Elsevier

Journal of Cleaner Production

Volume 233, 1 October 2019, Pages 1029-1037
Journal of Cleaner Production

How to predict future pro-environmental intention? The spillover effect of electricity-saving behavior under environmental and monetary framing

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2019.06.088Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Both environmental and monetary framing promoted environmental behavioral intention.

  • The spillover effect was influenced by the two different framings.

  • Environmental self-identity had a mediating effect on spillover.

  • Labeling someone as an environmentalist could enhance environmental self-identity.

  • Enhancing environmental self-identity could help avoid negative spillover.

Abstract

The spillover effect in the environmental realm has attracted attention from many researchers. The present study took electricity saving as an example to explore the mechanism of the spillover effect under environmental framing (EF) or monetary framing (MF) and examine the effect of “labeling” on the spillover effect to add value to existing environmental research. Three studies showed that both environmental and monetary framing could promote environmental intention. Study 1 tested the effectiveness of the intervention materials and found that both EF and MF increased the intention to save electricity. Study 2 and 3 revealed that the spillover effect was influenced by framing. Specifically, the spillover of EF was positive, whereas that of MF was negative. At the same time, environmental self-identity mediated both positive and negative spillover. Moreover, enhancing individuals’ environmental self-identity by labeling them as “environmentalists” could prevent negative spillover and increase positive spillover. The results of the present study also provided practical guidance regarding pro-environmental education and campaigns by emphasizing environmental benefits rather than monetary benefits and by strengthening environmental self-identity through labeling.

Introduction

Global warming is a growing problem that will continue to have future negative ramifications worldwide (Parant et al., 2016). Scientists have noted since the mid-20th century that human activities are likely to be the main reason for global warming, with more than 95% probability (IPCC, 2014). Therefore, changing individuals' environmental behavior can solve most of the environmental problems we have encountered (Steg et al., 2015). Moreover, with the rapid development of the economy and increasing public exposure to environmental harm, it is expected that more people will adopt pro-environmental behavior (Chen et al., 2016). In general, current activities to promote energy conservation and emissions reduction can be divided into two main strategies: one based on environmental framing (EF),1 which saves energy for the environment, and the other based on monetary framing (MF),2 which saves energy for monetary reasons since using less energy means spending less money. However, previous studies found different effects of these two strategies on pro-environmental behaviors (Bolderdijk et al., 2013; Steinhorst et al., 2015). Moreover, as environmental conservation is a continuous process, we must focus on not only the targeted behavior of intervention, but also on the non-targeted behavior in the future, that is, the spillover effect. Therefore, further comparative studies of the actual utility of these two strategies are required. Since saving energy is more urgent than ever (Zhang and Lin, 2018), we used electricity-saving behavior as an example of an intervention-targeted behavior to later examine individuals’ environmental behavior in other areas. In this study, we tested the influence of framing on the spillover effect and the role of environmental self-identity in this relationship.

The concept of the “spillover effect” in the field of environmental research was first proposed by Thøgersen (1999), who argued that pro-environmental behaviors in a specific environment could affect environmental behaviors in many other areas. In the present study, we compared the effects of different levels of past electricity-saving behavior on future environmental behavior to measure spillover effects. The spillover effect can be both positive and negative. A positive spillover effect means that when people perform a target environmental behavior, they will perform more non-targeted pro-environmental behaviors in other areas (Thøgersen and Crompton, 2009). For example, Lanzini and Thøgersen (2014) found that labeling shopping behavior as environmental behavior could promote other pro-environmental behavior, such as turning off lights when not in use. On the contrary, making people aware of their own environmental behavior may also cause a negative spillover effect (Klöckner et al., 2013; Thøgersen and Ölander, 2003). For example, when people reduce their water usage, they consumed more electricity (Tiefenbeck et al., 2013). A possible explanation may be that people regard past environmental practices as an excuse to reject environmental behaviors in other environmental areas (Diekmann and Preisendörfer, 1998). Whether spillover is positive or negative, it exerts an important effect on subsequent environmental behavior. Thus, it is worth examining when positive and negative spillover occur and determining an effective way to promote the positive spillover effect or avoid negative spillover in the long run (Nilsson et al., 2017).

Generally speaking, there are two approaches to achieving change in pro-environmental behavior. One highlights the economic benefits through price controls or other policies, both of which are based on external beliefs such as the idea that saving energy means saving money. The other approach emphasizes environmental benefits, which is based on the internal motivation, such as “saving energy protects the environment”. The query theory suggested that to the approach for evaluating an action should be based on the order of extracting individual motivations from memory (Weber and Johnson, 2009), and that the extraction order of environmental and monetary motivation may be different under different strategies. Moreover, previous research on the effectiveness of the economic and environmental strategy for promoting environmental protection did not reach a consistent conclusion. According to market principles, people's actions are often based on their own interests (Miller, 1999), such as financial gain. For example, Lanzini and Thøgersen (2014) found that economic compensation and monetary incentive to buy green products are more motivating for people to continue to buy green products than verbal encouragement and praise. In contrast, Dogan et al. (2014) argued that environmental strategy was more effective than monetary strategy. They found that the participants in the environmental group engaged in more ecological driving than the monetary group because they believed that environmental benefits were more worthwhile. Other studies have found that both MF and EF help people save electricity (Steinhorst et al., 2015; Steinhorst and Matthies, 2016). Therefore, in the present study, we examined whether there are different environmental spillover effects of electricity-saving behavior under MF and EF, and we explored the psychological mechanism of the spillover effect under the two framings.

Given that research assessing the spillover effect has long focused on why past environmental behavior strengthens or weakens subsequent green behavior (Mullen and Monin, 2016), some researchers have suggested that the level of an individual's self-identity might play an important role (Van der Werff et al., 2014). Environmental self-identity refers to the extent to which an individual considers himself to be an environmentalist (Van der Werff et al., 2014). As the core of the concept of the self, self-identity (how one understands oneself) affects our daily actions (Fekadu and Kraft, 2001; Sparks and Shepherd, 1992), so it is reasonable to suppose that environmental self-identity influences our environmental intentions and behavior (De Groot and Steg, 2015; Truelove et al., 2016).

Personal environmental self-identity is variable, and it can be changed when influenced by past environmental behavior (Van der Werff et al., 2014). Previous studies confirmed the mediating effect of environmental self-identity on both positive and negative spillover (Lacasse, 2016; Poortinga et al., 2013; Truelove et al., 2016). Concerning positive spillover, people who had a stronger environmental self-identity were more likely to adopt environmental behaviors such as saving electricity and purchasing green products (Lacasse, 2016; Van der Werff et al., 2014; Whitmarsh & O'Neill, 2010). On the other hand, self-identity also has a mediating effect on negative spillover in some contexts. For example, Truelove et al. (2016) found that people who had previously performed recycling behaviors had a lower level of environmental identity and were less supportive of a green fund. Negative spillover can threaten the long-term effectiveness of intervention strategies and daily life. Thus, it is important to consider improving the level of environmental self-identity in order to avoid negative spillover effects (Miller and Effron, 2010).

Researchers have proposed several ways to cultivate environmental self-identity (Lacasse, 2016), of which labeling is one effective method. Self-identity is often referred to as the label of self (e.g., Cook et al., 2002). Labeling people “environmentalists” can directly enhance their environmental self-identity (Lacasse, 2016; Van der Werff et al., 2013), because if the individual accepts the label attached to himself, his behavior will be consistent with what the label suggests. For example, one study found that when labeled as caring about green products, participants tended to choose green products in a shopping task (Kristensson et al., 2017). However, only a few studies have investigated the role of labeling in the spillover effect, which did not distinguish between EF and MF (Lacasse, 2016). It is not clear whether the label effect is different under EF versus MF, or how the spillover effect differs in either case. Therefore, in the present study, we intervened in participants’ environmental self-identity through labeling, focusing on examining whether labeling could change the negative spillover effect.

By means of three studies, the present research aimed to explore the mechanism of the spillover effect in different framings and the effect of labeling on the spillover effect. Study 1 tested the effectiveness of the intervention materials. Study 2 examined the spillover effect in EF and MF and determined whether environmental self-identity plays a mediator role in the relationship between past environmental behavior and future environmental intention. Study 3 examined the intervention effect of labeling people as “environmentalists” on the spillover effect. Through this process, our study revealed the spillover effects under EF and MF and the role of environmental self-identity, as well as identified an effective way to change from negative to positive spillover.

Section snippets

Study 1

Study 1 compared the effects of EF and MF on intentions to save electricity. We hypothesized that participants in either the EF or MF group would display a higher intent to save electricity than those in the control group (Hypothesis 1).

Study 2

Building off of our findings in study 1, we focused on the spillover effect of MF and further examined the spillover effects of MF and EF and their corresponding psychological mechanisms in study 2. However, we did not pre-test the electricity-saving behaviors of the participants in study 1, which may have had an impact on the results. Therefore, in Study 2, we needed to control the environmental behavior of the participants in the past. According to self-perception theory (Bem, 1972), whether

Study 3

Since study 2 demonstrated that environmental self-identity had a mediating effect on both positive and negative spillover, the question remained whether enhancing people's environmental self-identity would avoid negative spillover and promote positive spillover. We used the method of “labeling” to re-prime people's awareness and change their environmental self-identity (Lacasse, 2016). We hypothesized that after the labeling intervention, whether under EF or MF, participants' environmental

Discussion

The current research explored spillover effects on pro-environmental behavior under EF versus MF and their mediation mechanism. Specifically, in line with the hypothesis of study 1, both the EF and MF groups showed a higher level of intention to save electricity than did the control group, which suggested that the interventions of MF and EF are effective in achieving the targeted behavior. Study 2 found that under EF, participants who assumed that they had engaged in more electricity-saving

Conclusions

The present study compared the spillover effects under EF and MF and their mechanism, which can contribute value to existing environmental research. We found that both EF and MF led to a higher level of intention to save electricity. However, when the spillover effect was taken into account, EF had a positive spillover, whereas MF had a negative spillover; furthermore, environmental self-identity mediates both the positive and negative spillover effects. Enhancing people's environmental

Funding

This work was supported by the National Social Science Foundation of China (No. 18BSH122).

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