
‘Nudging’ for sustainable behaviors on college campuses

SEAS students in Professor Victoria Campbell-Arvai's Choice Architecture for Sustainability class created a how-to guide for the use of choice architecture to promote sustainability on college campuses. Choice architecture, or nudging, is a way of framing a decision-maker’s environment to help them make decisions that better align with the decision that their deep-thinking system would choose. Tony Gardella, Julie Hassen, Desmond Kirwan, Andriana Miljanic, Jaklyn Nunga, and Alex Serwer authored the report, "How to Effectively Nudge for Sustainable Behaviors on College Campuses," during the winter 2020 semester.
"There are a number of different choice architecture strategies that can be effective to nudge people to make more sustainable decisions," the authors wrote. "The framework [in this guide] outlines specific ways in which organizations, such as the University of Michigan, can design successful choice architecture interventions to promote sustainability. We hope that other organizations can apply this framework to design interventions."