Language and pro-environmental behavior

Last registered on May 05, 2021

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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title

Language and pro-environmental behavior

RCT ID

AEARCTR-0007636

Initial registration date

May 05, 2021

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published

May 05, 2021, 11:24 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country

Switzerland

Region

Country

Germany

Region

Country

United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

Region

Primary Investigator

Name

Andrea Essl

Affiliation

University of Bern

Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name

Frauke von Bieberstein

PI Affiliation

University of Bern

Contact Investigator

PI Name

Manuel Suter

PI Affiliation

University of Bern

Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status

In development

Start date

2021-01-15

End date

2022-08-31

Keywords

Behavior, Environment & Energy

Additional Keywords

Language, pro-environmental behavior, future tense

JEL code(s)

Secondary IDs

Abstract

Languages with a strong future-time reference (FTR) require speakers to grammatically mark future events (e.g. in English with “will” or “going to”), while others with a weak FTR do not (e.g. German). Previous research suggests that strong FTR languages make the future feel more distant than the present, implying that more short-term-oriented behavior occurs in areas such as saving and health. The aim of this research project is to examine the effect of the linguistic structure on individual pro-environmental behavior (PEB). In a between-subject online experiment, we will randomize the instructional language of the incentivized, environmental decision task among bilingual people who are fluent in the strong FTR language English and the weak FTR language German. We will elicit subjects’ pro-environmental behavior using a new incentivized decision task. This approach allows us to investigate whether there is a causal effect of a language’s FTR on individual PEB.

External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation

Essl, Andrea, Manuel Suter and Frauke von Bieberstein. 2021. "Language and pro-environmental behavior." AEA RCT Registry. May 05. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.7636-1.0

Sponsors & Partners

Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)

In a between-subject design, we will randomize the instructional language of the incentivized, environmental decision task among bilingual people who are fluent in the strong FTR language English and the weak FTR language German. In the strong FTR treatment, the environmental decision task will be described in English, using “will” to mark future events and to describe the impact of decisions on the environment. In the weak FTR treatment, subjects will receive a German description of the environmental decision task and no future time references will be used, i.e., all future events will be described in the present tense.

Intervention Start Date

2021-05-10

Intervention End Date

2021-06-15

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)

Amount of money invested in the environmental project; Pro-environmental behavioral intentions using a self-report Likert-type scale.

Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)

Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

In a between-subject online experiment, we will randomize the instructional language of the incentivized, environmental decision task among bilingual people who are fluent in the strong FTR language English and the weak FTR language German. We will elicit subjects’ pro-environmental behavior using a new incentivized decision task in which participants can decide between keeping money or investing money to an environmental project. Thus, this task consists of a decision tradeoff between own financial and environmental rewards. In the strong FTR treatment, the environmental decision task will be described in English, using “will” to mark future events and to describe the impact of decisions on the environment. In the weak FTR treatment, subjects will receive a German description of the environmental decision task and no future time references will be used. After the incentivized decision task, participants will complete a series of self-report scales on pro-environmental intentions, beliefs in climate change, general environmental views and answer demographic questions. In addition, all participants will be asked to take a language proficiency test for English and German.

Experimental Design Details

Randomization Method

computer (online experiment)

Randomization Unit

individual

Was the treatment clustered?

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters

The number of participants planned for the experiment is 824 people completing the study. We advertise for a minimum of 900 participants to take into account individuals excluded due to the restrictions below.

We will exclude subjects that:
- do not complete the Prolific task within 60 minutes of starting;
- exit and then re-enter the task as a new subject (as these individuals might see multiple treatments);
- are not approved for any other reason (e.g. not having a valid Prolific ID);
- do not pass the language proficiency tests
- failed crucial attention checks
- did not answer the control question correctly

In addition, and in line with previous research, we will analyze the data once with those who do not believe in climate change and once without them. The same approach is followed for those who do not believe in the positive impact of planting trees as climate change mitigation measure.

Sample size: planned number of observations

Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms

About 450 participants per treatment (about 412 participants per treatment after excluding participants as described above)

Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)

Based on a two-sided Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney test, an error probability of 0.05, and a power of 0.80, we require about 412 participants per treatment to detect an effect of Cohen’s d of 0.2.

Supporting Documents and Materials

IRB