How do you get people to save electricity and gas? And what role does the discussion about Christmas lights play in this? For behavioral researcher Andreas Nicklisch, Christmas lighting is a hot topic – and Switzerland could be more willing to experiment.
SRF News: Politicians are currently trying to get the population to save – on electricity, on gas. Does politics do that well?
Andreas Nicklisch: With regard to climate change, there were always calls for savings. Since February of this year we have been living in a slightly different world. Together with the day-to-day political developments, the calls for savings are now being received very differently by people. Politicians do something very well: They take the experiences that people are having and try to steer them in a certain direction.
From a research perspective, is there a recipe for getting people to do something – in this case, to save electricity and gas?
There is no panacea. But what we do know, for example, is that people in Switzerland used to react little to financial incentives. If we were to make public transport cheaper now, that would have relatively little effect. It needs other incentives. For example, you can try to give people the feeling that they are not alone but part of a larger group.
My guess is that the Swiss are now much more price-sensitive than they were before. This means that a combination of monetary and non-monetary incentives would work very well.
How do you respond to the argument that the industry is much more crucial to the system than the individual?
Being a role model is of course very important. The worst case scenario would be if the person calling for energy saving drove away in his big car. The role models that we have in our society must be aware of their responsibility. Companies are already very sensitized when it comes to energy consumption. Not only for cost reasons, but also for image reasons.
Opinions differ on the Christmas lights. Do municipalities damage the sense of community if they don’t do without the Christmas lights altogether?
I think you have to use common sense here. I would be absolutely against turning off all the Christmas lights. There are phenomena that we observe, for example, in the USA. There is a call to save fuel. You do it in a very direct way and you try to corner people very hard. And then the backlash happens: there are even cars that are supposed to emit a lot of soot. And that, of course, is a complete reversal of what you actually want to achieve.
I would be very opposed to having all the Christmas lights turned off.
Perhaps one could consider concentrating on one or two important Christmas lights. Using brute force is certainly the wrong approach.
From the point of view of research, where is there still potential in the call for savings?
Swiss politics is a bit more conservative politics. She’s not very adventurous. In the UK there is a national agency that looks at just such calls and mechanisms that can be used to steer people and their behavior in a certain direction.
I would wish that Swiss politics would be a little more willing to experiment with playful incentives.
The conversation was conducted by Annina Mathis.