Influencing Active Travel Behavior: The Importance of Social Norms

The ability to influence active transportation behavior offers an opportunity to address societal issues such as transportation congestion, air quality, and public health issues such as obesity. As a result a body of working... [ view full abstract ]

The ability to influence active transportation behavior offers an opportunity to address societal issues such as transportation congestion, air quality, and public health issues such as obesity. As a result a body of working is beginning to explore the behavioral dimensions that drive travel, including both social and behavioral norms. Research suggests that social forces may play an equal or paramount role to price / economic levers and that the psychological pull of social but more work is needed evaluate how market vs. social nudges work together to influence transportation decisions.

To evaluate this a group of roughly 500 participants were offered differing incentives in 4 identical trials. These incentives included various monetary amounts, a free gift or a social nudge tapping into altruistic values, in our case benefits to the environment. After tests for homogeneity, the results indicated that the social nudge had a high degree of effectiveness, as compared to both the financial incentives and gifts. Furthermore the results indicated that mixing market and social norms caused both to be less effective. These findings that travel incentive programs that focus solely on fiscal may be missing out on a significant opportunity. A focus on social norms and value may provide a tool to facilitate greater changes in travel behavior that can nudge individuals to more healthy and climate-sensitive modes of travel such as walking, biking and transit.