- Title
- Rethinking the challenges to attaining sustainable cities and communities: lessons from social norms and status quo bias
- Creator
- Hammond, Samuel Fiifi; Gajendran, Thayaparan; Maund, Kim; Savage, David A.
- Relation
- WABER 2019 Conference. Proceedings of WABER 2019 Conference (Accra, Ghana 05-07 August, 2019) p. 894-906
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.33796/waberconference2019.64
- Publisher
- West Africa Built Environment Research (WABER) Conference
- Resource Type
- conference paper
- Date
- 2019
- Description
- There is widespread agreement among building construction stakeholders about the need to reduce the negative environmental impact of construction activities. Globally, a wide range of policies has been instituted by governments to encourage the adoption of sustainable (green) technologies and practices to help in the attainment of sustainable cities and communities. However, building construction stakeholders are unwilling to adopt it. Several studies continue to proffer that the reasons behind this unwillingness are lack of knowledge and awareness, lack of regulations and codes, lack of financial incentives, high upfront cost amongst others. On the other hand, this paper takes a Behavioural Economics perspective to explain why there is a misalignment between the high-level consensus for the attainment of sustainable cities and communities, and the willingness of building construction stakeholders to adopt the sustainable (green) technologies and practices which can help in the attainment of this goal. The paper sought to identify the ‘elements’ that can impact building construction stakeholders’ decision-making and bring about the tendency for them to prefer non- adoption to adoption. It was found that two elements, social norms and status quo bias, can impact building construction stakeholder’s decision-making, and thus, two propositions were put forward. The aim of this paper was accomplished through a literature review. For policy-making, by explaining how social norms and status quo bias impact building construction stakeholders’ decision-making in the context of green construction adoption, we make a case for the need to supplement existing policy mechanisms to make them more effective or employ more innovative policy tools. Theoretically, this paper provides a basis for welcoming the Behavioural Economics perspective into Construction Management research. In terms of further studies, there is the need for empirical investigations to be carried out to support, refute or modify the findings of this paper. Also, further research can be undertaken along the Behavioural Economics perspective to find the factors taken into account in the decision-making.
- Subject
- barriers; behavioural economics; decision-making; green construction; sustainable construction; sustainable development
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1460118
- Identifier
- uon:45865
- Identifier
- ISBN:9789988260101
- Language
- eng
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