6. Conclusions and policy implications
Based on a three-year panel study of the activities of two samples of households from the city of Hangzhou, this paper detected a positive spillover when residents received an environmental education, but negative when residents were encouraged by monetary inducement. This difference may be due to the residents’ increased environmentalist identity because of exposure to environmental information, and rebound and single-action bias caused by the financial incentive. Moreover, the positive spillover effect was stronger when residents were engaged in more difficult initial behaviour (such as waste separation rather than dumping), which is consistent with the expectation that the performing a more difficult pro-environmental behaviour initially can engender a more salient environmental identity and higher willingness to maintain behavioural consistency. More importantly, positive spillover decreased more significantly over the three-year period than negative spillover − most likely as the result of the defensive response of residents from the longer-term education process involved.
We can also draw some conclusions from the results of our analysis for policymakers in further improving their pro-environment strategies. In principle, the government and social organisations would benefit from a greater understanding of the spillover effect and may learn to apply it to improve environmental governance. This is especially the case in China, where its extensive environmental crises – including the rapid growth of solid waste, resource exhaustion, abnormal climate and air pollution levels – provide a severe threat to the life quality of its population, and with many separate promotion efforts aimed at encouraging the public into profound behavioural change in different environmental domains. The findings of the present research suggest that an improved knowledge of behavioural spillover focusing on the ‘wedge’ effect of simple and painless steps on far-reaching changes can further enrich the policy package and provide a new approach to environmental challenges (Steinhorst and Matthies, 2016; Thøgersen and Crompton, 2009). As we pointed out, household waste separation is relatively simple and easier to be reshaped by external interventions, which can be considered as one of the effective instruments or levers for transition of energy consumption, habit and lifestyle.
