Sticker in the Box! Object-Person Distance and Descriptive Norms as Means to Reduce Waste

Abstract

With a steadily growing population, waste management and reduction have become increasingly important issues. While many people refrain from acting in an environmentally friendly way, we suggest that the activation of corresponding environmental norms in combination with a low object-person distance may instigate waste reduction behavior. Drawing from predictions of social influence research and Lewin's field theory, we put “no-ads-please” stickers into mailboxes of N=51 households without such a sticker (intervention). In parallel, we asked surrounding mailbox owners to put a no-ads-please sticker visibly on their mailbox. As expected, a substantial amount of stickers was subsequently used by intervention households. Importantly, the more surrounding mailboxes had a no-ads-please sticker, the more likely were intervention households to put the sticker on their own box. These findings reveal an effective way to easily motivate people to engage in waste reduction.