IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ris/fcnwpa/2016_019.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Shall I Open the Window? An Experiment on Effort and Habits in Thermal-Comfort Adjustment Practices

Author

Listed:
  • Galassi, Veronica

    (E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN))

  • Madlener, Reinhard

    (E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN))

Abstract

Energy retrofits of residential dwellings, ceteris paribus, result in a new socio-technical system characterized by higher room temperatures. In the new environment, individuals might change their type of interaction with the building and exert a certain level of effort to adapt to the new comfort situation depending on their previous practices. In this paper, by means of a Discrete Choice Experiment conducted among 3,161 tenants and owner-occupiers in Germany, we investigate preferences for practices implemented to adjust thermal comfort in retrofitted buildings, thus attempting to reconcile rational choice with social practice theories. We focus on effort and habits but our models also account for the type of control over the room temperature, adjustment time, and clothing. Our results show that in the presence of an obstruction, like potted plants or other decorative paraphernalia, in the proximity of the interaction point with the system, respondents dislike exerting effort to fully open the window but would still make the effort to switch off the heating system. Moreover, respondents with more environmentally-friendly heating and ventilation habits particularly dislike tilting the windows rather than opening them wide; however, after the retrofit they tend to prefer wearing lighter clothes at home. By quantitatively measuring the impact of each factor in the decision-making process, we contribute to the ongoing rebound debate in the energy economics and social psychology literature alike.

Suggested Citation

  • Galassi, Veronica & Madlener, Reinhard, 2016. "Shall I Open the Window? An Experiment on Effort and Habits in Thermal-Comfort Adjustment Practices," FCN Working Papers 19/2016, E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN).
    • Handle: RePEc:ris:fcnwpa:2016_019
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.fcn.eonerc.rwth-aachen.de/global/show_document.asp?id=aaaaaaaaaaullrp
    File Function: Full text
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cornelissen, Gert & Pandelaere, Mario & Warlop, Luk & Dewitte, Siegfried, 2008. "Positive cueing: Promoting sustainable consumer behavior by cueing common environmental behaviors as environmental," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 46-55.
    2. Strengers, Yolande, 2012. "Peak electricity demand and social practice theories: Reframing the role of change agents in the energy sector," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 226-234.
    3. Sorrell, Steve & Dimitropoulos, John, 2008. "The rebound effect: Microeconomic definitions, limitations and extensions," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 65(3), pages 636-649, April.
    4. Achtnicht, Martin, 2011. "Do environmental benefits matter? Evidence from a choice experiment among house owners in Germany," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(11), pages 2191-2200, September.
    5. Poortinga, Wouter & Steg, Linda & Vlek, Charles & Wiersma, Gerwin, 2003. "Household preferences for energy-saving measures: A conjoint analysis," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 24(1), pages 49-64, February.
    6. Milne, Geoffrey & Boardman, Brenda, 2000. "Making cold homes warmer: the effect of energy efficiency improvements in low-income homes A report to the Energy Action Grants Agency Charitable Trust," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 28(6-7), pages 411-424, June.
    7. David Hensher & William Greene, 2003. "The Mixed Logit model: The state of practice," Transportation, Springer, vol. 30(2), pages 133-176, May.
    8. Kwak, So-Yoon & Yoo, Seung-Hoon & Kwak, Seung-Jun, 2010. "Valuing energy-saving measures in residential buildings: A choice experiment study," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 673-677, January.
    9. Maréchal, Kevin, 2010. "Not irrational but habitual: The importance of "behavioural lock-in" in energy consumption," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(5), pages 1104-1114, March.
    10. Denzil G. Fiebig & Michael P. Keane & Jordan Louviere & Nada Wasi, 2010. "The Generalized Multinomial Logit Model: Accounting for Scale and Coefficient Heterogeneity," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(3), pages 393-421, 05-06.
    11. Arne Risa Hole, 2007. "Fitting mixed logit models by using maximum simulated likelihood," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 7(3), pages 388-401, September.
    12. Yuanyuan Gu & Arne Risa Hole & Stephanie Knox, 2013. "Fitting the generalized multinomial logit model in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 13(2), pages 382-397, June.
    13. Galassi, Veronica & Madlener, Reinhard, 2016. "Some Like it Hot: The Role of Environmental Concern and Comfort Expectations in Energy Retrofit Decisions," FCN Working Papers 11/2016, E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN).
    14. Anna Alberini, Silvia Banfi, and Celine Ramseier, 2013. "Energy Efficiency Investments in the Home: Swiss Homeowners and Expectations about Future Energy Prices," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 0(Number 1).
    15. William Greene & David Hensher, 2010. "Does scale heterogeneity across individuals matter? An empirical assessment of alternative logit models," Transportation, Springer, vol. 37(3), pages 413-428, May.
    16. Corradi, Nicola & Priftis, Konstantinos & Jacucci, Giulio & Gamberini, Luciano, 2013. "Oops, I forgot the light on! The cognitive mechanisms supporting the execution of energy saving behaviors," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 88-96.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Galassi, Veronica & Madlener, Reinhard, 2017. "The Role of Environmental Concern and Comfort Expectations in Energy Retrofit Decisions," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 53-65.
    2. Galassi, Veronica & Madlener, Reinhard, 2016. "Some Like it Hot: The Role of Environmental Concern and Comfort Expectations in Energy Retrofit Decisions," FCN Working Papers 11/2016, E.ON Energy Research Center, Future Energy Consumer Needs and Behavior (FCN).
    3. Haile, Kaleab K. & Tirivayi, Nyasha & Tesfaye, Wondimagegn, 2019. "Farmers’ willingness to accept payments for ecosystem services on agricultural land: The case of climate-smart agroforestry in Ethiopia," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 39(C).
    4. Yuanyuan Gu & Richard Norman & Rosalie Viney, 2014. "Estimating Health State Utility Values From Discrete Choice Experiments—A Qaly Space Model Approach," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 23(9), pages 1098-1114, September.
    5. Ajayi, V. & Reiner, D., 2020. "Consumer Willingness to Pay for Reducing the Environmental Footprint of Green Plastics," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 20110, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    6. Achtnicht, Martin, 2011. "Do environmental benefits matter? Evidence from a choice experiment among house owners in Germany," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(11), pages 2191-2200, September.
    7. Irani, Alexandra & Chalak, Ali, 2015. "Harnessing motorists’ potential demand for hybrid-electric vehicles in Lebanon: Policy options, CO2 emissions reduction and welfare gains," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 42(C), pages 144-155.
    8. Fischbacher, Urs & Schudy, Simeon & Teyssier, Sabrina, 2021. "Heterogeneous preferences and investments in energy saving measures," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    9. Achtnicht, Martin & Madlener, Reinhard, 2014. "Factors influencing German house owners' preferences on energy retrofits," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 254-263.
    10. Dalia Streimikiene & Tomas Balezentis & Irena Alebaite, 2020. "Climate Change Mitigation in Households between Market Failures and Psychological Barriers," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-21, June.
    11. Feil, J.-H. & Anastassiadis, F. & Mußhoff, O. & Kasten, P., 2016. "Analysing Farmers’ Preferences fo Collaborative Arrangements: An Experimental Approach," Proceedings “Schriften der Gesellschaft für Wirtschafts- und Sozialwissenschaften des Landbaues e.V.”, German Association of Agricultural Economists (GEWISOLA), vol. 51, March.
    12. Arne Risa Hole & Hong Il Yoo, 2017. "The use of heuristic optimization algorithms to facilitate maximum simulated likelihood estimation of random parameter logit models," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series C, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 66(5), pages 997-1013, November.
    13. Andersson, Henrik & Ouvrard, Benjamin, 2023. "Priming and the value of a statistical life: A cross country comparison," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 104(C).
    14. Andersson, Henrik & Ouvrard, Benjamin, 2023. "Priming and the Value of a Statistical Life: A Cross Country Comparison," TSE Working Papers 23-1439, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    15. Bartczak, Anna, 2015. "The role of social and environmental attitudes in non-market valuation," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 50(C), pages 357-365.
    16. Arne Hole & Julie Kolstad, 2012. "Mixed logit estimation of willingness to pay distributions: a comparison of models in preference and WTP space using data from a health-related choice experiment," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 42(2), pages 445-469, April.
    17. Ju-Hee Kim & Younggew Kim & Seung-Hoon Yoo, 2021. "Using a choice experiment to explore the public willingness to pay for the impacts of improving energy efficiency of an apartment," Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, Springer, vol. 55(5), pages 1775-1793, October.
    18. Chen, Tiantian & Fu, Xiaowen & Hensher, David A. & Li, Zhi-Chun & Sze, N.N., 2022. "Air travel choice, online meeting and passenger heterogeneity – An international study on travellers’ preference during a pandemic," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 439-453.
    19. Kendel, Adnane & Lazaric, Nathalie & Maréchal, Kevin, 2017. "What do people ‘learn by looking’ at direct feedback on their energy consumption? Results of a field study in Southern France," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 593-605.
    20. Kailu Wang & Eliza Lai-Yi Wong & Amy Yuen-Kwan Wong & Annie Wai-Ling Cheung & Eng-Kiong Yeoh, 2022. "Preference of Older Adults for Flexibility in Service and Providers in Community-Based Social Care: A Discrete Choice Experiment," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(2), pages 1-13, January.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Social practice theory; Generalized mixed logit; Discrete choice experiment; Energy efficiency; Thermal comfort; Germany;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C25 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Discrete Regression and Qualitative Choice Models; Discrete Regressors; Proportions; Probabilities
    • C90 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - General
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • Q40 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - General
    • R20 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - Household Analysis - - - General

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ris:fcnwpa:2016_019. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Hendrik Schmitz (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/fceonde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.