Behaviour Change Wheel Driven Normative Feedback in a Serious Game for Energy Conservation

Abstract

Existing energy conservation interventions provide feedback in the form of graphs and numbers. There is a need for more persuasive and theoretically informed interventions in order to bring about a greater conservation effect. Using the Behaviour Change Wheel (BCW) systematic method of intervention design, we designed a mobile phone game which uses normative feedback as a behaviour change technique to promote energy conservation. This paper describes an application of the BCW method to the energy domain and presents the design of Energy Explorer—a serious game with the purpose of promoting positive energy conservation behaviours in the home—that incorporates meaningful reference groups, average player community score, and normative leaderboards.