Episode 77
Behavioral Science Meets the Energy Transition, with Gerdien de Vries, Associate Professor at TU Delft
Ever wondered why we react the way we do to change, especially when it comes to the big stuff like sustainability and the energy transition?
Well, today we're diving into that very topic with our guest, Gerdien de Vries, an expert in climate psychology from TU Delft.
We’ll explore why some people are all in for new energy solutions while others dig in their heels. We'll break down psychological concepts like cognitive dissonance and social identity, revealing how they shape our responses to new energy projects and technologies.
Plus, we'll discuss how our livelihoods impact our openness to change, making it clear that understanding these dynamics is crucial for fostering real progress.
Takeaways:
- Understanding why we react differently to change is crucial, especially in sustainability contexts.
- Psychological concepts like cognitive dissonance can explain our resistance to necessary changes.
- Social identity plays a big role in how we perceive and accept new energy technologies.
- Communication is key in overcoming public resistance to sustainable energy projects.
- Life events often propel us to change when we otherwise might stick to the status quo.
- Engaging people from diverse backgrounds fosters understanding and can lead to effective climate action.
Links referenced in this episode:
Transcript
Have you ever thought about why you react the way you do when it comes to change?
Speaker A:Especially change related to sustainability, climate and the energy transition?
Speaker A:The topics that we discuss in this season of the podcast.
Speaker A:Some embrace change, eager to adopt new solutions, while others resist, sometimes fiercely.
Speaker A:Is it simply a matter of personal values, or does it go deeper?
Speaker A:In today's episode, we're diving into the fascinating world where psychology meets the energy transition.
Speaker A:My guest is Herlene de Vries, an associate professor at TU Delft and director of the Energy Transition Lab.
Speaker A:She specializes in climate psychology, studying how human behavior influences our ability or inability to make sustainable choices.
Speaker A:We'll unpack key psychological concepts like cognitive dissonance, social identity, and why change often feels so hard, even when we know it's necessary.
Speaker A:We'll also explore why new energy projects, like wind and geothermal, for instance, sometimes spark intense opposition, and how people's livelihoods shape their willingness to accept new realities.
Speaker A:If you ever wondered why some people hold on to old systems, why others are quick to adapt, and most importantly, how we can encourage real change, you should definitely keep listening.
Speaker A:So let's get into it.
Speaker A:Welcome to Stories for the Future, a podcast bringing excitement and optimism for what's ahead.
Speaker A:In this season, we're exploring the energy transition, breaking down walls and bringing people together.
Speaker A:We're going to chat with all sorts of people, from veterans from the oil and gas sector to passionate climate innovators.
Speaker A:I'm Weslulmei Klavnesparge, your guide on this journey.
Speaker A:And as I like to say, we'll try on different shoes with the aim to understand more and judge less.
Speaker A:Let's begin.
Speaker A:Welcome to Stories for the.
Speaker A:I will let you introduce yourself so we can get the correct pronunciation of your name.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah, my name is Gerdine de Vries.
Speaker B:It's a typical Dutch name.
Speaker B:And yeah, before we talked about this, we said already indeed that our parents didn't foresee an international career for us.
Speaker B:So we have both difficult names for people abroad.
Speaker B:But yeah, I'm an associate professor at University of Technology in Delft in.
Speaker B:In the Netherlands and I'm a social psychology by psychologist by training.
Speaker B:So I did a PhD in psychology and behavioral science elsewhere in the Netherlands and after I got my.
Speaker B:My PhD title, I.
Speaker B:I came here at this university.
Speaker B:I really wanted to make the switch from the micro perspective that psychologists have towards a more applied perspective that's is being taken here at the university because I really wanted to use the expertise and knowledge and the things that you learn as a psychologist to use that in this environment to apply it to making energy technologies and energy policy better and learn a lot also from the engineers here.
Speaker B:And I'm here Now for almost 10 years and I'm really, yeah, I'm really integrating.
Speaker B:Well, in the beginning, there are not so many psychologists here.
Speaker B:So in the beginning it was a bit looking for ways to collaborate.
Speaker B:But now more and more you see also in different faculties, people working on energy technologies that they really see the value of working together with social scientists and especially in my case, behavioral scientists.
Speaker B:So yeah, and I also lead with one of my colleagues an energy transition lab where we collaborate also with social scientists to accelerate the energy transition.
Speaker B:So yeah, I can give a lot of examples of the research that we are doing, but perhaps during the contrast I can do that.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker A:And I think that when I first found you, I think that energy transition lab and psychology, behavior change and the energy transition, that is like the topics are so interesting for this season of my podcast.
Speaker A:So why do you think that you ended up with, like you mentioned it, you wanted to work on more like hands on.
Speaker A:But why energy transition, do you think?
Speaker B:Yeah, so it's partly coincidence because when I did my master in psychology, there was a position in a big consortium, a big research consortium on CO2 capture and storage technology in the Netherlands.
Speaker B:It was a really big project with a lot of researchers.
Speaker B:So when this position opened, I was really attracted to it also because it was in a collaboration with different universities and it was really multidisciplinary.
Speaker B:So I like that.
Speaker B:And the topic that I applied to was on framing.
Speaker B:So how communication from the oil and energy of the oil and gas industry is being framed or is their perspective are being taken and what are the effects of that?
Speaker B:So I really wanted to look in that and I found the combination of an applied topic, technology, ccs and also the communication and psychology part of that.
Speaker B:Really interesting.
Speaker B:So I did during my PhD research on how communication from these types of industries impact the perceptions of the public about not only the industries themselves, but also the technologies.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:Could you share a little bit about that?
Speaker A:Because I think I read that you, you work on how does people react to new like changes in the like new types of energy, for instance, geothermal or wind, or new in your neighborhood or in your area.
Speaker A:And why is it, do you think that people or that often creates so much controversy and it's so heated often.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So a part of my research still is going into the direction of social acceptance and public perceptions.
Speaker B:Not all behavioral science or behavioral research that we do is towards that, that direction.
Speaker B:But the work that we do, we still see that often the resistance is not towards the technology itself, but it's more about the process of how the technology is being implemented.
Speaker B:So for ccs, for instance, we had a pilot project in the Netherlands that CO2 would be stored under like an area where people were living actually, so a built environment.
Speaker B:And there were a lot of people were resisting that, not because they didn't like the technology of storing CO2, but more about that they had the idea that the national government had made some agreements already with the industry to do that and did not really include their voices.
Speaker B:So often when we see resistance, it's more about the process than about the technology itself.
Speaker B:So yeah, we do a lot of research towards that also for technologies that are in a very early stage of development.
Speaker B:So we work together with the engineers to already try to assess the evaluations of people of the technology.
Speaker B:And then of course, that would also help to maybe make some tweaks to the technology itself to make it better suitable in a specific environment.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:And I guess it always comes down to communication.
Speaker B:Yes, definitely.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:We now have started a big European project on theothermal energy where we are going to assess local culture and also local beliefs and specifics about the area that a theatermal project would be built and to see how that feeds into the acceptance of these projects.
Speaker B:Because yeah, we, we already saw in earlier research that sometimes the people that are going to start with a project don't.
Speaker B:Don't realize that maybe the, like the ground is valuable for people in one sense or the other or there is a history with the specific area that people have that the people that are coming the first time to drill, for instance, or the big companies that are coming to.
Speaker B:To build a bigger site don't know.
Speaker B:So they do often of course like a quick scan maybe to see what the regulations are or like those kinds of things.
Speaker B:But the social temperature or the sentiment that is somewhere is also very important because if there's already a history of.
Speaker B:For instance, we saw that in one particular area that there was already a lot of trains running through the area that had poisons, poisoned or whatever, dangerous materials.
Speaker B:That's also important to know because these people already think that are at risk in one area and then if they have the idea, okay, they are trying to build now a lot of other stuff in our area and we feel as if we don't matter and that if there is something happens.
Speaker B:Yeah, to us that they don't.
Speaker B:That the industries don't care Then you get resistance.
Speaker B:But you would know that if you do a proper analysis of the area.
Speaker A:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker A:So I have told you before that with this season of the podcast, I try to build some bridges between people inside and outside the oil and gas industry.
Speaker A:And I have heard you talk about social identity and the way that we're so influenced by the people that surround us.
Speaker A:And I, I can see this so clearly for myself, like when I worked in, in that industry and when I, when I'm not.
Speaker A:So how do you see that play a role in the energy transition and those complex changes that we have to make?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So social identity is a psychological phenomenon that you really feel strongly towards the people that are like you.
Speaker B:So if you share an identity with people, for instance, in your family or your work environment or your neighborhoods, you feel that also the things that these other people think, their opinions and what they do and how they behave, that's.
Speaker B:Yeah, that reflects on you, that you also want to behave like that because you feel safe in that, in that, in that group.
Speaker B:So there's a difference between the people in that in group, as we call it, and people who are outside that group.
Speaker B:So the out group.
Speaker B:So what you can definitely get if you work in a specific environment is that your working environment and the opinions and ideas become your in group.
Speaker B:And the ideas that are in that group are very strong for you.
Speaker B:And even if there are some opinions that you have, like medium, that your medium share, it could be that because you have other people in your group that have stronger opinions can also influence you because you also want to feel part of that group.
Speaker B:So that could be that your opinions about certain things shift towards a more extreme end.
Speaker B:That's also how polarization works, because a lot of people have like, like medium opinions.
Speaker B:They're in the middle somewhere.
Speaker B:They are not very strongly to the one end or the other end.
Speaker B:But then if you are in this in group and the in group is very important to you, then you can move to a stronger opinion.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:So that that's could be how.
Speaker B:How it works with how safe you feel or how much you are influenced by the working environment.
Speaker B:So as you explained that you then move maybe from the one environment to the other and you are becoming part of what was formerly your out group and now is becoming your in group.
Speaker B:And you feel that you identify with that group and that identification grows, then the opinions of that group also grow strongly.
Speaker B:And that makes also maybe possible for you to shift how you think about things.
Speaker B:But there are other things, mechanisms that work well, because of course also when you are in a certain group or in group or a bubble, for instance, on social media, there are also algorithms that work that you get the information that is shared within that group.
Speaker B:So you're also not.
Speaker B:How do you say that?
Speaker B:You, you don't see or you don't read the other information from the out group.
Speaker B:So you're also not influenced by that.
Speaker B:So that's.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Strengthens the polarization.
Speaker B:So and, and, but you can also think of social identity that it also can make us stronger if you, if you realize that your identity is also maybe on a different level.
Speaker B:Because if, if I always give the example of football match, if you have a national competition, you might identify with your local like soccer team from the city that you live in and then you're really against the other city that like in, in the Netherlands we have Ajax and Feyenoord, the, the club from Amsterdam and a club from Rotterdam.
Speaker B:And people are either for Ajax or for Feyenoord.
Speaker B:But when there's an international competition, there are the world championships, then we are for the Netherlands, our Orange Lions.
Speaker B:And then we strongly identify with the Dutch soccer team.
Speaker B:And then it doesn't matter at all if there are people, players from Feyen or Ajax, we like them all.
Speaker B:And so your social identity in your in group can change depending on the context and the situation that you're in.
Speaker B:So you could also say as people that live on Earth, we are the habitants of Earth, we have a shared identity.
Speaker B:And I always find that interesting that, that it's very difficult for us to take that perspective.
Speaker B:But we are all on the same boat.
Speaker B:So you can think of your.
Speaker B:Especially when it's.
Speaker B:When it goes about climate change, of course, and global warming, we don't I think, have the luxury to think about what group you are in.
Speaker B:Or we have a shared problem, which is that the environment that we live on, which is very small, if you take that from a broad perspective of the whole galaxy, then Earth is only one little ball.
Speaker B:Then if we would meet people from Mars or from Venus or from Saturnus, I think the social identity of Earth habitants would be grow very fastly and we will unite more strongly than we do now.
Speaker B:But it's really difficult for us to get that perspective of being responsible for Earth.
Speaker B:So the.
Speaker B:Yeah, maybe to just wrap it up here then the in group and out group of maybe the oil and gas industry and climate activists or something is also not really useful.
Speaker B:It's better if we could unite.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:And have the same challenges yeah.
Speaker A:And that was really an interesting way to look at it, because I was going to ask you if you needed to, in order to get a different perspective, do you need to leave your in group and join another group?
Speaker A:But actually it would be better to just widen your perspective and see that.
Speaker A:You can see we have a common identity as Earthlings and we have a common enemy in a way, which is climate change.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And that in itself is also very difficult because the enemy is also.
Speaker B:That's us.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So we are doing it.
Speaker B:So it's.
Speaker B:I read a nice book that the writer, the author really said that.
Speaker B:Well, he said the thing with climate change is that there is no villain and there is no hero because there's no, like, starting point and no ending point, which makes it so difficult for us to grasp it and also to feel responsible for it.
Speaker B:But indeed, what is happening already, global warming is the enemy.
Speaker B:But then, yeah, we have to realize that.
Speaker B:That we are also the persons who created it that way.
Speaker B:And so we also have to solve it, which makes it psychologically very challenging to realize that.
Speaker A:Yes, I think this also goes very well to my next question or next topic, which is cognitive bias.
Speaker A:I've had people on the podcast who work inside the industry still and have heard that, for instance, the narrative that they.
Speaker A:The stories that they tell themselves inside the industry is changing based on kind of external factors, like, for instance, the war in Ukraine and insecurity when it comes to energy in Europe, for instance.
Speaker A:So suddenly you can see yourself as more as a kind of a hero because, oh, yes, we're providing energy or gas to Europe.
Speaker A:So.
Speaker A:So this is a really important thing that we're doing.
Speaker A:And that is right, of course, in a way.
Speaker A:So how does this affect people, do you think, the kind of the stories we tell ourselves and how is it possible to change it to a more useful story, perhaps a more useful narrative?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So I think the beautiful thing of our brain is that it's very good in making up stories to smooth anything that might create a tension.
Speaker B:So if you have maybe a tension between what you are doing and what you think you want to do.
Speaker B:So that's cognitive dissonance that you have.
Speaker B:A dissonance.
Speaker A:Yeah, dissonance was the word.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Then.
Speaker B:And there's so.
Speaker B:So let's take the example of you want to quit smoking, but you don't, because you still are smoking, then your brain is very good in trying to rationalize your current behavior because it's so difficult to change that behavior.
Speaker B:It says, okay, well, it's not that bad.
Speaker B:My grand grandparents also smoked and became very old, so it could not be that bad.
Speaker B:So especially if you have that tension, the brain is very strong in coming up automatically.
Speaker B:You cannot really manage that with some mechanisms to make it okay for you that you still doing that behavior.
Speaker B:So these narratives are functional in a sense that it help people to do what they are doing.
Speaker B:And yeah, so, so for instance, the, the licensing, the moral licensing part could be okay, people might say that what we are doing might be harmful, but we, we still do it because there's a reason for it.
Speaker B:In this case there's a shortage of, of gas.
Speaker B:And yeah, so, so these narratives are very difficult to change because they are created by the brain automatically to yeah, say why it's good for you to do that.
Speaker B:And in a sense it protects you also.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:And, and it's, it's not, it doesn't mean that you are doing something that you don't want to do, but it, it is always good to think about why you come up with these arguments or with these reasons or narratives.
Speaker B:So if, if you talk to people who are working in industry and actually feel like a, this cognitive dissonance because they think okay, I, maybe I should do a little bit more for the environment and what I do now is maybe not helping, that might be a signal for people that they might not be in the right space.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:But if you really are aware of these mechanisms and think about okay, I, I can make a change where I am because I, I, I actually also believe that, that a lot of people in oil and gas industry can make a change.
Speaker B:They can also make things more sustainable in where they are at.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:So, so that, that's, then the argument is also really that you do what you like and that you also feel that the behavior that you want to, to have is in line with what you do.
Speaker B:So there is no cognitive dissonance then, then it's just okay, I want to make a change.
Speaker B:I'm in this particular industry and I will make the change.
Speaker A:So you said that the cognitive or how we change either our thoughts about what we do or we change our situation, that protects us in a way.
Speaker A:So what does it do to us if we constantly go around with this dissonance for a long period of time?
Speaker A:Is that something that, does it do something to us like mentally or physically?
Speaker B:Yeah, actually I'm not an expert on that because that probably goes more into the clinical psychology.
Speaker B:But, but, but what I know from it is that it creates a kind of tension.
Speaker B:So it creates a kind of stress.
Speaker B:And I can imagine that that will burden you.
Speaker B:So if you are, I think, yeah, you can imagine yourself if you have, if you want to change something in your own behavior, like small behavior, like going more to the gym or eating more healthily or whatever, like the normal resolutions that people have with when the new year starts.
Speaker B:You always feel a little bit bad about yourself if you don't manage to keep up with that behavior.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So you really want to change something and you really have the intention and the motivation and the knowledge and also the resources.
Speaker B:And then in the end, after two or three months, you start stopping going to the gym and eating less healthy again, then you feel a bit bad or guilty.
Speaker B:So these feelings are not really pleasant.
Speaker B:So then if you have a strong, like the arguments in your head, so your brain is taking over and indeed change your thoughts about it and say, okay, it's not that bad.
Speaker B:If you eat hamburgers every day or not going to the gym, then it probably doesn't really bother you that much.
Speaker B:But if you still think that you should do that other behavior, then that's.
Speaker B:There's a constant process going on in the back of your head so that you are not doing what you want to do.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:But yeah, having said that, it's really, really difficult because the, the.
Speaker B:Yeah, I sometimes give the example of taking short showers.
Speaker B:I was at a conference last week about water management.
Speaker B:And then you could say we have to be more conscious about our water use, so it's better to take short showers.
Speaker B:But then I'm not sure how it is in your country, but here it's very cold, rainy, dark.
Speaker A:Yes, yes.
Speaker A:Too old.
Speaker B:And yeah, we are living in a country where everybody takes the bike.
Speaker B:So if you have been on the bike for 40 minutes and you get home wet, cold and depressed because it's so dark, then it's really nice to take a long bath or a long shower.
Speaker B:And then it's so hard to overcome your own behavior, your own, like meats.
Speaker B:And you really, your motivation needs to be very strong.
Speaker B:Then if you can convince yourself, okay, only three minutes shower and yeah, preferably cold.
Speaker B:So that's changing your behavior and balancing your motivations and things that you really want against the real world and what's happening there and your need for comfort and your need for safety and all these things is really difficult.
Speaker A:Yeah, I have a.
Speaker A:This is a little bit kind of unpleasant question because.
Speaker A:Because it's.
Speaker A:It doesn't say anything good about us as people because I Wonder if is it like it's more motivating for us to do something.
Speaker A:So talking about the shower, if you, if you learned that.
Speaker A:So I do this myself.
Speaker A:That it's what that is why I ask, I do this cold showers because I heard and read that it makes you.
Speaker A:It does something which is healthy to your body.
Speaker A:So I do it kind of from egoistic motivation.
Speaker A:Instead of thinking about when I do that cold shower, I'm not thinking about the climate or kind of the whole world.
Speaker A:So are we often more motivated when it's some kind of egoistic thing behind it, do you think?
Speaker B:Yeah, maybe I.
Speaker B:Maybe I should not call it egoistic because for.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So different motivations accounting for different people.
Speaker B:So some people who are really, really motivated, for instance, to change the climate, you could say there.
Speaker B:Sustainable behavior is also egoistic because it helps them to feel better, right?
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:And it taps into a core value.
Speaker B:So these core values might be different for different people.
Speaker B:So yeah, you could say demonstrating climate activism.
Speaker B:Some people also call that egoistic.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Because it bothers other people.
Speaker B:But in a sense you could say, yeah, it's a collective goal.
Speaker B:So these people don't do that for nothing.
Speaker B:They do that also for.
Speaker B:For Earth.
Speaker B:But yeah, in a sense they also do it, you could say for.
Speaker B:To tap into their own motivations.
Speaker B:So there are a lot of different values.
Speaker B:So maybe for you, the value of staying healthy or maybe living there longer also for your family, which makes it less egoistic.
Speaker B:Right, Right.
Speaker B:You can use that as a.
Speaker B:I can.
Speaker B:But we see for, for instance, that often with sustainable behavior, money is a very important behavior driver.
Speaker B:So you could say a lot about motivations.
Speaker B:But in the end, when, for instance, the gas price was rising in the Netherlands a couple of years ago, very much then it became so expensive to heat the house, for instance, 221 degrees, that everybody tried to.
Speaker B:To.
Speaker B:To lower their temperature in the house.
Speaker B:And now a lot of people are used to 19 degrees or even 18 degrees.
Speaker B:And there were already campaigns also from the government, but the campaigns didn't.
Speaker B:Were not as effective as the price rise.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So that money is very important driver.
Speaker B:So in that sense, yeah, we are as humans, sensitive for prices, money, comfort, safety, all these different things.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:But for some people, the motivation is really that they want to do something for Earth, for us, as behavioral scientists, very important to know what drives people.
Speaker B:And it also makes it difficult to give advice on measures because the target group really is directing what measure works.
Speaker B:For instance, if foreign.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:A behavior change.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:It's different to motivate a group of very like rich people in a very posh city to, to make sustainable investments in their houses versus social housing in a city where people are not owning their own apartments but renting it, for instance.
Speaker B:These are different groups of people with could both people could be motivated to do something about sustainability and both people can find money important, but it's in a different way maybe.
Speaker B:So that asks for different measures.
Speaker A:And then you also have then the kind of then what they call maybe the neighbor effect or something that when you see just your neighbor putting up solar, solar on their roof, that oh, maybe I should do that.
Speaker A:And if you think, could you think about that in a larger context?
Speaker A:So going back to the oil and gas industry, for instance, I always think that, okay, we're talking about big companies, big entities like organizations, but they still consist of people.
Speaker A:So could you have, do you see any kind of this contamination effect in a way when some companies do something which is, oh, maybe we should do that too.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Or is it too hard?
Speaker B:I don't have exact examples, I think of where what company did that.
Speaker B:But of course you can imagine that these decision makers at these companies know each other and see what other people are doing.
Speaker B:So indeed, what you call the neighbor effect, it's called the social norm.
Speaker B:So if a norm exists in an in group, for instance, your social identity you share with your neighbors, you feel that you are a bit the same and you see that if they can do the solar panels and buy them and install them, maybe you are also capable of doing that.
Speaker B:So that could indeed work the same for a CEO of an oil company that can see, okay, there's maybe another country, a company which takes a different direction or makes other decisions.
Speaker B:If they see that these companies can also pull that off and that there's maybe a CEO who makes a very bold decision to change their strategy or to change their sustainable goals, then that could have like a trickle down effect also on the other companies and it sets a norm maybe for the industry.
Speaker B:Okay, this is maybe the direction that we, that we could do.
Speaker B:But yeah, if you don't feel that these other people are a bit similar to you and you don't feel that as a social norm that you could also do the opposite.
Speaker B:So it is important then that you that there might be some recognition between these organizations.
Speaker A:Yeah, right.
Speaker A:So in my podcast, and this is for all the seasons, I've talked to a lot of different people who in some way went through some change.
Speaker A:And it's really Interesting to see when people.
Speaker A:And I guess this goes for society as well.
Speaker A:There's some triggering event.
Speaker A:It could be that you lose your job like I did.
Speaker A:It could be illness, it could be a divorce, a move, anything.
Speaker A:Or for society, maybe a natural disaster or a war.
Speaker A:So why is it, you think, so easy for us to keep going as just as normal and business as usual when things are kind of just okay.
Speaker A:It's okay.
Speaker A:You feel it's maybe not perfect, but it's okay.
Speaker A:So just continue as before.
Speaker A:So why do we need these kind of.
Speaker A:These life quakes in a way to make a change?
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So people are very.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:In Dutch, we have an expression.
Speaker B:It's a.
Speaker B:It's a.
Speaker B:It's a habit.
Speaker B:Animals.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Like the translation.
Speaker B:So we are.
Speaker B:We.
Speaker B:Habits are strong drivers for us.
Speaker B:So what we are used to do, we like.
Speaker B:We don't like change.
Speaker B:And.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And a bias that's connected to that is the status quo bias.
Speaker B:We like to keep things as they are because we know, we know that situation.
Speaker B:Every other new situation comes with new events, with unknowns, with.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Unpredictable events, maybe.
Speaker B:So it's.
Speaker B:And also a thing that we do research on is hassle.
Speaker B:So changing also comes with like, hassle or effort.
Speaker B:Things that you need to change.
Speaker B:Finding a new job for, for instance, or changing your environment.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Needs you to do something like.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Like.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:You have to look things up or make requirements, whatever.
Speaker B:So there's a lot of effort in that.
Speaker B:So.
Speaker B:And if you don't change your situation and leave it as it is, it's easier in your daily life.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So, yeah, my, my idea on that would be that if you already have this life quake, your life is already like upside down.
Speaker B:There is so much already changing that the idea of, I like things as they are, let's keep it that way.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:That's already not the case.
Speaker B:So that could also be a moment that you change your environment.
Speaker B:And there might be, of course, a lot of other issues because some people also stay in a certain industry, maybe because their parents are in that.
Speaker B:So when the parents are not there anymore, it might be the moment to change careers because you don't feel that you have to live up to expectations of others.
Speaker B:And in another sense, it also can also be that if you have a very big life event, for instance, the death of a spouse or whatever, that keeping your work environment the same could be very useful for you because there's already changing so much that you think, okay, that's the reason why I don't Want to change my career yet.
Speaker B:So there's no one, I think, explanation, but there are a lot of psychological mechanisms that could be in place why people change their environment when something else happens.
Speaker B:But if you are just okay in your environment and you are not really crying when you go to work and it pays you and you can get the bills and the rest of your life is also fine.
Speaker B:Um, yeah.
Speaker B:Then it's really hard to motivate yourself.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:To change.
Speaker A:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker A:And on that note, I, I had in another episode I, I read out this quote that my guest had included in her thesis and it says, it goes like this.
Speaker A:It is.
Speaker A:It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.
Speaker A:This is by Upton Sinclair and I think that was so good and related to the oil and gas industry.
Speaker A:And I really, really empathize with that.
Speaker A:Like it is when you feel that something like your threatens your livelihood or your normal life, it is very hard to, to make the change or to even agree in a way.
Speaker B:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:And some people don't have the luxury so to do that.
Speaker B:Because if you really motivated maybe to work in a different industry or a different area, but you need the money to pay your mortgage or to feed your family, then it's very hard to also explain or give in to yourself that you might not feel at place there.
Speaker B:So we also talk to policymakers sometimes who have to make for instance, policies depending on the political color of that moment.
Speaker B:So we have a system in the Netherlands that are.
Speaker B:We have different political parties that are in the power.
Speaker B:So at the moment it's a very different political color.
Speaker B:And a lot of European countries have this.
Speaker B:It's a political color is different than it was before.
Speaker B:But a lot of policymakers working at ministries making decisions about climate or energy.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Have to deal with different changing colors.
Speaker B:And so I often also discuss this with them.
Speaker B:So do you sometimes then feel that you have to make decisions based on a different idea that you would personally have?
Speaker B:And how do you feel about that?
Speaker B:Because that could also give this tension in your brain.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:That you have to make it policy that is aligned with the political color but not with your personal political flavor.
Speaker B:And yeah, if you are really depending on your job and you like what you do, then yeah, it's very hard to say, okay, I'm going to quit my job and I'm not going to work for this specific ministry anymore because I don't feel like that.
Speaker B:Especially because your brain has these automatic processes that will give you all kinds of arguments why it's okay to stay there and that you can make a change and that you can work around and.
Speaker B:Yeah, so, so it's, it's.
Speaker B:Yeah, for a lot of people maybe making that change to, to quit an industry or to quit a job is a very big step.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Yes, I have a very like time relevant question.
Speaker A:I'm just wondering a lot about, you know, the, the situation with the fires in California at the moment as we speak.
Speaker A:Very horrible situation.
Speaker A:So looking at that, how close to our faces do you think that like climate change has to be in order for, for many of us, I guess, but for some more than others to wake up and do you think that that situation there is a wake up call for more people or is it just you will going back to the cognitive dissonance again?
Speaker A:Like do you just change your views or explain it with something else still?
Speaker A:How close does it have to be?
Speaker B:Yeah, so it's difficult to make that a specific number.
Speaker B:But what we see and also we saw that in the Netherlands, we had like floods in the south of the Netherlands a while ago.
Speaker B:And yeah, it's especially if you're in a situation that you cannot move, for instance, the situation is as it is, a lot of people cannot make the decision to say okay, I'm moving to another country or I'm what to move to safer area.
Speaker B:So you're stuck to where you are.
Speaker B:So you have to deal with the fact that in your area maybe these things are happening.
Speaker B:That makes it very difficult to accept that, to accept for yourself that you are in danger.
Speaker B:So the protection of your brain then will make it indeed easier for you to say, okay, the south of the Netherlands, that's far away or Los Angeles, that's really far away.
Speaker B:And it's because yeah, they have a lot of roots and it's dry.
Speaker B:It's not like the Netherlands or it's not like Europe.
Speaker B:It's a, it's easy for your brain to yeah.
Speaker B:Wave that away and to make it less worse for us.
Speaker B:But having said that, we also know that, that some people are very sensitive.
Speaker B:So it's also depends also on, on the person that some people are really, really worried when they see these images on television or on, on the Internet and really feel.
Speaker B:So maybe these are the people who feel more identified with Earth.
Speaker B:They think, okay, it's really close by, it's Earth.
Speaker B:And we know that it could be maybe next stop could be our houses.
Speaker B:So that also is really different and difficult to say.
Speaker B:But I think a General idea is that it needs to be very close by and very relevant and personal.
Speaker B:And maybe your own family members have to suffer before you realize, okay, this is really a danger.
Speaker B:That could be a danger for myself.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And as we can see also, I think we are now talking about climate change, but there are other things happening in the world.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:There's hunger and there's war and.
Speaker A:Absolutely.
Speaker B:People are very good in looking away and don't feel responsible.
Speaker B:And yeah, you can sometimes, if you're really trying to rationalize it and you know that there are so many very rich people who take a private jet to have lunch somewhere, and on the other side of the earth, there are people who cannot have lunch because there's no food.
Speaker B:Then it's sometimes really difficult for me as a psychologist to try to get that and say, how is it possible that we can live like that?
Speaker B:But that's.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:Is how our brain works.
Speaker B:And we are indeed egoistic.
Speaker B:What you said in the beginning.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:We.
Speaker B:We also have a responsibility to ourselves that we survive and that our family survives.
Speaker B:And that's how we are programmed.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:So, yeah, it is hard.
Speaker B:And I also really feel that we need to change our behavior more system changes, that some things need to be like, more expensive than other things, and that we have to also need some help as people.
Speaker B:We cannot really rely on our motivations alone.
Speaker B:We also need some help with regulations and laws to steer our behavior.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker A:And also, like when you say this, we're so complex.
Speaker A:We humans are so complex.
Speaker A:And when we make these changes, we need to kind of work with our.
Speaker A:Our brains in mind and understand how we react to certain.
Speaker A:To things and to changes.
Speaker A:And so your job is so important.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And then on the other end, it's also frustrating because we know a lot, but we also cannot give all the answers.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker B:So we cannot really predict behavior or I cannot say in this situation, person A will also respond like this, like this.
Speaker B:It really depends always on contextual factors, on personal factors like what people have experienced, their own ideas, their expectations.
Speaker B:So it's often really difficult to give advice also on national policymakers because people indeed are so complex.
Speaker B:But it is a challenge also for us to keep on working and finding out these behavioral patterns and knowing more about these automatisms, these mechanisms that take place in your brain so that we at least can understand why we act irrational or strange.
Speaker B:Right?
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker A:Yes, I think it's so interesting.
Speaker A:So, but finally, what are your hopes for the coming decade when it comes to the energy transition?
Speaker A:Where we started.
Speaker B:Yeah, I hope, and that's maybe on my personal and also my job related.
Speaker B:I hope that indeed behavioral sciences are a part of the normal mix of things that people take into account when they are making innovations or making policy or take decisions.
Speaker B:Because I think, yeah, as we said that, that behavioral science is very important and I think it also has taken a like a sprint for the, over the past years to be taken into account.
Speaker B:But, but I hope that more and more so not only the policymakers on, in governments, but also the decision makers in for instance, the oil and energy industry, but also the climate activists and whatever organizations take into account that we already know a lot about why people act as they do and the factors that influence it.
Speaker B:So yeah, and I think that is mostly what I, what I hope.
Speaker B:I could also hope for instance for world peace and climate change, whatever.
Speaker B:But yeah, that's, that's, I think in my, in my profession I really am curious also to these behavioral patterns.
Speaker B:I'm as interested in people who have a very strong motivation to reduce climate change as the people who are, who do not believe that climate change is happening.
Speaker B:That's also very interesting.
Speaker B:And we also need to know why these people think like that.
Speaker A:Yes.
Speaker B:So, yeah, very long answer.
Speaker B:And what do you hope for the next decade?
Speaker A:Yeah, but I agree with you.
Speaker A:I hope that we think more about these things.
Speaker A:And I also one big hope for me is that we get more like the bridges again.
Speaker A:I hope that people from the different, what I call bubbles or in groups, out groups talk with each other because today I see there's some fences that are really high and if we don't talk, we don't understand each other.
Speaker A:So that I guess is my big hope.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker B:And I think knowing these things that there are in groups and out groups and how they are created and that we can also maybe help to create an overarching social identity that people find each other maybe in a different identity.
Speaker B:Yes, could really help.
Speaker B:But sometimes it's just about awareness that people realize that they are part of a bubble and that it probably.
Speaker B:Yeah, that keeps you in a bubble because of your automatic processes in your brains.
Speaker B:But if you give it some extra thoughts that you might realize, okay, let's take that extra step to move outside of my bubble and go to the other bubble and see, okay, how do we connect?
Speaker B:I think that's always necessary in polarized situations that you try to find common ground.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Because there might be, and I believe there's always, there will always be some common ground between People who are polarized.
Speaker A:Yeah.
Speaker B:Because we indeed share a planet and we share being human.
Speaker B:Right.
Speaker A:So, yeah, yeah.
Speaker B:A lot to a lot of things.
Speaker A:That we have in common as well.
Speaker A:Yes, absolutely.
Speaker A:I agree.
Speaker A:So where can people follow your work or even get in touch with you if they.
Speaker B:Well, if they are interested in my work, I'm on LinkedIn, so social media where I post a lot about my work, also in English.
Speaker B:And that's also maybe the best way to reach out to me.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B:LinkedIn Do Khedin Devries Tu Delft.
Speaker B:So you can also google my name and Tu Delft you will find my email address and my profile page and the research that we do.
Speaker B:So if you're interested in what I do, all my work is there.
Speaker B:So you can also read the articles and the work that we do and if you have any other issues or things to reach out, please do.
Speaker B:Yeah, I really like that I was on your podcast.
Speaker B:Yeah.
Speaker A:Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker A:It's been so interesting and as I said earlier, we could have talked for hours, I'm sure.
Speaker A:And it's such an interesting topic.
Speaker A:So thank you so much for your time.
Speaker B:Yeah, you're very welcome.
Speaker A:Well, wasn't that interesting?
Speaker A:I think so.
Speaker A:And I often say that if I were to choose my line of work or studies over again, I think psychology and behavior science would be really, really high up on the list.
Speaker A:What an exciting topic.
Speaker A:As always, all the links and information will be in the show notes.
Speaker A:And in addition to that, I I have started sharing a post for each episode on my new substack.
Speaker A:So that is now actually the easiest way to get noticed.
Speaker A:When there's a new episode out, go to vklavens.substack.com that is VK L A V E N E S.substack.com and you will get all the info plus everything else I'm sharing on Substack.
Speaker A:I will be back in in two weeks.
Speaker A:Thanks for listening and take care.
