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Nudging and Environmental Corporate Responsibility: A Natural Experiment

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Abstract

We devise a ‘nudging’ natural experiment to test the impact of a simple form of advertising on environmentally responsible products with/without the increase of the responsible product price. We find that the simple use of a small shelf-poster explaining the importance of buying a green product (with/without a concurring price increase) generates significant changes in market shares for some of the product classes for both food and non-food products. Part of the effect is generated by the reduced price elasticity of consumers to the poster-plus-price-increase treatment.

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  • Leonardo Becchetti & Francesco Salustri & Pasquale Scaramozzino, 2018. "Nudging and Environmental Corporate Responsibility: A Natural Experiment," CEIS Research Paper 426, Tor Vergata University, CEIS, revised 03 Apr 2018.
    • Handle: RePEc:rtv:ceisrp:426
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    nudging; environmental sustainability; randomised field experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C93 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Field Experiments
    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • M14 - Business Administration and Business Economics; Marketing; Accounting; Personnel Economics - - Business Administration - - - Corporate Culture; Diversity; Social Responsibility
    • Q56 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Environment and Development; Environment and Trade; Sustainability; Environmental Accounts and Accounting; Environmental Equity; Population Growth

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