Recently the concept of living green has turned out to be a very well-known topic in the media. The green sector of the economy is likely to be creating many new jobs for people and new, green energy sources are being looked at to replace old non-renewable fuels. However, what becomes effective or not in the brand-new Green Economy will be determined by consumers. To figure out what will succeed is to initially figure out exactly why people would want to go eco-friendly?

I sometimes try to ask myself this question and imagine why people do this. Well, I thought that most people that go green probably do so because they realise the effect we’re having on the environment. Or perhaps because they’re interested in the new green technology. The third reason I came up with was spending less, but in most cases being environmentally friendly can cost more (at least to start with).

However, even though they are virtually all sound reasons, in an article in the Wall Street Journal says that some basic research was done to find out what the trigger is to living green and it was not one of the answers above. The real contributing factor that gets people motivated to go earth-friendly is peer pressure. That’s all there is, simply plain old peer pressure.

Recently an experience was carried out where two placards were put into motel bathrooms. Both placards encouraged guests to reuse the shower towels instead of having it dispatched for cleaning. One placard had the sentence “Show your respect for nature.” The additional one said “Join your fellow guests in helping to spare the environment”. It proved that 75% of guests did follow the request to reuse the towels. But the card that received the best results was the second card stating to work with the other guests. In a follow up test, the second card was improved to read “75% of guests using this room reused their bathroom towels”. The modified placard got better returns than the original.

So as you have seen peer pressure worked in this situation, just as it truly does work in most situations in everyday life. It looks like just saying that one can help save the environment is not enough yet to say everyone is doing it will certainly cause people to do something.

This tiny experiment can help companies decide how they will start marketing their green products and solutions. That sense of guilt caused by peer pressure has quite a few people taking action consequently where they would not have accomplished anything otherwise. So the best option to market a green product is to make the consumer feel blameworthy for not doing it. It’s quite likely that companies may use a similar tactic done in the experiment.

On the whole I was surprised at the research project and its results. Still when I really think about it, it really not all that suprising. I guess men and women psychologically comply with what others do because it may be simpler or we simply don’t want to be known as different.

So that’s the real reason people would like to go green. While you’ll find people going green for authentic reasons, it’s a bit shocking that most would do it as a result of peer pressure.

How dedicated are you to sustainable renewable energy debated? Well, you will need to find out about ways to going green now if you mean it. Oops… you will be needing something else… sustainable renewable energy news.