Caring for the Commons: Using Psychological Ownership to Enhance Stewardship Behavior for Public Goods

Abstract

How can consumers be encouraged to take better care of public goods? Across four studies, including two experiments in the field and three documenting actual behaviors, the authors demonstrate that increasing consumers’ individual psychological ownership facilitates stewardship of public goods. This effect occurs because feelings of ownership increase consumers’ perceived responsibility, which then leads to active behavior to care for the good. Evidence from a variety of contexts, including a public lake with kayakers, a state park with skiers, and a public walking path, suggests that increasing psychological ownership enhances both effortful stewardship, such as picking up trash from a lake, and financial stewardship, such as donating money. This work further demonstrates that the relationship between psychological ownership and resulting stewardship behavior is attenuated when there are cues, such as an attendance sign, which diffuse responsibility among many people. This work offers implications for consumers, practitioners, and policy makers with simple interventions that can encourage consumers to be better stewards of public goods.

Reality Check: Infusing Ecological Value into Academic Marketing Research

“…The authors did so because the lab enabled them to manipulate factors that could reduce or enhance psychological ownership in a way that (1) ensured the independence of the moderator from either the independent or dependent variable and (2) enabled them to achieve adequate power in the experiments by recruiting a sufficient number of participants (which is often a challenge in field studies). Thus, Peck et al (2021) offer convincing evidence that psychological ownership is indeed a mechanism by which stewardship behavior is improved.…”

“…Finally, we encourage the use of actionable moderators to offer causal evidence for a process by which an effect occurs. Continuing the earlier example of Peck et al (2021), the authors use their field studies to establish the main effect of psychological ownership on stewardship but move to the lab to demonstrate the process by moderation. The authors did so because the lab enabled them to manipulate factors that could reduce or enhance psychological ownership in a way that (1) ensured the independence of the moderator from either the independent or dependent variable and (2) enabled them to achieve adequate power in the experiments by recruiting a sufficient number of participants (which is often a challenge in field studies).…”

“…Another key feature of EV is to ensure that the stakeholder has a degree of control or agency over the variables studied. As an example, Peck et al (2021) use both lab and field studies to examine the conditions under which consumers would take better care of the public spaces and public goods which they consumed (e.g., picking up trash in a lake, donating funds to maintain a state park). The interventions they tested were designed to increase psychological ownership of the public good, and all were feasible actions that managers could take (e.g., changing a sign from “Welcome to the park” to “Welcome to your park”).…”

“The Forest Has Become Our New Living Room” – The Critical Importance of Urban Forests During the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…In our view, there are three possible areas of action: First, the sheer number of forest visitors, their diverse activities, and their desire to appropriate the forest as a public space pose challenges for forest managers and their communication with the public. Forest owners might encounter challenges when forest visitors develop psychological ownership toward certain forest areas (Pierce et al, 2003;Avey et al, 2009;Peck et al, 2020). While forest visitors may use and perceive theforests as a public space, foresters may bring the needs of forestry and conservation to the table.…”

COVID-19: A call for mentorship in radiology

“…Increasing psychological ownership enhanced effortful stewardship such as picking up trash in a lake and financial stewardship such as donating money. 32 Organizations which invest in mentoring and partnering with physicians transform the physician role from "carpenter" to "architect", and engage physicians like radiologists in improving care for their patients and the sustenance of the organization. 33 The long-term effects that the COVID-19 pandemic has on a radiologist's well-being are currently unknown, so radiology practices must do all they can do now to help support the emotional and mental health of their radiologists.…”