Wipe more, wash less

When it comes to reusing towels in hotels, social pressure affects more than green values

By Marina Krakowski

Most hotel guests have probably come across a sign in the bathroom asking them to help protect the environment by reusing towels. The day-to-day laundry in a large hotel consumes millions of liters of water a year, and the soap and electricity also charge a high price. However, a new study shows that appealing to people's "green" conscience is not the most effective way to convince them how to wipe clean.

In the experiments, the results of which ultimately confirmed the long-standing claim of experts in persuasion methods, the researchers led by Noah Goldstein, now at the University of California, Los Angeles, placed two types of polished signs: one displaying the usual environmental message, and another reporting that most of the other guests had reused in towels "This is one of the oldest marketing exercises," says Goldstein, citing the many studies that have shown that in situations of uncertainty, people tend to follow the herd. Indeed, as the researchers describe in the October 2008 issue of the Journal of Consumer Research, the social message was 25% more effective than the usual environmental message. In a subsequent study, Goldstein's team examined slight changes in the social message and reached even more impressive results: when guests were told that those who had previously stayed in the same room had reused towels, this had a greater effect than when they were told that other guests in the same hotel had done so - even though The rooms were the same.

Experienced travelers understand that hotels save on laundry costs if guests reuse towels, so the appeal to environmental conscience may seem hypocritical. After all, the hotel could have decided to return this money to the guests. However, one of the problems with such financial incentives is logistical: According to the American Hotel and Lodging Association, tracking the number of towels reused in each room can be difficult. But there is also a greater difficulty than that: Goldstein fears that if the financial incentives are not high enough, they may achieve the opposite goal.

This is the idea of ​​"motivation crowding", a theory that predicts that financial incentives push aside the urge to do things for other reasons. "Sex is a good example," says Uri Gnazi, an economist at the University of California, San Diego, who studies the impact of incentives. When trying to initiate sexual contact, the other party may agree or reject the initiative, but if you offer to add ten dollars to the deal, you will definitely be rejected. "When you bring money into the picture, you completely change the meaning of the conversation," explains Ganizi. "Instead of friendly relations, where we are simply nice to each other, we get reciprocal relations based on exchange." In a study that is often cited, Ganizi found that after Israeli kindergartens in Haifa began imposing a fine of ten shekels on parents who were late picking up their children, the number of lates actually increased because the parents saw the fine as the price of being late. Ganisi says that similarly, a $XNUMX discount for guests who reuse towels will make them think that "for the price of a dollar, I can already get clean towels." Of course, a sufficiently high incentive would encourage reuse, but the cost to the hotel would be too high.

It is estimated that the reuse of towels varies between 35% and 75%, depending on how the rate of reuse is measured. In order to increase reuse, Genizy suggests that hotels not involve money in the matter, but prove their sincerity by donating to environmental causes. However, Goldstein warns that conditions should not be placed on these donations. His research team found that the hotel's promise to make a donation in exchange for reusing towels did not encourage guests to do so, but when hotels informed guests that the donation had already been paid, reuse increased by 45%. The feeling of reciprocity, Goldstein believes, is what pushed many guests to be more "green" as well.