TY - JOUR
T1 - The short-run and long-run effects of behavioral interventions
T2 - Experimental evidence from energy conservation
AU - Allcott, Hunt
AU - Rogers, Todd
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2014, American Economic Association. All rights reserved.
PY - 2014/10/1
Y1 - 2014/10/1
N2 - We document three remarkable features of the Opower program, in which social comparison-based home energy reports are repeatedly mailed to more than six million households nationwide. First, initial reports cause high-frequency "action and backsliding," but these cycles attenuate over time. Second, if reports are discontinued after two years, effects are relatively persistent, decaying at 10-20 percent per year. Third, consumers are slow to habituate: they continue to respond to repeated treatment even after two years. We show that the previous conservative assumptions about post-intervention persistence had dramatically understated cost effectiveness and illustrate how empirical estimates can optimize program design.
AB - We document three remarkable features of the Opower program, in which social comparison-based home energy reports are repeatedly mailed to more than six million households nationwide. First, initial reports cause high-frequency "action and backsliding," but these cycles attenuate over time. Second, if reports are discontinued after two years, effects are relatively persistent, decaying at 10-20 percent per year. Third, consumers are slow to habituate: they continue to respond to repeated treatment even after two years. We show that the previous conservative assumptions about post-intervention persistence had dramatically understated cost effectiveness and illustrate how empirical estimates can optimize program design.
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U2 - 10.1257/aer.104.10.3003
DO - 10.1257/aer.104.10.3003
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:84905710973
VL - 104
SP - 3003
EP - 3037
JO - American Economic Review
JF - American Economic Review
SN - 0002-8282
IS - 10
ER -