The Persistence of Treatment Effects with Norm-Based Policy Instruments: Evidence from a Randomized Environmental Policy Experiment

摘要

Economists have only recently started to explore the effects of norm-based strategies, such as appeals to prosocial behavior or the use of social comparisons, as a means to promote prosocial behaviors. To date, this literature has focused exclusively on short-run effects. This study seeks to advance our understanding of such strategies by exploring whether and how they influence demand in both the short and long run. We do so by investigating the effectiveness of information transfers and prosocial messages in a large-scale, natural field experiment carried out in conjunction with a water utility system in metropolitan Atlanta.