New report – Nudge, Think or Shove: Shifting Values and Attitudes Towards Sustainability

Citation

(2011), "New report – Nudge, Think or Shove: Shifting Values and Attitudes Towards Sustainability", Management of Environmental Quality, Vol. 22 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/meq.2011.08322cab.004

New report – Nudge, Think or Shove: Shifting Values and Attitudes Towards Sustainability

Article Type: News From: Management of Environmental Quality: An International Journal, Volume 22, Issue 3

Pursuing sustainability requires widespread shifts in public behaviour. This briefing builds on a recent roundtable at the British House of Lords, to consider three broad approaches to influencing public behaviour: “nudge”, “think” and “shove”. The report considers the benefits and drawbacks of each, and explores how the three approaches can complement one another. It finds that:

1. 1.

   “Nudge” is effective for specific, limited shifts in behaviour such as recycling.

2. 2.

   “Think” is effective at building support and legitimacy for the big, transformational changes that we need in society, such as decarbonising the economy. “Think” can be particularly powerful in building people’s ability and motivation to participate in and drive those transformational changes

3. 3.

   “Shove” often helps to create the conditions under which “nudge” is most effective. Building on these insights, the report starts to sketch out an optimal mix of “nudge”, “think” and “shove”, which uses the best of all three approaches to transform social values and attitudes towards sustainability at the pace we need: www.dea.org.uk/resources/item.asp?d=4115