Psychology and energy conservation: Contributions from theory and practice

Abstract Domestic energy consumption accounts for a substantial proportion of greenhouse gas emissions and therefore needs to be reduced to meet international climate targets for emission reductions. Changing individual household behaviours forms an integral part of approaches to reduce emissions. In this chapter, we provide an overview of research from psychology on household energy consumption. Using illustrative examples, we describe several motivations for people to save energy at home and then move on to some of the most commonly used behaviour change interventions in this field. We then describe the main drivers of adoption rates of new energy-saving technologies and discuss research on the acceptability of energy policies and infrastructural changes. We end the chapter by arguing for more interdisciplinary energy research, whereby research methods and theories used in psychology are complemented with those from other relevant disciplines, such as sociology, economics, building sciences, and environmental sciences.