Recently my daughter was performing in a school concert. At the end of one of the performances there was an awkward silence as no one was clapping and the kids were just standing there. Then one person in the audience started to clap and then there was a build-up of applause across the room until everyone was clapping.
To be fair, there was a good reason why this awkward pause occurred in the first place which I will tell you at the end, but what I had just witnessed was the power of social proof in directing human behaviour.
The principle of social proof asserts that people think it is appropriate for them to believe, feel, or do something to the extent that others, especially comparable others, are believing, feeling, or doing it.
We see examples of the principle of social proof all around us from product reviews (9 out of 10 customers rated our product 5 stars) through to the “canned laughter” you hear in television sitcoms that have been shown to increase the perceived funniness of a joke no matter how cheesy it might be.
Think about the following scenario for a moment – You go to the nearby food court to get a chicken and salad sandwich for lunch. There are two stores that sell chicken and salad sandwiches that are exactly the same price. One of the stores (store A) has 8 people standing in a queue to order and the other store (store B) is deserted without any customers. Which one do you choose? If you are like 80% of people you are likely to join the queue with the other 8 customers at store A because “they must know something I don’t”.
As sustainability professionals we can also harness the power of social proof to deliver the positive environmental and social impacts we are all so passionate about as the following case study will demonstrate.
Energy efficiency – everyone is doing it right?
To test the power of social proof a group of researchers in California braved the dangers of backyard dogs and lawn watering systems to conduct a study to see what messaging would work best to get people to conserve household energy.
The researchers delivered one of four messages to homes in the San Marcos area, once a week for a month, asking the residents to reduce their energy consumption. Three of the messages contained a frequently employed reason for conserving energy: the environment will benefit; or it’s the socially responsible thing to do; or it will save you significant money on your next power bill. The fourth message played the social-proof card, stating (honestly) that most of your fellow community residents do try to conserve energy at home.
At the end of the month, the researchers recorded how much energy was used and learned that the social-proof-based message had generated 3.5 times as much energy savings.
The researchers and residents were surprised by the result – in fact when asked, the residents expected the social proof message to be the least effective.
When examining the result, the researchers surmised that the reason the social proof message was so effective was because of the high degree of uncertainty the residents felt in achieving energy savings. Energy efficiency is one of those initiatives where the benefits are somewhere off in the future so until you get there you are simply not sure if you will in fact save any energy at all – the problem of uncertain achievability.
This problem of uncertain achievability exists in many areas of sustainability from energy efficiency to the benefits of reducing carbon emissions.
In the case of this experiment, the principle of social proof was effective because of this uncertainty as the note stating that most of the residents neighbours do try to conserve energy had the effect of destroying the problem of uncertain achievability. Once the residents learned that others were saving energy then this removed any doubts about whether it was achievable and it became realistic and therefore implementable.
What does this mean for sustainability professionals?
Social proof is a powerful force that can be used by sustainability professionals to help in the implementation of sustainability initiatives, but it is most effective when there is a high degree of uncertainty as to what someone should do because they will look to others to determine the correct behaviour.
Thinking back to my daughters concert that I mentioned at the beginning – before the awkward silence at the end of the performance there had been a pause in the music part way through the song. Some of the parents started clapping enthusiastically only for the kids to suddenly keep going which made for a few chuckles around the room and some embarrassed side glances from the overly enthusiastic clappers (we’ve all been there before!).
When the performance did in fact come to an end there was a degree of uncertainty about whether this was actually the finish (because no one wanted to be the lone clapper again!). Once one person started to clap and some others joined in, the principle of social proof kicked in and the kids got the hearty applause they deserved.
The big lesson for us is that to get the most benefit out of the principle of social proof in delivering our sustainability strategies, you should think about the times when people who you want to engage in your sustainability initiatives are likely to feel uncertain about what they should do and find some social proof to guide their decision making.
Before you go, this article has been shared and liked by 9 out 10 people who share and like articles so go ahead and click like and share. Seriously, everybody else is doing it 😉
References
Cialdini, Robert. Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence and Persuade. Random House.
Nolan, J. M., P. W. Schultz, R. B. Cialdini, N. J. Goldstein, and V. Griskevicius. 2008. “Normative Social Influence Is Underdetected.” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 34: 913–23.