Psychological factors influence on energy efficiency in households
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.24136/oc.v8i4.41Keywords:
psychological factors, efficient use of electricity, householdsAbstract
Research background: Most of the studies and their authors focus on the social and eco-nomic impacts of energy-saving behavior. However, they do not focus on the psychological factors affecting the efficiency of energy consumption in households. Lithuania has a lack of a unified and justified opinion on psychological factors that affect the energy efficiency of households.
Purpose of the article: The main objective of the article is to identify the psychological factors that influence energy efficiency in households and to identify the appropriate measures to change the individual?s energy consumption behavior.
Methods: The article was based on analysis of scientific literature and expert evaluation, when experts selected the most influencing psychological factors. Expert valuation allowed to set the right conditions in which individuals are more easily assimilated by means of energy saving.
Findings: In most cases, economic and technological factors significantly influence household energy consumption. Increased energy-efficient equipment production and supply is causing an energy consumption growth in households, because they are more inclined to buy and use more efficient electrical equipment. An investigation has showed that the energy consumption is strongly influenced by some cultural and psychological factors: with greater public openness to innovation, the households tend to use energy more efficiently. Also, some psychological indicators have significant impact on energy consumption has ? frequently the more pronounced neuroticism or extraversion rate. Since the research was performed only in Lithuania, in the future it will seek to carry out an investigation in several countries and to compare a various factors on the proposed measures and the efficiency of household energy consumption.
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References
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Nair, G., Gustavsson, L., & Mahapatra, K. (2010). Factors influencing energy efficiency investments in existing Swedish residential buildings. Energy Policy, 38(6). doi: 10.1016/j.enpol.2010.01.033.
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Olson, M. E. (1981). Consumer attitudes towards energy conservation. Journal of Social Issues, 37.
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Schiller, S. R., Prindle, B., Cowart, R., & Rosenfeld, A. H. (2008). Energy efficiency and climate change mitigation policy. ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings. Washington, DC: American Council for an Energy Ef-ficient Economy.
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Steg, L. (2008). Promoting households energy conservation. Energy Policy, 36.
Stern, P. (2000). What psychology knows about energy conservation. American Psychologist, 47.
Stern, P. (2000) Toward a coherent theory of environmentally significant behavior. Journal of Social Issues, 56.
Streimikiene D., Volochovic, A., Simanaviciene A. (2012). Comparative assess-ment of policies targeting energy use efficiency in Lithuania. Renewable and Sustainable Energy, 16(6). doi: 10.1016/j.rser.2012.02.045.
Štreimikien? D., & Volochovic, A. (2011). The impact of household behavioral changes on GHC emission reduction in Lithuania. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 15(8). doi: 10.1016/j.rser.2011.07.027.
Štreimikien?, D., & Šikšnelyt?, I. (2014). Electricity market opening impact on investments in electricity sector. Renewable & Sustainable Energy Reviews, 29. doi: 10.1016/j.rser.2013.08.093.
Tonglet, M., Phillips, P., & Read, A. (2004) Using the theory of planned behaviour to investigate the determinants of recycling behavior: a case study from Brix-worth, UK. Resources. Conservation and Recycling, 3.
Uzzel, R., & Rathzel, N. (2009). Changing relations in global environmental change. Global Environmental Change, 19(3). doi: 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009 .05.001.
Wilson, Ch., & Dowlatabadi, H. (2007). Models of decision making and residential energy use. Retrieved form http://arjournals.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/ 10.1146/annurev.energy.32.053006.141137 (07.02.2017).
Zarnikau, J. (2003). Consumer demand for green power and energy efficiency. Energy Policy, 31(15). doi: 10.1016/S0301-4215(02)00232-X.
Abrahamse, W., Steg, L., Vlek, C., & Rothengatter, T. (2007) The effect of tailored information, goal setting, and tailored feedback on household energy use, ener-gy related behaviors, and behavioral antecedents. Journal of Environmental Psychoology, 27. doi:10.1016/j.jenvp.2007.08.002.
Akerlof, G. A., & Shiller, R. J. (2009). Animal spirit. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.
Baležentis, A., Baležentis, T., & Štreimikien?, D. (2011). The energy intensity in Lithuania during 1995-2009. Energy Policy, 39(9). doi: 10.1016/j.enpol.2011. 08.055.
Bamberg, S., & Schmidt, P. (2003). Incentives, morality, or habit? Predicting stu-dents car use for university routes with the models of Ajzen, Schwartz, and Tri-andis. Environment and Behavior, 35(2).
Black, J. S., Stern, P. C., & Elworth, J. T. (1985). Personal and contextual influ-ences on household energy adaptations. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 28.
Brekke, K. A., & Johansson-Stenman, O. (2008). The behavioral economics of climate change. Oxford Review of Economics, 23(2).
Brown, M. (2001). Market failures and barriers as a basis for clean energy policies. Energy policy, 29(14). doi: 10.1016/S0301-4215(01)00067-2.
Brownstone, D., & Bunch, D. S. (2000). Train, K. joint mixed logit models of stated and revealed preferences for alternative-fuel vehicles. Transportation Research, 34.
Darby, S. (2006). The effectiveness of feedback on energy consumption - a review for defra of the literature on metering, billing and direct displays environmental change institute, Oxford university. Retrieved form http://www.eci.ox.ac.uk/ research/energy/downloads/smart-metering-report.pdf (07.02.2017).
De Young, R. (1993). Changing behavior and making it stick. The conceptualiza-tion and management of conservation behavior. Environment and Behavior, 25(4).
Dietz, T., Gardner, G. T., Giligan, J., Stern, P. C., & Vandenberg, P. (2009). Household actions can provide a behavioural wedge to rapidly reduce US car-bon emissions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science of the United States of America, 106(44).
Dulleck, U., & Kaufman, S. (2004). Do customer information programs reduce household electricity demand? The Irish programme. Energy Policy, 32(8).
Ek, K. (2005). Public and private attitudes towards ??Green?? electricity: the case of Swedish wind power. Energy Policy, 33(13).
Elster, J. (1996). Rationality and the emotions. Economic Journal, 438.
Faiers, A., C., & Neame, C. (2006). Consumer attitudes towards domestic solar power systems. Energy Policy, 34.
Faraqui, A., Sergici, S., & Sharif, A. (2010). The impact of informational feedback on energy consumption ? a survey of the experimental evidence. Energy, 35(4). doi: 10.1016/j.energy.2009.07.042.
Garmendia, E; Stagl, S. (2010). Public participation for sustainability and social learning: Concepts and lessons from three case studies Europe. Ecological Economics, 69(8). doi: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2010.03.027.
Gatersleben, B., Steg, L., & Vleck, C. (2002). Measurement and determinants of environmentally significant consumer behavior. Environment and Behavior, 34(3).
Gifford, R. (2011). The dragons of inaction: Psychological barriers that limit cli-mate change mitigation and adaptation. American Psychologist, 66(4).
Godwy, J. M. (2007). Behavioral economics and climate change policy. Rensselaer Working papers in Economics.
Homans, G. (1961). Social behaviour its elementary forms. London: Routledge & Kegan P.
Howard, S. (1969). The theory of buyer behavior. New York: John Wiley.
Iyer, M., Kempton, W, & Payne, Ch. (2006). Comparison groups on bills: auto-mated, personalized energy infromation. Energy and Buildings, 38(8). doi: 10.1016/j.enbuild.2005.11.009.
Jager, W. (2000). Modelling consumer behaviour. Groningen: Universal Press.
Koppl, W. (2004). Rational choice hermenutics. Journal of Economic Behaviour & Organization, 3.
Lee, J. (2000). Adapting triandis?s model of subjective culture and social behaviour relations to consumer behaviour. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 9.
Lutzenhiser, L. (2009). Behavioral assumptions underlying California residential sector energy efficiency programs. California Institute for Energy and Envi-ronment. Retrieved form http://ciee-dev.eecs.berkeley.edu/energyeff/doc uments/ba_ee_res_wp.pdf (07.02.2017).
Maibach, E. W., Rose-Renouf, L. A., & Leiserowitz, A. (2008). Communication and marketing as climate change-intervention assets. American Journal of Pre-ventive Medicine, 35(5). doi: 10.1016/j.amepre.2008.08.016.
Marechal, K. (2007). The economics of climate change and the change of climate in economics. Energy policy, 35(10). doi: 10.1016/j.enpol.2007.05.009.
Martinsson, J., Lundqvist, L. J., & Sundström A. (2011). Energy saving in Swedish households. The (relative) importance of environmental attitudes. Energy Poli-cy, 39(9). doi: 10.1016/j.enpol.2011.05.046.
Mohr, D. (2000). Promoting sustainable behavior: an introduction to community-based social marketing. Journal of Social Issues, 56(3). doi: 10.1111/0022-4537.00183.
Nair, G., Gustavsson, L., & Mahapatra, K. (2010). Factors influencing energy efficiency investments in existing Swedish residential buildings. Energy Policy, 38(6). doi: 10.1016/j.enpol.2010.01.033.
Noeren, D. (2007). CO2 emission reduction in the German household sector till 2050 ? Barriers and Incentives. Retrieved form http://www.lumes.lu.se/data base/alumni/05.07/thesis/Dominik_Noeren.pdf (07.02.2017).
Oikkonomou, V., Becchis, F., Steg, L., & Russolillo, D. (2009). Energy saving and energy efficiency concepts for police making. Energy Policy, 11.
Olson, M. E. (1981). Consumer attitudes towards energy conservation. Journal of Social Issues, 37.
Poortiga, W., Steg, L., Velek, Ch., & Wiersma, G. (2003). Household preferences for energy-saving measures: a conjoint analysis. Journal of Energy Psychology, 24.
Schiller, S. R., Prindle, B., Cowart, R., & Rosenfeld, A. H. (2008). Energy efficiency and climate change mitigation policy. ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings. Washington, DC: American Council for an Energy Ef-ficient Economy.
Simanaviciene, Z., Volochovic, A., & Cibinskiene, A. (2016). Features of energy saving potential in Lithuanian households. Equilibrium. Quarterly Journal of Economics and Economic Policy, 11(1). doi: 10.12775/EQUIL.2016.007
Steg, L. (2008). Promoting households energy conservation. Energy Policy, 36.
Stern, P. (2000). What psychology knows about energy conservation. American Psychologist, 47.
Stern, P. (2000) Toward a coherent theory of environmentally significant behavior. Journal of Social Issues, 56.
Streimikiene D., Volochovic, A., Simanaviciene A. (2012). Comparative assess-ment of policies targeting energy use efficiency in Lithuania. Renewable and Sustainable Energy, 16(6). doi: 10.1016/j.rser.2012.02.045.
Štreimikien? D., & Volochovic, A. (2011). The impact of household behavioral changes on GHC emission reduction in Lithuania. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 15(8). doi: 10.1016/j.rser.2011.07.027.
Štreimikien?, D., & Šikšnelyt?, I. (2014). Electricity market opening impact on investments in electricity sector. Renewable & Sustainable Energy Reviews, 29. doi: 10.1016/j.rser.2013.08.093.
Tonglet, M., Phillips, P., & Read, A. (2004) Using the theory of planned behaviour to investigate the determinants of recycling behavior: a case study from Brix-worth, UK. Resources. Conservation and Recycling, 3.
Uzzel, R., & Rathzel, N. (2009). Changing relations in global environmental change. Global Environmental Change, 19(3). doi: 10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2009 .05.001.
Wilson, Ch., & Dowlatabadi, H. (2007). Models of decision making and residential energy use. Retrieved form http://arjournals.annualreviews.org/doi/pdf/ 10.1146/annurev.energy.32.053006.141137 (07.02.2017).
Zarnikau, J. (2003). Consumer demand for green power and energy efficiency. Energy Policy, 31(15). doi: 10.1016/S0301-4215(02)00232-X.
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31-12-2017
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Simanaviciene, Z., Virgilijus, D., & Simanavicius, A. (2017). Psychological factors influence on energy efficiency in households. Oeconomia Copernicana, 8(4), 671-684. https://doi.org/10.24136/oc.v8i4.41
