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Meta-Analysis
. 2023 Mar 28;120(13):e2214851120.
doi: 10.1073/pnas.2214851120. Epub 2023 Mar 21.

Field interventions for climate change mitigation behaviors: A second-order meta-analysis

Affiliations
Meta-Analysis

Field interventions for climate change mitigation behaviors: A second-order meta-analysis

Magnus Bergquist et al. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. .

Abstract

Behavioral change is essential to mitigate climate change. To advance current knowledge, we synthesize research on interventions aiming to promote climate change mitigation behaviors in field settings. In a preregistered second-order meta-analysis, we assess the overall effect of 10 meta-analyses, incorporating a total of 430 primary studies. In addition, we assess subgroup analyses for six types of interventions, five behaviors, and three publication bias adjustments. Results showed that climate change mitigation interventions were generally effective (dunadjusted = 0.31, 95% CI [0.30, 0.32]). A follow-up analysis using only unique primary studies, adjusted for publication bias, provides a more conservative overall estimate (d = 0.18, 95% CI [0.13, 0.24]). This translates into a mean treatment effect of 7 percentage points. Furthermore, in a subsample of adequately powered large-scale interventions (n > 9,000, k = 32), the effect was adjusted downward to approximately 2 percentage points. This discrepancy might be because large-scale interventions often target nonvoluntary participants by less direct techniques (e.g., "home energy reports") while small-scale interventions often target voluntary participants by more direct techniques (e.g., face-to-face interactions). Subgroup analyses showed that interventions based on social comparisons or financial incentives were the most effective, while education or feedback was the least effective. These results provide a comprehensive state-of-the-art summary of climate change mitigation interventions, guiding both future research and practice.

Keywords: climate change mitigation; intervention; meta-analysis; pro-environmental behavior; synthesis.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no competing interest.

Figures

Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.
Forest plot of the mean overall unadjusted effect sizes of the included meta-analyses. Note. k = number of studies, N = number of participants, dotted line = overall effect, Estimate (95% CI) = estimate and 95% CIs. *The effect size from Nisa et al. (19) is based on the restricted maximum likelihood estimator, as reported by van der Linden and Goldberg (26).
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2.
Flow chart. Note. One meta-analysis was excluded due to “educational setting” (Zelezny, 1999 (74)), five meta-analyses were excluded due to “insufficient data” (Buckley, 2020 (75); Delmas et al., 2013 (71); Green et al., 2019 (76); Nemati and Penn, 2020 (77); and Sanguinetti et al., 2020 (78)), and seven meta-analyses were excluded due to “CCA”/”uniqueness” (Abrahamse and Steg, 2013 (2); Arnott et al., 2014 (79); Lokhorst et al., 2013 (58); Osbaldiston 2004 (80); Nisa et al., 2019 (19); Poškus et al., 2016 (81); and Scheibehenne et al., 2016 (82)).
Fig. 3.
Fig. 3.
Funnel plot of subgroup effects.

References

    1. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, “Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change” (Cambridge University Press, 2022).
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    1. Schultz P. W., Strategies for Promoting Proenvironmental Behavior: Lots of Tools but Few Instructions. Eur. Psychol. 19, 107–117 (2014).
    1. Allcott H., Social norms and energy conservation. J. Public Economics 95, 1082–1095 (2011).
    1. Ferraro P., Price M., Using non-pecuniary strategies to influence behavior: evidence from a large-scale field experiment. Rev. Econ. Stat 1, 64–73 (2013).

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