{"id":5503,"date":"2012-12-03T09:52:00","date_gmt":"2012-12-03T16:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unrbep.org\/?p=5503"},"modified":"2012-12-05T14:51:04","modified_gmt":"2012-12-05T21:51:04","slug":"whats-really-killing-energy-behavior-change","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/whats-really-killing-energy-behavior-change\/","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s really killing energy behavior change?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Source: GreenBiz.com<\/a><\/em>
\nBy Lee Ann Head<\/a><\/em>
\nPublished November 28, 2012<\/em><\/p>\n

For many years, we\u2019ve asked consumers who they most blame for rising energy costs. And for years, respondents have said they most blame either 1) oil companies, or 2) the U.S. government \u2013 with utilities much farther down the list. This year, in light of declining natural gas prices, we edited the question, asking who (or what) respondents thought most\u00a0affects\u00a0energy costs.<\/a>\u00a0With this change, \u201cblame\u201d shifted dramatically to utilities, followed closely by oil companies and the U.S. government.<\/p>\n

Most pertinent, however, is who Americans don\u2019t blame \u2013 themselves.\u00a0Only 12 percent blamed energy costs on their own demand, because 80 percent of consumers think they use the same or less energy in their homes than they did five years ago<\/a>. And we know this simply isn\u2019t true \u2014 American residential energy consumption hit record highs last year.
\n
\nThis incredibly strong \u201cit\u2019s not my fault\u201d mentality creates a huge challenge for energy conservation behavior change.\u00a0\u00a0According to social scientist J.B. Rotter<\/a>, perceived\u00a0locus of control<\/em>\u00a0strongly influences whether behaviors are thought to be \u201cinstrumental for goal attainment.\u201d So if the locus of control for home energy bills is perceived to be external, or under the control of \u201cpowerful others\u201d (utilities), then individual action is thought to be largely irrelevant. Put simply, many Americans do not believe that energy conservation behaviors will lower their energy bills. And if lowering bills (saving money) is the primary driver for most, then there\u2019s no perceived need or reward for behavior change.<\/p>\n

Compounding the problem is the fact that almost 40 percent of Americans who\u2019ve completed energy-efficient home improvements or changed energy consumption behaviors (e.g., changed thermostat settings) said they haven\u2019t seen a decline in their utility bills.\u00a0An applicable psychological concept for this situation is called\u00a0learned helplessness,\u00a0<\/em>which develops when people take actions to address a problem that ultimately fail, thereby solidifying the conclusion that they have no control.<\/p>\n

Learned helplessness often translates into a serious motivation problem. Those who have failed at previous tasks are more apt to conclude that they can\u2019t succeed in the future.\u00a0According to pioneering researchers Steven Maier and Martin Seligman,<\/a>\u00a0\u201cExposure to uncontrollable events interferes with our ability to perceive contingent relationships between our behavior and outcomes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Likewise, the more we succeed, the more we attribute success to our own actions (internality) and the more likely we are to \u201cdirect actions toward attainment of desired goals.\u201d\u00a0In other words, the more we try without seeing a change in our bills, the more likely we are to blame the utility, give up and do nothing more. But if we see bill reductions when we change our behaviors and make improvements, the more we believe we can act to reduce our bills, and the more likely we are to do more.<\/p>\n

In order to combat learned helplessness and shift the perceived locus of control for energy, we believe that a systemic disruption is needed. Utilities must accelerate the roll-out of smart meters (and the energy monitoring tools they enable) to increase consumer engagement and education about home energy consumption.\u00a0Energy efficiency rebates and incentives need to be reworked to reward multiple behaviors and improvements \u2014 rather than one-off activities \u2014 to help homeowners reach the number of actions required to see a real change in their bills. States and utilities need to more aggressively incentivize residential solar generation, de-couple rates, and make time-of-use billing the norm. We\u2019ve got to shift the perceived locus of control by creating bill reduction \u201cwins\u201d for consumers before we\u2019ll see real, lasting, behavior change.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source: GreenBiz.com By Lee Ann Head Published November 28, 2012 For many years, we\u2019ve asked consumers who they most blame for rising energy costs. And for years, respondents have said they most blame either 1) oil companies, or 2) the U.S. government \u2013 with utilities much farther down the list. This year, in light of … Continue reading What\u2019s really killing energy behavior change?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7,15],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5503"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5503"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5511,"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5503\/revisions\/5511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unrbep.org\/dealerportal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}