Econ Papers Daily / 期刊论文
更少航班，更多火车：隐性及显性标签干预促进可持续旅行行为改变
Less flights, more trains: implicit and explicit labeling interventions to encourage sustainable travel behavior change
摘要
Aviation is a major contributor to global greenhouse gas emissions, highlighting the urgent need for behavioral interventions that encourage a shift toward more sustainable modes of transportation, such as rail travel. This research investigates how ecolabels influence travel mode decisions by promoting trains over flights. In an online experiment with a fictitious booking travel platform, 330 participants indicated their purchase intention and actual selection between three travel options: a flight (high emissions), a bus (moderate emissions), and a train (low emissions), across four experimental conditions. These included a control condition (no label), an implicit color-coded label, an explicit label informing about the CO₂ emissions, and a combined label incorporating both the implicit and explicit formats. Results indicate that the implicit label significantly decreased participants' intention and actual selection of air travel and increased their intention and choice for train travel. No significant effects were observed on bus travel choices. Furthermore, the combined label did not yield additional benefits beyond those achieved by either label alone. These findings contribute to the research on behavioral economics and environmental psychology by addressing a critical gap in understanding how interventions that are effective in low-impact, low-effort contexts (e.g., food and packaging choices) affect people's decisions regarding high-impact, high-effort behavior changes, such as rethinking travel behavior.
中文摘要
航空业是全球温室气体排放的主要贡献者，这凸显了亟需通过行为干预鼓励人们转向更可持续的交通方式，如铁路出行。本研究探讨了生态标签如何通过促进火车而非飞机出行来影响出行方式决策。在一项基于虚构预订旅行平台的在线实验中，330名参与者在四种实验条件下，对三种出行选项——飞机（高排放）、巴士（中等排放）和火车（低排放）——表明了购买意向并做出了实际选择。这四种条件包括：控制条件（无标签）、隐性颜色编码标签、告知CO₂排放的显性标签，以及结合隐性和显性两种形式的组合标签。结果表明，隐性标签显著降低了参与者对航空出行的意向和实际选择，并提高了其对火车出行的意向和选择。未观察到对巴士出行选择产生显著影响。此外，组合标签并未产生超出单独使用任一标签所取得效果的额外收益。这些发现为行为经济学和环境心理学研究做出了贡献，填补了一个关键空白，即理解在低影响、低努力情境中（如食品和包装选择）有效的干预措施如何影响人们在高影响、高努力行为改变方面的决策，例如重新思考出行行为。