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on Nudge and Boosting |
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Issue of 2024‒02‒26
two papers chosen by |
| By: | Ankinée KIRAKOZIAN; Raphaël CHIAPPINI; Nabila ARFAOUI |
| Abstract: | The central issue of this paper is to understand how policy makers can design instruments to create incentives towards green mobility. With this in mind, we ran a field experiment in 89 French firms (both public and private organizations) over 54 weeks to investigate how nudges and financial incentives can decrease the use of polluting vehicles by employees during their commute to work each week. Based on data including 845 employees, our study highlights several results related to three important attributes of policy design: the type of instrument, the timing and the targeting. We find that individuals exposed to the nudges “Moral Appeal”, “Risk of Loss”, and a combination of these two, significantly decrease their use of polluting vehicles in their daily commute to work. We find no treatment effect, either for the other nudges or for the impact of financial incentives. Our findings also reveal a persistent effect in time of the three successful nudges on the transport behavior of employees. Using a causal forest method to evaluate the heterogeneous treatment effects of these three nudges, we demonstrate that distance from work and pro-environmental behavior are the strongest predictors of treatment effects. We find that the further the employees reside from their workplace, the lower the treatment effect estimates. It suggests that selective targeting can improve the efficiency of the nudging policy. |
| Keywords: | Nudge, field experiment, green mobility, transport mode. |
| JEL: | C93 D91 Q5 R4 |
| Date: | 2023 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:grt:bdxewp:2023-09&r=nud |
| By: | Raissa Fabregas; Michael Kremer; Matthew Lowes; Robert On; Giulia Zane |
| Abstract: | Mobile phone-based informational programs are widely used worldwide, though there is little consensus on how effective they are at changing behavior. We present causal evidence on the effects of six agricultural information programs delivered through text messages in Kenya and Rwanda. The programs shared similar objectives but were implemented by three different organizations and varied in content, design, and target population. With administrative outcome data for tens of thousands of farmers across all experiments, we are sufficiently powered to detect small effects in real input purchase choices. Combining the results of all experiments through a meta-analysis, we find that the odds ratio for following the recommendations is 1.22 (95% CI: 1.16, 1.29). We cannot reject that impacts are similar across experiments and for two different agricultural inputs. There is little evidence of message fatigue, but the effects diminish over time. Providing more granular information, supplementing the texts with in-person calls, or varying the messages’ framing did not significantly increase impacts, but message repetition had modest positive effects. While the overall effect sizes are small, the low cost of text messages can make these programs cost-effective. |
| JEL: | Q0 |
| Date: | 2024–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:32048&r=nud |