Abstract
Adolescents are an important population to target with energy-saving interventions: Not only are adolescents high consumers of energy, but they are also the adult consumers of the future. In the present study, an online energy-saving intervention was developed based on implementation intentions, a widely used psychological behavior change technique. A total of 180 adolescents, aged 13 to 15 years, were recruited using purposeful sampling and were allocated to either the intervention or control condition. A significant increase in adolescent’s self-reported energy-saving behavior was found among adolescents who had received the intervention, which was sustained at the 6-week follow-up. However, some adolescents were more affected by the intervention than others; adolescents who already actively engaged in energy saving (as identified by their readiness to change prior to the intervention) reported a significant increase in energy-saving behaviors as a consequence of participation in the intervention, whereas those who were not already saving energy did not.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1049-1072 |
| Number of pages | 24 |
| Journal | Environment and behavior |
| Volume | 48 |
| Issue number | 8 |
| Early online date | 29 Apr 2015 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Oct 2016 |
Bibliographical note
Publisher Copyright:© 2015, © 2015 SAGE Publications.
Keywords
- behavior change
- computer applications
- content areas
- energy
- environmental psychology
- pro-environmental behavior
- psychology
- technology