Using episodic future thinking to improve climate decision making and action in organisations

背景和理由根据2022年《泰晤士报》的一项调查，英国66%的小企业从未寻求过如何减少碳足迹的信息。应对气候变化不积极的一个原因是心理距离。众所周知，时间上遥远和不确定的事件被认为价值不那么极端，因此没有完全包括在商业决策中。最近的一项荟萃分析(RöSch等人，2022年)表明，对未来可能经历的心理模拟(称为情节未来思维或EFT)会减少金钱和健康相关选择的折扣。此外，李在al.(2020)表明，参与EFT增加了与气候有关的风险认知和随后从事有利于环境的行为的倾向。与其他更抽象的未来思维形式不同，EFT引发了具体的心理表征，从而使原本难以捉摸的未来变得更加有形。EFT可以被用来想象积极的(例如，从实施缓解行动中获得的好处)或消极的未来(例如，与未缓解的气候变化相关的成本)。这项研究的目的这项研究将建立在现有工作的基础上，这些工作是作为加州大学心理学院的盖亚和卡斯特中心的一部分进行的，内容是组织如何做出决策和建立变革，以实现低碳转型。将确定和形成研究问题和方法，以审查利益攸关方如何构思未来，以及他们在气候变化方面塑造未来的能力。这将被用来确定EFT对企业承诺和实施可持续实践有什么影响。心理学院和K Sharp Ltd之间的合作将确保研究具有相关性，并直接传播到位于威尔士的企业，同时保持其方法和理论的完整性。可能的方法和设计该项目将采取多阶段的方法，使用来自社会/环境和认知心理学的方法。学生的第一年将被用来界定EFT作为组织决策和行动的推动力的适用性，并发展一篇文献综述，以提炼EFT的思想及其在气候人体工程学中的应用。这将被用来开发测试基于EFT的干预措施的有效性的方法，基于学生人口运行一项试点研究，并适当地改进干预措施。第二年将看到干预措施在目标人群中的应用，这将侧重于小企业，因为他们可能比大企业需要更多的支持和指导。这将需要数据捕获和动态可视化。第三年将寻求评估使用电子现金转账相对于当前方法的优缺点，以期确定它将与之合作的其他合适的利益攸关方群体，并使电子转账方法与这些群体合作。这个项目寻求快速应用，因此将寻求在整个项目中与关键利益攸关方接触，以确保它能够得到利用。这些利益相关者包括(但不限于)地方政府、威尔士政府、小企业联合会和威尔士航空航天公司。

Background and rationaleAccording to a 2022 Times survey, 66% of small businesses in the UK never sought information on how to reduce their carbon footprint. One reason for poor engagement with climate change is psychological distance. It is well established that temporally distant and uncertain events are perceived as less extreme in value, and are therefore not fully included in businesses decision making. A recent meta-analysis (Rösch et al., 2022) showed that mental simulations of likely future experience (known as Episodic Future Thinking or EFT) reduce discounting in monetary as well as health-related choices. In addition, Lee at al. (2020) demonstrated that engagement in EFT increases climate related risk-perception and subsequent tendencies to engage in pro-environmental behaviour. In contrast to other, more abstract forms of future thinking, EFT elicits concrete mental representations, and thus makes an otherwise elusive future more tangible. EFT can be used to imagine positive (e.g. benefits derived from having implemented mitigative action) or negative futures (e.g. costs associated with unmitigated climate change). Aim of the researchThe studentship will build on existing work conducted as part of the GAIA and CAST centres, both based at CU's School of Psychology, on how organisations make decisions and establish change to achieve a low-carbon transformation. Research questions and methodologies will be identified and shaped to examine how stakeholders conceive the future and their capacity to shape it with regards to climate change. This will be used to determine what influence EFT has on businesses commitment to and implementation of sustainable practices. The collaboration between the School of Psychology and K Sharp Ltd will ensure the research has relevance and is directly disseminated to businesses located in Wales, while maintaining its methodological and theoretical integrity. Possible methods and designThe project will take a multi-stage approach, using methods from both social/environmental and cognitive psychology. The first year of the studentship will be used to scope the applicability of EFT as a nudge for organisational decision-making and action as well as develop a literature review to refine the thinking and its application to climate ergonomics. This will be used to then develop methodology that will test the efficacy of an EFT based intervention, run a pilot study based on student population and refine the intervention appropriately. Year two will see the application of the intervention on the target cohort, this will focus on small businesses because they potentially need more support and guidance than large businesses. This will require data capture and dynamic visualisation. Year three will seek to evaluate the advantages/disadvantages of EFT use against current approaches with a view to determining other suitable stakeholder groups that it would work with and adapt the EFT approach to work with those groups. This project seeks rapid application, and therefore engagement with key stakeholders throughout the project will be sought to ensure it can be exploited. These stakeholders include (but are not restricted to) Local Government, Welsh Government, Federation of Small Business and Aerospace Wales.