"You can't scare people into getting fit or going green" says the Economic and Social Research Council. No word on if you can scare people into voting Republican. No rebuttle from the Catholic church or Jewish mothers, either.
The team identified 33 distinct strategies for changing intentions and behaviour across the 129 different studies. The most frequently used strategies provided general information, details of consequences and opportunities for comparison. Yet the most effective strategies were to prompt practice, set specific goals, generate self-talk, agree a behavioural contract and prompt review of behavioural goals. The two least effective strategies involved arousing fear and causing people to regret if they acted in a particular fashion.
Gee whiz, sounds like all that metrics stuff - "What you can't measure, you can't manage" might be true after all.
Actually, I'm not sure how they got from the most effective strategy for a personal trainer to you can't scare people into adopting your position. I guess it 's the difference between you can't scare people into actually doing something about the environment but it's easy to get them to pay lip service to the environment, you know people who natter on about what you can do while doing nothing themselves.
