Looking beyond the hype: conditions affecting the promise of behaviour change apps as social innovations for low-carbon transitions

Panel: 2. Efficiency and beyond: innovative energy demand policies

Authors:
Devon Wemyss, ZHAW Zurich University of Applied Sciences, Switzerland
Francesca Cellina, Institute for Applied Sustainability to the Built Environment, University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland, Switzerland
Manuel Grieder, Faculty of Economics, UniDistance Suisse, Switzerland

Abstract

Digital tools, specifically smartphone apps, have emerged as enablers of social innovation for the transition to low-carbon societies by using novel data to creatively engage people to act more sustainably, and thus capture the power of collective individual action. Such apps have increasingly been adopted and in real-world experiments have shown their positive impact in the short-term. Despite many studies assessing their behaviour change effectiveness, to our knowledge behaviour change apps have not been looked at through a transformative social innovation lens. A systematic cost-benefit analysis as a policy measure and the contextual conditions that affect their social innovation, namely their capability to support a collective change in carbon emitting practices, have rarely been analysed. Indeed, the rapid uptake of apps may be a hype that does not fulfil expectations, and if not addressed can lead to premature rejection of the technology.

Thus critical reflection is required to look beyond this hype to understand the conditions for longer term impact. We performed a cost-benefit analysis to assess the break-even point in number of users of two behaviour change apps to achieve net-positive impact and discuss relevant technical, organisational, political and financial conditions that enable or impede this impact. These contextual details are often lacking in reporting on intervention effectiveness, even when the experiment is well documented and strict scientific assessment procedures are followed. However, these details are critical to development and scale-up of behaviour change apps, and thus cannot be backgrounded when discussing impact and ultimately deciding whether to invest resources in them, compared to other possible policy interventions. Particularly, the comparison between the costs associated with the apps’ development and maintenance and the climate benefits they deliver, is a relevant support for policymaking: if the benefits delivered by these apps are lower than the costs associated with their development and maintenance over time, relying on them as tools to support the energy and climate transition would at least be questionable.

The break-even number of users resulting from the cost-benefit analysis necessitates very significant scale up efforts: approx. 140 – 1,900 times the numbers of participants in the two cases analysed. Such scale up efforts come at a cost, which we did not include in our analysis. Achieving such user numbers appears feasible, as several similar apps were able to achieve considerable app downloads. For instance, GoodGuide, an app providing environmental and ethical information on household products, had over 400,000 downloads one year after the company’s formation. And the H2020 project ENCHANT is working on behaviour change interventions, potentially involving smartphone apps, targeting up to 10 million households in six countries.

Our assessment highlights several dilemmas and opportunities for capturing the real transition potential of social innovation. We have revealed several weaknesses in the technical, organisational, political, and financial contexts which limit wide scale-up of the use of the apps, as well as in the scope and conception of the apps to develop long-term financially viable business models, beyond the typical short-lived experiments. We find that the required scale-up in users seems challenging, yet feasible. However, guaranteeing that the supportive conditions are available is vital for the relevance of behaviour change apps as policy interventions.

Understanding which specific conditions can enable or impede the large-scale transformative potential of an app can support the decision about the development of tools, as well as help to innovate for the “long game” of behaviour change, in order to identify viable business models and obtain the suitable (government or other) support that ensures higher chances for the needed long-term scale-up.