Social Interaction in Responsibility Ascription: The Case of Household Recycling

Brekke, Kjell Arne; Kipperberg, Gorm; Nyborg, Karine

doi:10.3368/le.86.4.766

Cited by 94 publications

(82 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…The effect of information can also be catalyzed in combination with other instruments. This is also in line with the results of Brekke et al [81] indicating that perceived responsibility is a determinant for reported recycling behavior, but also that uncertainty in the information for example about other people's behavior could cause reluctance to accept responsibility. Also Bruvoll and Nyborg [82] conclude that people are willing to conform to social norms, even if it comes with perceived costs in terms of time or work.…”

Section: Results Of the Evaluationsupporting

confidence: 81%

Policy Instruments towards a Sustainable Waste Management

et al. 2013

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Abstract:The aim of this paper is to suggest and discuss policy instruments that could lead towards a more sustainable waste management. The paper is based on evaluations from a large scale multi-disciplinary Swedish research program. The evaluations focus on environmental and economic impacts as well as social acceptance. The focus is on the Swedish waste management system but the results should be relevant also for other countries. Through the assessments and lessons learned during the research program we conclude that several policy instruments can be effective and possible to implement. Particularly, we put forward the following policy instruments: "Information"; "Compulsory recycling of recyclable materials"; "Weight-based waste fee in combination OPEN ACCESSSustainability 2013, 5 842 with information and developed recycling systems"; "Mandatory labeling of products containing hazardous chemicals", "Advertisements on request only and other waste minimization measures"; and "Differentiated VAT and subsidies for some services". Compulsory recycling of recyclable materials is the policy instrument that has the largest potential for decreasing the environmental impacts with the configurations studied here. The effects of the other policy instruments studied may be more limited and they typically need to be implemented in combination in order to have more significant impacts. Furthermore, policy makers need to take into account market and international aspects when implementing new instruments. In the more long term perspective, the above set of policy instruments may also need to be complemented with more transformational policy instruments that can significantly decrease the generation of waste.

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Section: Results Of the Evaluationsupporting

confidence: 81%

Policy Instruments towards a Sustainable Waste Management

et al. 2013

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“…The importance of non-monetary incentives in waste recycling has already been emphasized in literature (Berglund, 2006;Brekke et al 2003Brekke et al , 2007Brekke et al , 2010Hage et al 2009;Halvorsen, 2008). Kinnaman (2006) indeed suggests that the benefits of recycling households are increased more by warm-glow incentives than by unit-based pricing, to the point that households may even be willing to pay for the opportunity to recycle 7 .…”

Section: Conceptual Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Waste prevention and social preferences: the role of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations

Cecere

Mancinelli

Mazzanti

2014

Ecological Economics

185

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Though reduction is at the top of the waste management hierarchy, EU policies have historically introduced waste management incentives mainly concerning waste recovery and recycling, in addition to actions aimed at reducing disposal in landfills. Only very recently have EU policies started defining targets for waste reduction. Against this backdrop, we aim to examine whether individual behavior towards waste reduction is more strongly driven by extrinsic motivations such as social norms, or intrinsic motivations such as purely altruistic preferences. We exploit a large new survey that covers thousands of individuals for the EU27, to test the role of motivations when people are faced with collective management of the public good. We find that diverse motivations are behind the reduction of food waste: extrinsic motivations nevertheless increase the likelihood of producing more waste. Green consumption / recycling-oriented attitudes and individualistic thinking about waste management relate to 'waste producers'. This shows that in order to go beyond a recycling-oriented society towards reduction of the source of waste externality -its generation -the nature of social preferences matters. Behavior patterns leading to waste reduction are less socially oriented, less exposed to peer pressure and more reliant upon purely 'altruistic' social attitudes. Policy makers should learn from the relevant insights on social behavior we here address if our societies aim to fully integrate the idea of waste reduction alongside recycling in the future.

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“…For example, people donate anonymously to charities (Eckel and Grossman 1996), they vote for reasons of civic duty, despite their vote being extremely unlikely pivotal (Riker and Ordeshook 1968); they respect the law (Cooter 2000) also if incentives that back up the obligations are weak (Galbiati and Vertova 2008). People pay their taxes despite low detection probabilities for evasion (Kirchler 2007), and people also care for the environment out of moral convictions (Brekke, Kipperberg, and Nyborg 2010 interesting field study) and also act on perceived moral obligations (Schwartz 1977). As shown above, in experiments people make contributions to one-shot public goods without any extrinsic incentive to do so.…”

Section: The Determinants Of Social Order I: Internalized Normsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human Prosocial Motivation and the Maintenance of Social Order

Gächter¹

2014

The Oxford Handbook of Behavioral Economics and the Law

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Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in AbstractThis chapter presents some insights from basic behavioural research on the role of human pro-social motivation to maintain social order. I argue that social order can be conceptualised as a public good game. Past attempts to explain social order typically relied on the assumption of selfish and rational agents ("homo economicus"). The last twenty years of research in behavioural and experimental economics have challenged this view. After presenting the most important findings of recent research on human pro-sociality I discuss the evidence on three pillars of the maintenance of social order. The first pillar is internalised norms of cooperation, sustained by emotions such as guilt and shame. The second pillar is the behaviour of other people who typically are "conditional cooperators" willing to cooperate if others do so as well. This motivation can sustain cooperation if enough people cooperate but can jeopardise social order if many others follow selfish inclinations. The third pillar are sanctions meted out to anyone who does not cooperate; ideally punishment can work as a mere threat without being executed much. The chapter also presents some evidence on the cross-cultural variability of some findings, in particular with regard to punishment behaviour. The chapter concludes with remarks on future research.

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Social Interaction in Responsibility Ascription: The Case of Household Recycling

Cited by 94 publications

References 44 publications

Policy Instruments towards a Sustainable Waste Management

Policy Instruments towards a Sustainable Waste Management

Waste prevention and social preferences: the role of intrinsic and extrinsic motivations

Human Prosocial Motivation and the Maintenance of Social Order

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