G4
Business
KLMNO
SUNDAY, JULY 18, 2010
Moral licensing, or why it’s not easy staying green
green from G1
eyebrows as Hummers pull up to his environmentally sensitive ap- pliance store, Eco-Green Living, near the nuclear-free zone of Ta- koma Park. From a theoretical perspective, the research has shown that “it’s like we can withdraw from our moral bank accounts,” Monin said. “It’s a lens through which you see the rest of your behavior. But it may not even be conscious.” This seemingly contradictory
behavior is all around us, but it is probably most apparent, and easy to lampoon, in the greening of America. University of Toronto behavior- al marketing professor Nina Ma- zar showed in a recent study that people who bought green prod- ucts were more likely to cheat and steal than those who bought con- ventional products. One of Ma- zar’s experiments invited partici- pants to shop either at online stores that carry mainly green products or mainly conventional products. Then they played a game that allowed them to cheat to make more money. The shop- pers from the green store were more dishonest than those at the conventional store, which brought them higher earnings in the game. “People do not make decisions
BILL O’LEARY/THE WASHINGTON POST
“There are so many contradictions in today’s world, especially when it comes to green issues,” said Keith Ware, owner of Eco-Green Living, an environmentally sensitive appliance store in the District.
in a vacuum; their decisions are embedded in a history of behav- iors,” Mazar wrote, with co-au- thor Chen-Bo Zhong. “Purchasing green products may license in- dulgence in self-interested and unethical behaviors.” Local home-appliance and building contractors who special- ize in green products see exam- ples of such indulgence almost ev- ery day. They have begun to warn customers that installing green products in their homes does not give them license to overcon- sume: Don’t run the plasma TV all night just because you put so- lar panels on your roof; don’t take endless showers because your wa- ter is heated off the grid; don’t do more loads of laundry because your machine is energy-efficient. There is ample reason for such warnings.
“Subconsciously, I think this is just part of human nature. It’s like, ‘If I just do a little, I’m off the hook and my conscious is
clear.’ ” — Jason Holstine, Amicus Green Building Center
Lucas Davis, an energy econo-
mist at the University of Califor- nia, Berkeley, has published a study showing that after getting high-efficiency washers, con- sumers increased clothes wash- ing by nearly 6 percent. Other studies show that people leave en- ergy-efficient lights on longer. A recent study by the Shelton Group, which advocates for sus- tainable consumer choices, showed that of 500 people who had greened their homes, a third saw no reduction in bills. “Subconsciously, I think this is just part of human nature,” said Jason Holstine, owner of Amicus Green Building Center in the Kensington. “It’s like, ‘If I just do a little, I’m off the hook and my con- scious is clear. Give me a pat on the back, and thank you very much.’ Then it goes too far.” “They think, ‘I’m being a good person, I can do more of this stuff and still come out ahead,’ ” said Frank Zeman, director of the Cen- ter for Metropolitan Sustainabil- ity at New York Institute of Tech- nology. “Although the problem is that they will never come out ahead. This goes to the heart of the sustainability challenge.” But for luxury retailers, this be-
havior is often a boon. Uzma Khan, a marketing professor at Stanford who studies the psychol- ogy of buying, once asked study participants to choose between buying a vacuum cleaner or de- signer jeans. Participants who were asked to imagine having committed a virtuous act before
shopping were significantly more likely to choose jeans than those not thinking of themselves as vir- tuous. “That’s the amazing thing here:
People don’t even have to do good for this effect to happen,” Khan said. “Even if they plan to do something good, it will give them a boost in their self-image. Any type of situation where you have guilt involved, you will see this, and so this happens in luxury goods.”
And neither the customer nor
the retailer could know it’s hap- pening. Moral licensing behavior ex- tends, in a different way, into di- eting. Khan showed in a study last year that people ate more chocolate while drinking Diet Coke than while drinking more, sugary fare. Dietitians in the re- gion report all sorts of odd justifi- cations from clients eating bad food while trying to lose weight. Rovenia Brock, a District dieti- tian, says she has clients keep a food and activity diary because it is the only way for them to see that ordering a diet soda at Mc- Donald’s is slowing their prog- ress.
Without the diary, “it’s helter-
skelter and their behavior will be all over the place,” Brock said. “It’s like spaghetti on the wall.” When they write down their behavior, the inequitable trade-offs come into full view — if they don’t lie. Many clients, uncomfortable with seeing the truth revealed in their diary, simply leave it out, she said. Brock said she sympathizes with clients who engage in moral licensing. It turns out that she’s not so different from them. All her diet counseling apparently makes it easier for her to decide to gulp down a pint of Haagen- Dazs banana split ice cream. “I feel like I deserve to have it,” she said. “I know I’m gonna work out, work it off, blah, blah, blah. It starts out with a cup, and then lat- er on I can hear it calling me from the freezer. One scoop turns into another. Like my clients, if I pick up the pint and put in a spoon, I’m done. That’s my goose cooked, royally.”
rosenwaldm@washpost.com
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