Noah J. Goldstein

The Constructive, Destructive, and Reconstructive Power of Social Norms

Despite a long tradition of effectiveness in laboratory tests, normative messages have had mixed success in changing behavior in field contexts, with some studies showing boomerang effects. To test a theoretical account of this inconsistency, we conducted a field experiment in which normative messages were used to promote household energy conservation. As predicted, a descriptive normative message detailing average neighborhood usage produced either desirable energy savings or the undesirable boomerang effect, depending on whether households were already consuming at a low or high rate. Also as predicted, adding an injunctive message (conveying social approval or disapproval) eliminated the boomerang effect. The results offer an explanation for the mixed success of persuasive appeals based on social norms and suggest how such appeals should be properly crafted.

Normative Social Influence is Underdetected

The present research investigated the persuasive impact and detectability of normative social influence. The first study surveyed 810 Californians about energy conservation and found that descriptive normative beliefs were more predictive of behavior than were other relevant beliefs, even though respondents rated such norms as least important in their conservation decisions. Study 2, a field experiment, showed that normative social influence produced the greatest change in behavior compared to information highlighting other reasons to conserve, even though respondents rated the normative information as least motivating. Results show that normative messages can be a powerful lever of persuasion but that their influence is underdetected.

Fear and Loving in Las Vegas: Evolution, Emotion, and Persuasion

How do arousal-inducing contexts, such as frightening or romantic television programs, influence the effectiveness of basic persuasion heuristics? Three theoretical models make different predictions: (1) A general arousal model predicts that arousal should increase the effectiveness of heuristics, (2) an affective valence model predicts that effectiveness should depend on whether the context elicits positive or negative affect, and (3) an evolutionary model predicts that persuasiveness should depend on both the specific emotion elicited and the content of the particular heuristic. Three experiments examine how fear-inducing versus romantic contexts influence the effectiveness of two widely used heuristics—social proof (e.g., “most popular”) and scarcity (e.g., “limited edition”). The results support the predictions from an evolutionary model, showing that fear can lead scarcity appeals to be counterpersuasive and that romantic desire can lead social proof appeals to be counterpersuasive. The findings highlight how an evolutionary theoretical approach can lead to novel theoretical and practical marketing insights.

The spyglass self: a model of vicarious self-perception.

Self-perception theory posits that people sometimes infer their own attributes by observing their freely chosen actions. The authors hypothesized that in addition, people sometimes infer their own attributes by observing the freely chosen actions of others with whom they feel a sense of merged identity--almost as if they had observed themselves performing the acts. Before observing an actors behavior, participants were led to feel a sense of merged identity with the actor through perspective-taking instructions (Study 1) or through feedback indicating that their brainwave patterns overlapped substantially with those of the actor (Studies 2-4). As predicted, participants incorporated attributes relevant to an actors behavior into their own self-concepts, but only when they were led to feel a sense of merged identity with the actor and only when the actors behavior seemed freely chosen. These changes in relevant self-perceptions led participants to change their own behaviors accordingly. Implications of these vicarious self-perception processes for conformity, perspective-taking, and the long-term development of the self-concept are discussed.

You Wear Me Out The Vicarious Depletion of Self-Control

Acts of self-control may deplete an individuals self-regulatory resources. But what are the consequences of perceiving other peoples use of self-control? Mentally simulating the actions of others has been found to elicit psychological effects consistent with the actual performance of those actions. Here, we consider how simulating versus merely perceiving the use of willpower can affect self-control abilities. In Study 1, participants who simulated the perspective of a person exercising self-control exhibited less restraint over spending on consumer products than did other participants. In Study 2, participants who took the perspective of a person using self-control exerted less willpower on an unrelated lexical generation task than did participants who took the perspective of a person who did not use self-control. Conversely, participants who merely read about another persons self-control exerted more willpower than did those who read about actions not requiring self-control. These findings suggest that the actions of other people may either deplete or boost ones own self-control, depending on whether one mentally simulates those actions or merely perceives them.

The science and practice of persuasion

Abstract From business owners to busboys, the ability to harness the power of persuasion is often an essential component of success in the hospitality industry.

Reciprocity by Proxy: A Novel Influence Strategy for Stimulating Cooperation

We explored a novel reciprocity-based influence strategy to stimulate cooperation called the reciprocity-by-proxy strategy. Unlike in traditional reciprocity, in which benefactors provide direct benefits to target individuals to elicit reciprocity, the reciprocity-by-proxy strategy elicits in the target a sense of indebtedness to benefactors by providing benefits to a valued third party on behalf of the target (e.g., first making a donation to a charity on behalf of one’s employees and then later asking employees to comply with a request). We hypothesize that this strategy should be more effective than the widely used incentive-by-proxy strategy, in which one makes a request of a target, promising to provide aid to a valued third party if the target first complies with the request (e.g., offering to make a donation to charity for every employee who complies with a request). We found that hotel guests were more likely to reuse their towels when the hotel’s environmental conservation program used a reciprocity-by-proxy strategy than when it used an incentive-by-proxy or standard environmental strategy. Four additional experiments replicate this finding, rule out alternative explanations, and reveal that the reciprocity-by-proxy approach can backfire when the target audience does not support the beneficiary of the aid.

Perceived perspective taking: When others walk in our shoes.

A great deal of psychological research has investigated the influence of perspective taking on individuals, indicating that perspective taking increases the extent to which people like, feel a sense of self-other overlap with, and help those whose perspective they take. However, previous investigations of the topic have been limited to the study of the perspective taker, rather than the individual whose perspective has been taken. The purpose of the current work is to begin to fill this large gap in the literature by examining the consequences of believing that another individual is taking ones perspective, a phenomenon we refer to as perceived perspective taking. Over a series of 6 experiments, we demonstrate that perceiving that ones perspective has been taken confers many of the same interpersonal benefits as taking anothers perspective. Specifically, our data suggest that believing that another person has successfully taken ones perspective results in an increased liking for, a greater sense of self-other overlap with, and more help provided to that person. Consistent with predictions, we find that ones self-other overlap with the perspective taker and the amount of empathy one perceives the perspective taker to feel operate in tandem to mediate the link between perceived perspective taking and liking for the perspective taker. Further, a mediational path from perceived perspective taking to helping behavior through liking is supported. Future directions are discussed, along with implications for theory and application in domains such as intergroup relations, conflict resolution, and political campaigning.

Use of behavioral economics and social psychology to improve treatment of acute respiratory infections (BEARI): rationale and design of a cluster randomized controlled trial [1RC4AG039115-01] - study protocol and baseline practice and provider characteristics

BackgroundInappropriate antibiotic prescribing for nonbacterial infections leads to increases in the costs of care, antibiotic resistance among bacteria, and adverse drug events. Acute respiratory infections (ARIs) are the most common reason for inappropriate antibiotic use. Most prior efforts to decrease inappropriate antibiotic prescribing for ARIs (e.g., educational or informational interventions) have relied on the implicit assumption that clinicians inappropriately prescribe antibiotics because they are unaware of guideline recommendations for ARIs. If lack of guideline awareness is not the reason for inappropriate prescribing, educational interventions may have limited impact on prescribing rates. Instead, interventions that apply social psychological and behavioral economic principles may be more effective in deterring inappropriate antibiotic prescribing for ARIs by well-informed clinicians.Methods/designThe Application of Behavioral Economics to Improve the Treatment of Acute Respiratory Infections (BEARI) Trial is a multisite, cluster-randomized controlled trial with practice as the unit of randomization. The primary aim is to test the ability of three interventions based on behavioral economic principles to reduce the rate of inappropriate antibiotic prescribing for ARIs. We randomized practices in a 2 × 2 × 2 factorial design to receive up to three interventions for non-antibiotic-appropriate diagnoses: 1) Accountable Justifications: When prescribing an antibiotic for an ARI, clinicians are prompted to record an explicit justification that appears in the patient electronic health record; 2) Suggested Alternatives: Through computerized clinical decision support, clinicians prescribing an antibiotic for an ARI receive a list of non-antibiotic treatment choices (including prescription options) prior to completing the antibiotic prescription; and 3) Peer Comparison: Each provider’s rate of inappropriate antibiotic prescribing relative to top-performing peers is reported back to the provider periodically by email. We enrolled 269 clinicians (practicing attending physicians or advanced practice nurses) in 49 participating clinic sites and collected baseline data. The primary outcome is the antibiotic prescribing rate for office visits with non-antibiotic-appropriate ARI diagnoses. Secondary outcomes will examine antibiotic prescribing more broadly. The 18-month intervention period will be followed by a one year follow-up period to measure persistence of effects after interventions cease.DiscussionThe ongoing BEARI Trial will evaluate the effectiveness of behavioral economic strategies in reducing inappropriate prescribing of antibiotics.Trials registrationClinicalTrials.gov: NCT01454947

Illusory Power Transference: The Vicarious Experience of Power

We use two experiments to investigate “illusory power transference,” in which individuals minimally associated with powerful others act as if they themselves are powerful outside the boundaries of the association. The experiments elicit this phenomenon through social comparison processes that result in individuals’ perceptions of their own power assimilating toward the power of the powerful other, which is driven by the motivation to characterize oneself as powerful. We demonstrate that men who have a tenuous association with a powerful other (versus a powerless or equal-power other) felt more powerful and were more optimistic, confident, and risk seeking, even though they could not leverage the associate’s power. Consistent with research suggesting that women are less motivated to characterize themselves as powerful, however, this effect did not emerge among women. A third experiment suggests that, besides underlying motivations, whether the association is cooperative or competitive determines if one’s sense of power is likely to assimilate to, or contrast away from, the associate’s level of power.