The Psychology of Choices
The Psychology of Choices
Overemphasis on the economics of energy efficiency is hampering efforts to implement efficient lighitng. Understanding the psychology of technology choices is a key to success, argues guest author Jennifer Veitch.
Although the technology exists for creating innovative, energy-efficient lighting designs that are also ergonomically sound, these novel systems will only achieve the intended energy savings if the end users are considered from the outset. Incentive programs target facilities managers, lighting designers, architects, developers, and engineers, and focus on cost-benefit analyses of the various lighting systems; but end users dissatisfied with a lighting system will modify it.
End-user modifications can nullify the energy savings realizable through the use of efficient lighting systems. For instance, they can attempt direct changes by adding task lamps or by disabling control gear. They also can effect indirect change, through facilities managers and designers, by voicing their dissatisfaction with a new lighting installation. Facilities managers and designers report that one barrier to the adoption of innovative lighting systems is the fear that occupants will not accept them. In the rush to implement new technologies, we must not forget that lighting energy efficiency isn't an end in itself: The lighting system must provide for the needs of the users in the space.
This said, how can we encourage people to adopt a new, energy-efficient lighting system in place of the traditional solutions? When we talk about reducing resource use, including energy, to save the planet for future generations, we are, in effect, calling for behavioral change. Psychologists are specialists in the scientific study of behavior, and psychological research points the way for changes in lighting and other choices.
DECISION-MAKING PROCESSES
Psychologists have a twenty-year history of studying energy conservation and the factors that influence energy-use choices. Technology choices offer the most effective target for continuing energy conservation. Historically, for example, energy savings through lighting were encouraged with reminders to "switch off when not in use". Although the reminders were initially effective, the energy savings did not persist. Switching off a light is a frequent behavior, and to change it requires repeated reinforcement. However, when the lighting system is itself energy efficient, provided that it meets user needs and is properly maintained, energy savings should be realized throughout the life of the system. The most important behavior to affect, therefore, is the initial lighting system choice.
The figure (below) shows a model of environmental technology decisions. This model provides a framework for understanding the influences on people making lighting decisions. It shows two parallel sets of processes, one involving psychological processes-which I will discuss here-and one involving the more traditional economic (here called positional) processes. The two sets of processes occur simultaneously to determine whether or not the individual will choose in favor of a new environmental technology.
The decision begins with the perception that there is a choice to be made. People pay more attention to vivid and personal information than to dull, abstract information, a fact well known in marketing but not always made use of in lighting literature. In addition, people evaluate the information they perceive. Source credibility will determine in part whether the message about energy-efficient lighting is accepted or rejected as trivial or ridiculous. (One might ask whether utility incentive programs are credible in this sense, for who expects a company to pay its customers not to buy its product?)
In comparing the alternatives in the choice, we rely on memory to call up what we have learned previously, and we store new information. In doing so, we are not passive or unbiased recording devices. Rather, we remember best the information consistent with what we know or believe. Also, the comparison processes themselves are biased. We weigh most heavily the information that comes to mind most readily, which is personal, vivid, and concrete, and involves people similar to ourselves.
Traditional economic models of purchasing decisions assume that decision-making is economically rational; psychology shows that it is not. People are unable to evaluate hypothetical economic alternatives accurately. For example, they fail to include inflationary increases in energy costs and therefore underestimate the benefits of an energy-efficient product. Moreover, existing knowledge, beliefs, and memories influence every aspect of the decision process.
To encourage the "yes" answer, we in the lighting community should attend to both positional and psychological processes, rather than falling into the trap of assuming that economics alone will make energy-efficiency the obvious choice. For example, the availability of incentives will be irrelevant if the decision-maker, having heard a vivid anecdote about another installation, judges that the new lighting system will have hidden costs in health or well-being for the users.
UNDERLYING BELIEFS
Consider these processes applied to fluorescent lighting, where my research and that of others has shown that there is persistent skepticism of this complex technology. A substantial proportion of people believe that fluorescent lighting is "bad for you" in some way, and the general public has a poor grasp of how it works.
People with such beliefs would be unlikely to favorably evaluate information about fluorescent lamps. Moreover, they would be less likely to retain information about fluorescent lighting and less likely to invest in it or in technologies they perceive to be similar to fluorescent lighting. Research conducted in the United States at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute supported this prediction, finding that people who feared ill health as a consequence of fluorescent lighting were less likely to have CFLs in their homes than were other people.
This model can be applied to decisions about any environmental technology choice. To apply it to energy-efficient lighting, we need to understand what people believe about lighting. More specifically, what will bias or influence the way they perceive, evaluate, remember, and compare the information provided to them? Furthermore, we need to know how interior lighting influences people visually, biologically, and especially behaviorally, so we can ensure that lighting system designs meet user needs. The long-term success of energy-efficiency can only be ensured by campaigns demonstrating to people that energy-efficiency does not require sacrifices in end-user convenience, comfort, or performance.
Future behavioral research on lighting should help to convince decision-makers that energy-efficient lighting is a low-risk choice and help to identify new approaches to lighting design that could further improve energy efficiency. This knowledge should form the cornerstone of renewed attention to program design. We need to be more focused in the application of what we know about behavioral change techniques, so that information campaigns and energy conservation programs can promote lighting energy efficiency more effectively.
PROGRAMS CHANGING FOCUS
In my opinion, the lighting industry and energy agencies tend to overlook the psychological processes involved in lighting decisions and the role of individual end users. A glance through the proceedings of the last Right Light Conference, in which speakers from many nations presented their organizations' efforts to encourage energy-efficient lighting choices, bears this out. All incorporated models were based principally on economic cost-benefit analyses.
Until recently, a government-owned electric utility that I studied relied on financial incentives to promote energy-efficient lighting. Economic circumstances have now forced an end to their incentive programs; their new advertising campaigns emphasize aesthetics and comfort as the benefits of energy-efficient lighting. Actors make the message vivid and personal. A thorough program evaluation of this and other campaigns would determine the effectiveness of this approach.
This effort is important because lighting is one of the more obvious and (by definition) visible energy uses in both residential and commercial buildings. This gives those of us involved in studying or designing lighting a leadership role, for energy-efficient lighting can lead the way to more responsible use of our planet's limited resources without diminishing the quality of life.
Jennifer A. Veitch
The author works with the National Research Council of Canada, Institute for Research in Construction, Ottawa, K1A 0R6, Canada.
Fax: +1 613 954 3733
E-mail: veitch@irc.lan.nrc.ca
Note: Adapted from The Psychology Behind Right Light Choices: Review and Research Agenda, presented at the Right Light Conference, Arnhem, The Netherlands, September 1993.
See also:
Massive Programs Get the Dutch Market Moving (IAEEL 1/93), and letters.