Skip to main content

Nudging with care: the risks and benefits of social information

Public Choice volume 191, pages 443–464 (2022)Cite this article

Abstract

Nudges are popular types of interventions. Recent years have seen the rise of ‘norm-nudges’—nudges whose mechanism of action relies on social norms, eliciting or changing social expectations. Norm-nudges can be powerful interventions, but they can easily fail to be effective and can even backfire unless they are designed with care. We highlight important considerations when designing norm-nudges and discuss a general model of social behavior based on social expectations and conditional preferences. We present the results of several experiments wherein norm-nudging can backfire, and ways to avoid those negative outcomes.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution.

Access options

Buy single article

Instant access to the full article PDF.

USD 39.95

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6

Notes

  1. Normative expectations are second-order beliefs about the normative beliefs of other people (Bicchieri 2006, p. 14). Both empirical and normative expectations are social, in that they refer to others’ behavior or beliefs. 

  2. The statement does not mean that what is a moral or religious norm to some may not be a social norm to others. Wearing a veil or chador is a case in point. For many Muslim women, it is a valued sign of identity that they wear proudly, while others living in a strict Muslim country may wear it only because sanctions could be severe if they do not.

  3. By ‘mechanisms’ we mean what motivates people to choose particular behaviors, and descriptive and social norms rely on different motives. Arguably, individuals are not always aware or consciously processing the information available to them and may obey norms as default rules, without much thinking. Whether norm-nudging involves system 1 or system 2 is an open discussion (Bicchieri 2006; Löfgren and Nordblom 2019).

  4. That is not the case with descriptive norms: if a descriptive norm is not followed, it ceases to exist (think of September 3, 1967, when the traffic in Sweden switched from driving on the left-hand side of the road to the right. A coordinated change in expectations immediately induced different behavior).

  5. For brevity, we present only shortened versions of the experiments and their key results.

  6. For comprehensive analysis of cases in which normative information can be manipulated, see Bicchieri and Chavez (2013).

  7. In both conditions, on average, participants think that “majority” means 71.44% and 71.84%, respectively.

  8. A case of inferring the normative from the empirical would be a situation where we believe that “most people misbehave”. Here, we may have an interest in inferring that they also approve of the bad behavior.

  9. Note that compared to a setting in which behavior cannot be observed by a third party, anonymous observation without economic consequences leads to an inferior aggregate outcome and a significant reduction in the charity’s account. These results are discussed in more detail in the original Bolton et al. (2019) paper.

  10. The finding is in line with Allcott (2011), who reports that norm-messaging primarily affects the most deviant individuals with the highest energy use (also see Ferraro and Price 2013).

References

  • Akerlof, G. A., & Kranton, R. E. (2000). Economics and identity. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 115(3), 715–753.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Allcott, H. (2011). Social norms and energy conservation. Journal of Public Economics, 95(9–10), 1082–1095.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Allen, V. L. (1965). Conformity and the role of deviant. Journal of Personality, 33(4), 584–597.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bardsley, N. (2008). Dictator game giving: Altruism or artefact? Experimental Economics, 11(2), 122–133.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Berkowitz, A. D., & Perkins, H. W. (1987). Recent research on gender differences in collegiate alcohol use. Journal of American College Health, 36(2), 123–129.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bhanot, S. P. (2018). Isolating the effect of injunctive norms on conservation behavior: New evidence from a field experiment in California. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes (in press).

  • Bicchieri, C. (2006). The grammar of society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bicchieri, C. (2016). Norms in the wild: How to diagnose, measure, and change social norms. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bicchieri, C., Ashraf, S., Das, U., Kohler, H.-P., Kuang, J., McNally, P., Shpenev, A., & Thulin, E. (2018a). Phase 2 gates project report. Social networks and norms: Sanitation in Bihar and Tamil Nadu, India. Working paper. Available at: https://repository.upenn.edu/pennsong/17/.

  • Bicchieri, C., & Chavez, A. (2010). Behaving as expected: Public information and fairness norms. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 23(2), 161–178.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bicchieri, C., & Chavez, A. (2013). Norm manipulation, norm evasion: Experimental evidence. Economics & Philosophy, 29(2), 175–198.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bicchieri, C., Dimant, E., Gächter, S., & Nosenzo, D. (2019a). Observability, social proximity, and the erosion of norm compliance. Working paper. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3355028.

  • Bicchieri, C., Dimant, E., & Sonderegger, S. (2019b). It’s not a lie if you believe it: On norms, lying, and self-serving belief distortion. Working paper. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3326146.

  • Bicchieri, C., Dimant, E., & Xiao, E. (2018b). Deviant or wrong? The effects of norm information on the efficacy of punishment. Working paper. Available at SSRN. https://ssrn.com/abstract=3294371.

  • Bicchieri, C., & Ganegonda, D. (2016). Determinants of corruption: A socio-psychological analysis. In P. Nichols & D. Robertson (Eds.), Thinking about bribery, neuroscience, moral cognition and the psychology of bribery (pp. 179–205). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bicchieri, C., Jiang, T., & Lindemans, J. W. (2014). A structured approach to the diagnostic of collective practices. Frontiers in Psychology, vol.5, December.

  • Bicchieri, C., & Mercier, H. (2014). Norms and beliefs: How change occurs. In M. Xenitidou & B. Edmonds (Eds.), The complexity of social norms (pp. 37–54). Cham: Springer.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Bicchieri, C., & Xiao, E. (2009). Do the right thing: But only if others do so. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 22(2), 191–208.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bolton, G., Dimant, E., & Schmidt, U. (2019). When a nudge backfires: Using observation with social and economic incentives to promote pro-social behavior. Working paper. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3294375.

  • Brent, D. A., Lott, C., Taylor, M., Cook, J., Rollins, K., Stoddard, S., et al. (2017). Are normative appeals moral taxes? Evidence from a field experiment on water conservation. Working paper. Available at: http://faculty.bus.lsu.edu/papers/pap17_07.pdf.

  • Chaudhury, N., Hammer, J., Kremer, M., Muralidharan, K., & Rogers, F. H. (2006). Missing in action: Teacher and health worker absence in developing countries. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 20(1), 91–116.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cialdini, R. B., Kallgren, C. A., & Reno, R. R. (1991). A focus theory of normative conduct: A theoretical refinement and reevaluation of the role of norms in human behavior. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 24, 201–234.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cialdini, R. B., Reno, R. R., & Kallgren, C. A. (1990). A focus theory of normative conduct: Recycling the concept of norms to reduce littering in public places. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 58(6), 1015.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cialdini, R. B., & Trost, M. R. (1998). Social influence: Social norms, conformity and compliance. In D. T. Gilbert, S. T. Fiske, & G. Lindzey (Eds.), The handbook of social psychology (pp. 151–192). New York: McGraw-Hill.

    Google Scholar 

  • Damgaard, M. T., & Gravert, C. (2018). The hidden costs of nudging: Experimental evidence from reminders in fundraising. Journal of Public Economics, 157, 15–26.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dana, J., Weber, R. A., & Kuang, J. X. (2007). Exploiting moral wiggle room: Experiments demonstrating an illusory preference for fairness. Economic Theory, 33(1), 67–80.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Deutsch, M., & Gerard, H. B. (1955). A study of normative and informational social influences upon individual judgment. The Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology, 51(3), 629.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dimant, E. (2019). Contagion of pro- and anti-social behavior among peers and the role of social proximity. Journal of Economic Psychology, 73, 66–88.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dimant, E., & Schulte, T. (2016). The nature of corruption: An interdisciplinary perspective. German LJ, 17, 53–72.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dinner, I., Johnson, E. J., Goldstein, D. G., & Liu, K. (2011). Partitioning default effects: Why people choose not to choose. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 17(4), 332.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ekström, M. (2012). Do watching eyes affect charitable giving? Evidence from a field Experiment. Experimental Economics, 15(3), 530–546.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eriksson, K., Strimling, P., & Coultas, J. C. (2015). Bidirectional associations between descriptive and injunctive norms. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 129, 59–69.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ernest-Jones, M., Nettle, D., & Bateson, M. (2011). Effects of eye images on everyday cooperative behavior: A field experiment. Evolution and Human Behavior, 32(3), 172–178.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fehr, E., & Gächter, S. (2000). Fairness and retaliation: The economics of reciprocity. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 14(3), 159–181.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ferraro, P. J., Miranda, J. J., & Price, M. K. (2011). The persistence of treatment effects with norm-based policy instruments: Evidence from a randomized environmental policy experiment. American Economic Review, 101(3), 318–322.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ferraro, P. J., & Price, M. K. (2013). Using non-pecuniary strategies to influence behavior: Evidence from a large-scale field experiment. Review of Economics and Statistics, 95(1), 64–73.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fischbacher, U., & Föllmi-Heusi, F. (2013). Lies in disguise—An experimental study on cheating. Journal of the European Economic Association, 11(3), 525–547.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Frey, B. S., & Meier, S. (2004). Social comparisons and pro-social behavior: Testing “conditional cooperation” in a field experiment. American Economic Review, 94(5), 1717–1722.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gächter, S., Molleman, L., & Nosenzo, D. (2018). The behavioral logic of rule following and social norm compliance (unpublished manuscript).

  • Gino, F., Hauser, O. P., & Norton, M. I. (2019). Budging beliefs, nudging behaviour. Mind & Society, 15, 1–12.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldstein, N. J., Cialdini, R. B., & Griskevicius, V. (2008). A room with a viewpoint: Using social norms to motivate environmental conservation in hotels. Journal of Consumer Research, 35(3), 472–482.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hallsworth, M., Chadborn, T., Sallis, A., Sanders, M., Berry, D., Greaves, F., et al. (2016). Provision of social norm feedback to high prescribers of antibiotics in general practice: A pragmatic national randomised controlled trial. The Lancet, 387(10029), 1743–1752.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hogg, M., & Turner, J. (1987). Social identity and conformity. In W. Doise & S. Moscovici (Eds.), Current issues in European social psychology (Vol. 2). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jachimowicz, J. M., Duncan, S., Weber, E. U., & Johnson, E. J. (2019). When and why defaults influence decisions: A meta-analysis of default effects. Behavioural Public Policy, 1–28.

  • Jachimowicz, J. M., Hauser, O. P., O’Brien, J. D., Sherman, E., & Galinsky, A. D. (2018). The critical role of second-order normative beliefs in predicting energy conservation. Nature Human Behaviour, 2(10), 757.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Konow, J. (2000). Fair shares: Accountability and cognitive dissonance in allocation decisions. American Economic Review, 90(4), 1072–1091.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kraft-Todd, G. T., Bollinger, B., Gillingham, K., Lamp, S., & Rand, D. G. (2018). Credibility-enhancing displays promote the provision of non-normative public goods. Nature, 563(7730), 245.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krupka, E. L., & Weber, R. A. (2013). Identifying social norms using coordination games: Why does dictator game sharing vary? Journal of the European Economic Association, 11(3), 495–524.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Löfgren, Å., & Nordblom, K. (2019). A theoretical framework explaining the mechanisms of nudging (unpublished manuscript).

  • Lindström, B., Jangard, S., Selbing, I., & Olsson, A. (2018). The role of a “common is moral” heuristic in the stability and change of moral norms. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 147(2), 228.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • List, J. A. (2007). On the interpretation of giving in dictator games. Journal of Political Economy, 115(3), 482–493.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • List, J. A., Berrens, R. P., Bohara, A. K., & Kerkvliet, J. (2004). Examining the role of social isolation on stated preferences. American Economic Review, 94(3), 741–752.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mas, A., & Moretti, E. (2009). Peers at work. American Economic Review, 99(1), 112–145.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Miller, D. T., & McFarland, C. (1987). Pluralistic ignorance: When similarity is interpreted as dissimilarity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 53(2), 298.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mols, F., Haslam, S. A., Jetten, J., & Steffens, N. K. (2015). Why a nudge is not enough: A social identity critique of governance by stealth. European Journal of Political Research, 54(1), 81–98.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Reijula, S., Kuorikoski, J., Ehrig, T., Katsikopoulos, K., Sunder, S., et al. (2018). Nudge, boost, or design? Limitations of behaviorally informed policy under social interaction. Journal of Behavioral Economics for Policy, 2(1), 99–105.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rivis, A., & Sheeran, P. (2003). Descriptive norms as an additional predictor in the theory of planned behaviour: A meta-analysis. Current Psychology, 22(3), 218–233.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rogers, T., Goldstein, N. J., & Fox, C. R. (2018). Social mobilization. Annual Review of Psychology, 69, 357–381.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Schultz, P. W., Nolan, J. M., Cialdini, R. B., Goldstein, N. J., & Griskevicius, V. (2007). The constructive, destructive, and reconstructive power of social norms. Psychological Science, 18(5), 429–434.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Shpenev, A., Kohler, H.-P., & Bicchieri, C. (2019). Sanitation behavior in urban and rural India: a networks and norms approach (unpublished manuscript).

  • Spiekermann, K., & Weiss, A. (2016). Objective and subjective compliance: A norm-based explanation of ‘moral wiggle room’. Games and Economic Behavior, 96, 170–183.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stibe, A., & Cugelman, B. (2016). Persuasive backfiring: When behavior change interventions trigger unintended negative outcomes. In International conference on persuasive technology (pp. 65–77). Berlin: Springer.

  • Stuntz, W. J. (2000). Self-defeating crimes. Virginia Law Review, 86, 1871.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tajfel, H. (1982). Social psychology of intergroup relations. Annual Review of Psychology, 33(1), 1–39.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thaler, R., & Sunstein, C. (2008). Nudge: Improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • The Guardian. (2013). Antanas mockus: Colombians fear ridicule more than being fined. https://www.theguardian.com/public-leaders-network/2013/oct/28/antanas-mockus-bogota-mayor.

  • Turner, J. C. (1985). Social categorization and the self concept: A social cognitive theory of group behavior. In E. J. Lawler (Ed.), Advances in group process (Vol. 2, pp. 77–122). Greenwich, CT: JAI.

    Google Scholar 

  • Yoeli, E., Hoffman, M., Rand, D. G., & Nowak, M. A. (2013). Powering up with indirect reciprocity in a large-scale field experiment. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 110(Supplement 2), 10424–10429.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Syon Bhanot, Jon Jachimowicz, Arjun Khandelwal and two anonymous referees for helpful comments and suggestions.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Social Norms and Behavioral Dynamics, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA

    Cristina Bicchieri & Eugen Dimant

  2. Wharton School of Business, Philadelphia, USA

    Cristina Bicchieri

  3. Identity and Conflict Lab, Philadelphia, USA

    Eugen Dimant

Authors
  1. Cristina Bicchieri
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Eugen Dimant
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Cristina Bicchieri.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Bicchieri, C., Dimant, E. Nudging with care: the risks and benefits of social information. Public Choice 191, 443–464 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11127-019-00684-6

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11127-019-00684-6

Keywords

  • Norm-nudges
  • Nudge
  • Social information
  • Social norms

JEL Classification

  • B41
  • D01
  • D9