@article{ref1,
title="Dynamic norms promote sustainable behavior, even if it is counternormative",
journal="Psychological science",
year="2017",
author="Sparkman, Gregg and Walton, Gregory M.",
volume="28",
number="11",
pages="1663-1674",
abstract="It is well known that people conform to normative information about other people's current attitudes and behaviors. Do they also conform to dynamic norms-information about how other people's behavior is changing over time? We investigated this question in three online and two field experiments. Experiments 1 through 4 examined high levels of meat consumption, a normative and salient behavior that is decreasing in the United States. Dynamic norms motivated change despite prevailing static norms, increasing interest in eating less meat (Experiments 1-3) and doubling meatless orders at a café (Experiment 4). Mediators included the anticipation of less meat eating in the future ( preconformity) and the inference that reducing meat consumption mattered to other people (Experiments 2 and 3). In Experiment 5, we took advantage of a natural comparison to provide evidence that dynamic norms can also strengthen social-norm interventions when the static norm is positive; a positive dynamic norm resulted in reduced laundry loads and water use over 3 weeks during a drought.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0956-7976",
doi="10.1177/0956797617719950",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0956797617719950"
}