy mediates the direct effect of goal level on intention.