Methodological Challenges of Research in Nudging

Complex societal issues, related to health and sustainability, provide major challenges to scientists, business managers, and policy makers alike. Despite their diversity, these issues have in common that effective solutions to public health (e.g., reducing prevalence of overweight and obesity) and environmental degradation (e.g., reducing pollution and household level waste), as well as social inequality issues (e.g., working conditions of primary producers in developing and emerging countries) critically depend on initiatives of companies but certainly, and probably even more so, on behavioral change on the part of end consumers. Mobilizing commitment of and actual demand from end consumers, in the end, is the “oil in the machinery” needed to move markets into a more healthful and sustainable direction (Van Trijp & Fischer, 2010). Unfortunately, despite societal urgency, there is not a strong track record to build on regarding the success of previous efforts to change consumer behavior “for the better.” Notwithstanding considerable policy attention, such approaches have not been particularly successful, as for example exemplified by the fact that no country in the world has been able to reverse the obesity epidemic (Roberto et al., 2015).