There's an interesting article in Sunday's Toronto Star, elaborating on the point Aran was making about the psychology of climate change:The article discusses social psychology research suggesting that for people to take action they need to feel a little peer pressure -- that what they're doing is in-line with social norms. Scary forecasts, or single helpful actions (like buying efficient light bulbs) don't really work without the pressure of feeling like the actions are socially approved.
http://www.thestar.com/article/584093
The article references a study where participants were given feedback on their home energy use including an indicator as to how well or poorly they were doing compared to the rest of the group. Virtually every participant cut-down on their energy use. Cool. I believe this sort of effect is what the folks at Zerofootprint have in mind with there service that connects communities around their carbon consumption.
This suggests a new avenue of attack in the persuasion theme of software engineering contributions to fighting climate change: fostering social norms of beneficial actions. Here we can apply all that we know about awareness tools from software development environments, how teams work and share ideas, how to present complex information sensibly, etc...
3 comments:
Maybe it's the iconoclast in me, but when I think of social 'persuasion', I have mental images of Leni Riefenstahl and Soviet sloganeering.
Yeah, "persuasion" is not the right term, but you know what I mean for now, at least.
And I agree, it seems somewhat creepy to speak so directly about persuasion. And yet, it's part of the game, no?
Hey, iconoclast, you don't need to venture that far into the past. "Persuasion" can also be read as "lobbying" (of the public opinion) and then what comes to mind are huge ad campaigns of companies like Shell boasting their engagement in "clean energy".
Maybe persuasion is creepy, but it's also a very normal thing in North American culture. I have personally never been to the US, but I have heard that US Americans have a special type of person called a "political pundit" whose job seems to be just that: "politically educate the people", "persuade", "partisan propaganda".
Whether it's a good or bad thing, you're definitely not alone if you decide to play this kind of game.
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