Aligning theory and measurement in behavioral models of water conservation

Water Policy ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 762-776 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bradley S. Jorgensen ◽  
John F. Martin ◽  
Meryl W. Pearce ◽  
Eileen M. Willis
Keyword(s):  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Behavioral Intentions ◽  
Habit Strength ◽  
Behavioral Models ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Single Person ◽  
Consumption Data ◽  
Household Water

Discussion in the water literature has called for research on the role of behavioral intentions in explanations of both water demand and water conservation. But previous research has suggested that individual-level motivations are not good predictors of metered household water consumption. Two possible reasons for the lack of association between intentions and actual water conservation are that: (i) conservation behaviors are habitual and (ii) conservation behaviors and intention are measured at different levels of analysis. These explanations were tested in a sample of 415 residential households who provided permission to access their water consumption billing records. The effects of intentions, habit strength, and their interaction were examined in single-person households where the alignment of theory and measurement were the same. While behavioral intentions were associated with self-reports of past water conservation and habit strength, none of these variables were good predictors of water conservation. The implications of these results for the development of attitude theory using metered consumption data are discussed.

Understanding urban residential end uses of water

2011 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shirley Gato-Trinidad ◽  
Niranjali Jayasuriya ◽  
Peter Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Water Usage ◽  
Single Family ◽  
Washing Machines ◽  
Consumption Data ◽  
Household Water ◽  
Family Home ◽  
End Use ◽  
End Uses

The ‘end use’ of water is a breakdown of the total household water usage such as water used for toilets, showers, washing machines, taps, lawn watering, etc. Understanding end uses of water will enable water planners, water authorities and household owners determine where water is used/wasted, how much and how often. This paper describes the end uses of water from a number of single-family homes in Greater Melbourne, Australia. The study involves the analysis of water consumption data recorded at 5-s intervals from logged households collected by Yarra Valley Water in Melbourne in 2004. The study determines how much water is used for outdoor and indoor purposes in a single-family home in Melbourne and compares the water usage during winter and summer. Hourly patterns of major end uses of water are also developed. The aim of this study is to improve the understanding of the end uses of water and to assist where to focus water conservation efforts that would be most effective financially and environmentally, and be acceptable to everyone.

How Trust and Risk Perception Affect Household Water Use

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raymond Yu Wang ◽  
Xiaofeng Liu
Keyword(s):  
Risk Perception ◽  
Water Use ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Tap Water ◽  
Demand Management ◽  
Management Strategies ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Recycled Water ◽  
Household Water

Household water use accounts for an important portion of water consumption. Notably, different households may behave differently regarding how water is used in everyday life. Trust and risk perception are two significant psychological factors that influence water use behavior in households. Since trust and risk perception are malleable and subject to construction, they are useful for developing effective demand management strategies and water conservation policies. The concepts of trust and risk perception are multidimensional and interconnected. Risk perception varies across social groups and is often shaped by subjective feelings toward a variety of activities, events, and technologies. Risk perception is also mediated by trust, which involves a positive expectation of an individual, an organization, and/or an institution that derives from complex processes, characteristics, and competence. Likewise, different social groups’ trust in various entities involved in household water use is subject to the significant and far-reaching impact of risk perception. The complexity of the two notions poses challenges to the measurement and exploration of their effects on household water use. In many cases, risk perception and trust can influence people’s acceptance of water sources (e.g., tap water, bottled water, recycled water, and desalinated water) and their conservation behavior (e.g., installing water-saving technologies and reducing water consumption) in household water use. Trust can affect household water use indirectly through its influence on risk perception. Moreover, trust and risk perception in household water use are neither given nor fixed; rather, they are dynamically determined by external, internal, and informational factors. A coherent, stable, transparent, and fair social and institutional structure is conducive to building trust. However, trust and risk perception differ among groups with diverse household and/or individual demographic, economic, social, and cultural characteristics. Direct information from personal experiences and, more importantly, indirect information from one’s social network, as well as from mass media and social media, play an increasingly important role in the formation and evolution of trust and risk perception, bringing a profound impact on household water use in an era of information. Future directions lie in new dynamics of risk perception and trust in the era of information explosion, the coevolution mechanism of risk perception and trust in household water use, the nuanced impacts of different types of risks (e.g., controllable and uncontrollable) on household water use, and the interactive relations of risk perception and trust across geographical contexts.

Predicting Household Water Consumption With Individual-Level Variables

2013 ◽  
Vol 46 (7) ◽  
pp. 872-897 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bradley S. Jorgensen ◽  
John F. Martin ◽  
Meryl W. Pearce ◽  
Eileen M. Willis
Keyword(s):  
Water Consumption ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Household Water

A methodology for synthetic household water consumption data generation

2018 ◽  
Vol 100 ◽  
pp. 48-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dimitris T. Kofinas ◽  
Alexandra Spyropoulou ◽  
Chrysi S. Laspidou
Keyword(s):  
Water Consumption ◽  
Data Generation ◽  
Consumption Data ◽  
Household Water

scholarly journals Barriers and opportunities for behavior change in managing high water demand in water scarce Indigenous communities: an Australian perspective

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 765-773
Author(s):  
Safaa Aldirawi ◽  
Regina Souter ◽  
Cara D. Beal
Keyword(s):  
Behavior Change ◽  
Water Use ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Water Demand ◽  
Indigenous Communities ◽  
High Water ◽  
Indigenous Community ◽  
Water Users ◽  
Household Water

Abstract Managing water demand by reducing water consumption and improving water use efficiency has become essential for ensuring water security. This research aimed to identify the primary determinants of household water consumption in an Australian Indigenous community to develop evidence-based water demand management policies and strategies that might be implemented by the water service provider. A behavior change framework was applied to investigate the opportunity, ability, and motivational determinants affecting household water consumption and conservation in an Australian Indigenous community. The lack of water conservation knowledge and skills of high water users could be barriers to saving water. Low water users have positive attitudes towards water conservation and a higher level of awareness about their own water use. While there is a lack of a belief that water shortages will occur, low water users do have concerns of vulnerability to droughts, and that could be a driver for their sense of obligation to engage in water conservation practices. The research recommended communication messages and tools to address identified barriers to enabling positive changes to water use behaviors, which have wider applications in remote Australian Indigenous communities.

scholarly journals Social Norms Based Eco-Feedback for Household Water Consumption

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (5) ◽  
pp. 2796
Author(s):  
Ukasha Ramli
Keyword(s):  
Social Norms ◽  
Field Experiment ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Scarcity ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
Habit Formation ◽  
Sustainable Consumption ◽  
Feedback Intervention ◽  
Household Water ◽  
The World

Physical water scarcity is a growing threat to people’s lives around the world. Non-pecuniary interventions that encourage water conservation amongst households are an effective tool to promote sustainable consumption. In a randomised field experiment on 3461 UK households, a social norms based eco-feedback intervention was found to reduce water consumption by around 5.43 L a day or by 1.8% over 29 months. This effect did not persist for the 10 months after the intervention was stopped suggesting a lack of habit formation. Unlike previous studies, households with low consumption at baseline reduced their consumption the most, while high consumers did not. Heterogeneity was also found across quantile treatment effects, where households in the top and bottom quantiles increased their consumption. These results further contribute to the growing evidence on the effectiveness of combining social norms and eco-feedback as an intervention for conservation.

scholarly journals Quantifying the impact of the COVID-19 lockdown on household water consumption patterns in England

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Halidu Abu-Bakar ◽  
Leon Williams ◽  
Stephen H. Hallett
Keyword(s):  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Demand ◽  
Demand Forecasting ◽  
Consumption Patterns ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Research Directions ◽  
Consumption Data ◽  
Household Water ◽  
Future Research Directions ◽  
The Impact

AbstractThe COVID-19 lockdown has instigated significant changes in household behaviours across a variety of categories including water consumption, which in the south and east regions of England is at an all-time high. We analysed water consumption data from 11,528 households over 20 weeks from January 2020, revealing clusters of households with distinctive temporal patterns. We present a data-driven household water consumer segmentation characterising households’ unique consumption patterns and we demonstrate how the understanding of the impact of these patterns of behaviour on network demand during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown can improve the accuracy of demand forecasting. Our results highlight those groupings with the highest and lowest impact on water demand across the network, revealing a significant quantifiable change in water consumption patterns during the COVID-19 lockdown period. The implications of the study to urban water demand forecasting strategies are discussed, along with proposed future research directions.

scholarly journals PERAN PEREMPUAN DALAM KONSERVASI AIR RUMAH TANGGA

2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 73
Author(s):  
Aulia Rohendi ◽  
Chairan M. Nur
Keyword(s):  
Water Conservation ◽  
Behavioural Change ◽  
Environmental Issues ◽  
Household Behavior ◽  
Women's Associations ◽  
Household Water ◽  
Role Of Women ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Village

The availability of world freshwater that can be used by humans is very small in number compared with many people's estimates, especially for those living in regions with abundant of water. Water conservation should be done according to Islamic advice, then considering other users' water needs, maintaining water quality, saving energy, and considering increasing water demand as per population growth. Prior to the scarcity and water damage, water conservation needs to be done in non-domestic and domestic / household levels. Household water conservation can be done through behavioural change and technological change. This study focuses on changes in household behavior in water conservation related to the role of women. A qualitative approach is applied in this study by conducting interviews with resource persons who play a significant role in environmental issues and some are housewives. The results show that household water conservation can be done in simple and easy ways, for example by monitoring water use by children, choosing water-saving ways of gardening, washing clothes at once, and so on. The role of women in household water conservation is significant because women are the main users of water and women can educate children early on. The government is expected to arrange strategies to promote water conservation on a household scale by educating and disseminating it to women's associations at the village level.Keywords : 

scholarly journals What roles do smart sensors play in citizens' water use? From the perspective of household water-saving

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kang Tian ◽  
Zhuo Chen
Keyword(s):  
Water Use ◽  
Water Consumption ◽  
Water Conservation ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Water Saving ◽  
Smart Sensors ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Behavioural Intervention ◽  
Household Water ◽  
The Impact

Abstract The rapid population growth has led to increasing demand for water resources. Studies have shown that the application of new technologies can effectively influence and promote citizens to save water. The application of smart water sensors can effectively monitor household water consumption and feedback the recorded data to citizens promptly, thereby influencing family members' water-saving attitudes and behaviours. For the widespread use of future water sensors in households, it can demonstrate its essential role in three aspects: water use information feedback to reduce water consumption, water information measurement helps to cultivate water conservation awareness, and water use information release as an effective means of behavioural intervention. This research provides some suggestions for the promotion and use of smart sensors in the home and points out the future research directions for the impact of water sensing on household water-saving behaviour.

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